Sift wins India’s first gold at World Cup
New Delhi, April 5
Indian shooter Sift Kaur Samra produced a sensational come-from-behind performance to win her first individual ISSF World Cup gold medal in the women’s 50m rifle 3 positions final in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
The 23-year-old from Faridkot thus earned India its first gold of the season-opening World Cup stage event late on Friday. The world record holder was a huge 7.2 points behind Anita Mangold of Germany after 15 shots in the kneeling position. However, she staged a dream comeback in the prone and standing positions to win by a canter in the end.
Sift finished with 458.6 points at the end of the 45-shot final, while Mangold ended 3.3 points behind on 455.3. Junior World Championship medallist Arina Altukhova of Kazakhstan was third, bowing out after the 44th shot with a tally of 445.9.
India are second in the standings with a gold and a bronze, won in the men’s 3 positions by Chain Singh. China are on top with a gold and a silver.
Sift did extremely well to qualify in top spot with a strong 590, while the likes of reigning Olympics champion Chiara Leone and former Olympics champion Nina Christen, both from Switzerland, could not make the top-eight. A host of Olympics medallists like Alexandria Le of Kazakhstan and Mary Tucker of the US also could not cross the qualifying hurdle.
Competing in a stellar field, Sift could not penetrate the 10-ring to begin with and ended the kneeling position almost out of reckoning. She then found her rhythm in her favourite prone position and by the end of it, brought the gap down with the leader, now Nele Stark, to about 4.3, but still remained in eighth place. A classy 52.3 in the first series of five standing shots when all struggled saw her shoot up to joint third and she never looked back from there. A steady second series of 51.2 saw her take the lead for the first time and as the leaderboard shuffled furiously below her she finished with scores of 10.5, 10.3, 10.5, 10.0 and 9.7 for a clinical performance.
Four rounds of qualification were played in the men’s and women’s skeet competitions, with Paris Olympian Raiza Dhillon emerging as the best Indian at this stage. One more round of 25 targets will be held followed by the final. Raiza is placed sixth, the final qualifying spot, with a tally of 94 after rounds of 25, 22, 24 and 23 and was just two off the lead. Ganemat Sekhon was in 11th with 92, while Darshna Rathore (89) was further down in 18th.
In men’s skeet, Bhavtegh Gill shot 94 to be in 18th spot, while Anant Jeet Singh Naruka shot 93 and Gurjoat Khangura 91 and the trio will have their task cut out.
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