Shooters falter to end outside medals; Koreans nail gold

 Indian shooters endured their first dry day of the Asian Games with Harpreet Singh missing out on a final berth by one place here on Wednesday.

Having led the country’s charge with one gold and five bronze so far, a few more was expected from the Ongnyeon International Range on the fifth day of the competition but it was not to be as all of them fired blanks.

The day was most disappointing for Harpreet, who failed to make the final cut for the 25M Rapid Fire Pistol with a terrible display in the final set of 10 shots in each stage.

In the first stage, after firing 98 and 99, he shot 93 and the pattern followed in the second stage too, another 93 in the final attempt following efforts of 98 and 97 that cost him a place in the final, leaving him disappointed.

His poor final series had a strong bearing in the team championship as well, India finishing tied fourth on 1704 with Vietnam missing out on a bronze after finding just 39x — inner ten — as compared to 41x registered by the Vietnamese shooters. 

Gurpreet Singh and Pemba Tamang were the other members of the Indian team, and a team medal seemed to be there for the taking in this event,to add to the Indian tally.

The women shooters fared worse with Raj Chaudhary (22nd), Lajja Gauswami (25th) and Tejaswini Muley (36) coming a cropper in the 50M Rifle Prone event. India finished 11th in the team event.

Meanwhile, Korea’s Kim Jun-Hong won the gold in the rapid fire pistol  defeating China’s Zhang Jian. Another Chinese, Hu Haozhe, claimed the bronze.



Results: Men: 25M Rapid Fire Pistol: Individual: Kim Jun-Hong (Kor) 1; Zhang Jian (Chn) 2; Hu Haozhe (Chn) 3.

 Team: Korea (1747) 1; China (1746) 2; Vietnam (1704, 41x) 3. India (Hapreet Singh, Gurpreet Singh, Pemba Tamang) 1704 (39x), 3.

Women:

50M Rifle Prone: Individual: Naratunya Chuluunbadrakh (Mgl) 624.1, 1; Suryani Binti (Mas) 620.6, 2; Bitna Eum (Kor) 620.6, 3. Team: Korea (1855.5) 1; China (1854.1) 2; Malaysia (1853.6) 3. India (Raj Chaudhary, Lajja Gauswami, Tejaswini Muley) 1837.1, 11.