Shooting: Parth Rakesh Mane wins double gold medal at Lima Junior Worlds
Lima (Uttam Hindu News): Parth Rakesh Mane won the title of Junior World Champion by winning individual gold medal in 10 meter air rifle and gold medal in team event. This match took place in the International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) Junior World Championship.
After winning the 10m Air Rifle individual title, Parth also won the gold medal in the men’s 10m Air Rifle team event along with Ajay Malik and Abhinav Shaw. India also got its third gold when Gautami Bhanot, Shambhavi Kshirsagar and Anushka Thakur won the 10m air rifle in the junior women’s team event.
But the biggest achievement of the day was that of 16 year old Parth Mane. He performed brilliantly and scored 250.7 points in the 24-shot final, surpassing reigning Junior Asian champion Huang Liwanlin of China by 0.7 points.
Also, America’s Brayden Peiser won the bronze medal, while Paris Olympics silver medalist Victor Lindgren of Sweden finished fourth. Reigning double junior world champion Roman Auffrere finished sixth.
India’s other shooters, Ajay Malik and 15-year-old Abhinav Shaw finished fifth and seventh respectively. Ajay lost to Lindgren in the shoot-off with 186.7 points, while Abhinav finished seventh with 144.2 points.
In the qualification round of the first 62 competitors, Ajay stood second (628.8), Parth stood fourth (627.7) and Abhinav stood sixth (627.0). India’s other two competitors, Umamahesh Maddineni (625.5) and Talwar Singh (625.2), finished 13th and 14th.
With this, the team of Parth, Ajay and Abhinav scored a total of 1883.5 points and won the team gold by defeating America (1877.6) and Germany (1873.9).
Three Indians also reached the junior women’s air rifle final, but could not win individual medals. Gautami Bhanot performed brilliantly and qualified second among 90 competitors with a score of 634.7.
China’s Wang Jifei topped the junior world record with 635.7 points. Shambhavi Kshirsagar qualified at fourth position (632.6) and Ojasvi Thakur qualified at fifth position (631.4). Anushka Thakur was at 17th place (627.5) and Saumya Khedkar was at 20th place (627.4). Gautami finished fourth in the final, where she trailed the bronze medalist American shooter by 0.2 points. He finished the competition with 209.3 points. Shambhavi (188.4) finished fifth and Ojasvi (146.1) finished seventh.
However, Gautami and Shambhavi, along with Anushka Thakur, performed brilliantly in the team competition. They defeated the US to win the gold medal with a junior world team record score of 1894.8. Norway finished third.
Indian players also took part in the junior men’s and women’s skeet competition in the shotgun range, but luck was not on their side. Gurfateh Singh Sandhu finished 29th in the qualification with 112 points, while Bhavteg Singh Gill also finished 31st with 112 points. Harmehar Singh Lalli stood at 44th position with 107 points.
In the junior women’s skeet competition, Mansi Raghuvanshi stood best for India in shotgun. She scored 109 points and finished 8th, missing qualifying by just one point.
India still leads the medal table with five gold medals.
