Aishwary claims gold in Asian shooting championship, Adriyan wins junior title

Aishwary Pratap Singh Tomar won gold in the men’s 50m rifle 3 positions at the Asian Shooting Championship, while junior shooter Adriyan Karmakar clinched his first continental title with an Asian record

Shymkent (Kazakhstan): Indian shooter Aishwary Pratap Singh Tomar dished out a dominant show to win the gold medal in the men’s 50m rifle 3 positions competition at the Asian Shooting Championship here on Sunday.

In the junior men’s 3P event, Adriyan Karmakar claimed the gold medal with an Asian junior record of 463.8 in the final.

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Aishwary shot 462.5 to finish on top. China’s Wenyu Zhao won the silver medal with 462 points, while Japan’s Naoya Okada claimed bronze with 445.8.

The 24-year-old Olympian led the field for a major part of the competition. He had an excellent outing in the kneeling position and, though not as strong in prone, did enough in standing to emerge winner after entering the final phase with a lead of more than 1.5 points.

Among the other Indians, Chain Singh finished fourth, while Akhil Sheoran ended fifth in the final.

Earlier, the Indian trio of Aishwary, Chain Singh and Sheoran bagged the silver medal in the 50m rifle 3 positions team event. Their tally of 1747 fell three short of China’s 1750.

Aishwary, who was placed third in qualification with 584, secured his second Asian title in this event, having earlier won gold in 2023. He had to settle for silver in 2024 after losing to Sheoran in Jakarta.

In qualification, Chain Singh was fifth with 582, while world championship bronze medallist Sheoran clinched the seventh qualifying spot with 581. China had all three shooters qualify, while Japan and Korea secured the other two places.

In the final, Aishwary took a healthy lead after the first five shots of the kneeling position and steadily extended it. Zhao came closest after the 13th shot, just 0.3 behind, but a 10.8 from Aishwary in the 14th restored a one-point advantage and sealed his victory.

Meanwhile, double Olympic medallist Manu Bhaker, who had won two bronze medals earlier this week in the women’s 10m air pistol individual and team events, was fourth in the women’s 25m pistol qualification after the precision stage. Esha Singh stood second.

Adriyan on target in junior event

In the junior men’s 3P, Vedant Waghmare was second in qualifying with 582, while Adriyan squeezed into the eighth and final spot with 576. Sami Ullah Khan (575), Rohit Kanyan (575), Gaurav Desale (569) and Hitesh Srinivasan (564) missed out.

Vedant, Adriyan and Rohit combined to win the team gold with 1733.

In the individual final, Adriyan started strongly, leading China’s Han Yinan by 0.9 after 15 kneeling shots. Vedant was sixth at that stage but climbed to second after the prone round, trailing Adriyan by 0.4.

By the standing position, Adriyan extended his lead to 3.2 over Vedant. Host shooter Oleg Noskov briefly overtook Vedant, but the Indian regained ground. A late surge by Han pushed Vedant to bronze, but Adriyan sealed gold with closing shots of 10.8, 10.2, 10.4, 10.5 and 10.5 to secure his first continental junior title along with an Asian junior record.