Gurpreet, Amanpreet lead India to 1-2 finish at Asian Shooting championship

India continued its dominance at the Asian Shooting Championship in Kazakhstan, taking its medal tally to 82. Gurpreet Singh won his first international gold in the 25m Standard Pistol, leading a 1-2 finish with Amanpreet Singh, alongside multiple team golds

Hyderabad: Rio de Janeiro Olympian Gurpreet Singh led India to a 1-2 finish in the 25m Standard Pistol event, with Amanpreet Singh winning silver, at the 16th Asian Shooting Championship in Shymkent, Kazakhstan, on Thursday. India’s overall medal tally swelled to 82 medals — 44 gold, 20 silver and 18 bronze.

The duo also secured the team gold along with Harsh Gupta, with a combined score of 1709. India added two more gold medals on the day in the 50m Rifle Prone Junior Team and the 25m Standard Pistol Junior Team events.

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For the 37-year-old Gurpreet, it was his first-ever international gold medal, improving on the bronze he had won in the same event 12 years ago at the Asian Championships in Tehran.

Both Gurpreet and Amanpreet shot identical scores of 572, but Gurpreet’s 18 inner-10s compared to Amanpreet’s 11 gave the Army shooter the edge. China’s 25m Rapid Fire Pistol gold medalist Su Lianbofan settled for bronze.

In the junior 25m Standard Pistol, Suraj Sharma won silver (571-12x) and Tanishq Naidu bagged bronze (568-11x). The two, along with Mukesh Nelavalli, combined for team gold with 1703-39x.

While the Indians missed out on individual medals in the 50m Rifle Prone across senior and junior categories, the junior trio of Sami Ulah Khan, Adriyan Karmakar and Kushagra Singh Rajawat clinched the team gold with 1844.3 points.

The Asian Championships will conclude on Friday with the 50m Rifle Prone Women, 25m Centre Fire Pistol Men, and Men’s Junior events on the schedule.