Olympians Anish, Sift, Umamahesh win national shooting selection trials

Olympians Anish Bhanwala and Sift Kaur Samra, along with junior world medalist Umamahesh Maddineni, topped their events at the National Selection Trials in Dehradun. The competition saw close finishes and standout performances from seasoned names and emerging shooters alike

Hyderabad: Olympians Anish Bhanwala and Sift Kaur Samra, along with Junior World Championship medalist Umamahesh Maddineni, emerged winners at the National Selection Trials (T3) for Group ‘A’ athletes in their respective events—25m Rapid Fire Pistol Men, 50m Rifle 3 Positions Women, and 10m Air Rifle Men—held at the Trishul Shooting Range, Maharana Pratap Sports College, Dehradun, on Wednesday.

Anish shot 33 in the final, four more than his statemate Adarsh Singh, who finished second. Navy’s Pradeep Singh Shekhawat took third place with a score of 23. Anish had earlier tallied 289 in Stage 2 of qualification after scoring 293 in Stage 1 to top the qualification with 582-21x. Pradeep followed with 581-17x (290, 291), while Gurmeet Singh placed third with 579-15x (289, 290). Harsimar Singh Rattha (577-21x), Neeraj Kumar (576-16x), and Adarsh Singh (574-23x) completed the top six.

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Sift Kaur Samra, fresh off a bronze at the ISSF World Cup in Munich, dominated the women’s 50m 3 Positions final with a score of 467.3, finishing 10.4 points ahead of Aakriti Dahiya, who scored 456.9. Ashi Chouksey secured third place with 443.9, after topping the qualification round with a score of 592, ahead of Sift (591) and Aakriti (588). Mehuli Ghosh (588), Ayushi Podder (587), Vidarsa K Vinod (586), Vanshika Shah (585), and Nischal Singh (585) rounded out the top eight.

In the 10m Air Rifle Men final, Umamahesh Maddineni clinched the top spot with a score of 252.2, narrowly edging past Buenos Aires World Cup gold medalist Rudrankksh Patil, who finished with 251.5. Divyansh Panwar came third with 230.1. In the qualification round, local favourite Shourya Saini and Divyansh both scored 632.9, with Shourya ranked higher due to more inner 10s. Seventeen-year-old Parth Rakesh Mane scored 632.5 to finish third. Rudrankksh (631.9), Paarth Makhija (631.6), Umamahesh (630.9), Sandeep Singh (630.9), and Vishal Singh (630.7) completed the top eight.