New Delhi: China seems to be the strongest Rifle/Pistol team at the first ISSF World Cup of the year and their medal run went further with Zhang Yiwen, who sealed the women’s 50m Rifle 3 Positions Gold this morning.
Continuing with their winning tempo, half-way thorough the competition, Chinese shooters won all the Rifle/Pistol finals conducted at New Delhi, leaving just the three Shotgun matches to Australia and Italy.
21 year old Zhang Yiwen made her first appearance count in an ISSF World Cup as the young shooter got better from his kneeling series 4th place with 151.7 points, to 3rd place with a strong prone position fraction she closed with 306.3 points. Zhang reached the lead during the standing position series, pocketing gold medal with 455.7 points in spite of a spine-chilling 9.3-point last shot.
Up next to the Chinese was Singapore’s Jasmine Ser Xiang Wei bagging the silver medal with 453.8 points and Two-time World Cup medalist Eva Roesken of Germany (32) finished the final in 3rd place with 443.6 points.
Shooting for the hosts, Tejaswini Sawant (36) finished at the 7th place with 402.4 points. She was eliminated along with Rio 2016 Olympic finalist Najmeh Khedmati of the Islamic Republic of Iran (20) who finished in 8th with 402.2 points.
In the Men’s Double Trap event, Australian Double Trap Men shooter James Willett (21) doubled the Gold medal pocketed by women’s Trap athlete Penny Smith on February 24th. The Australian took an early lead in the final match by crushing all of his first 36 targets, but lost ground midway to India’s Ankur Mittal (24) and found himself tied with his rival after 30 doubles, when the two of them were the only remaining shooters in the match. And then when the situation could go any side, the Indian missed three hits in a very short span of time, while Willett shot with great precision and found himself sitting on a consistent gap with only five doubles remaining. The Australian athlete managed his advantage wisely, maintaining the lead and collecting the Gold medal with 75 hits, against Mittal’s with 74.
James Dedman won bronze with a score of 56 hits. India’s second finalist Sangram Dahiya finished at 6th position.