Swiftly seizing gold, Shreyasi Singh clinches gold in women’s double trap Commonwealth Games

NewsBharati    11-Apr-2018
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Gold Coast, April 10: Edging out Australia’s Emma Cox in a shoot-off at the 2018 Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast on Wednesday, Shreyasi Singh hallmarked the gold medal for India. While Shreyasi won gold in women’s double trap, Ankur Mittal added a bronze medal to India’s kitty with a superb effort in an exciting double trap final in which he was in front for much of the time. Totalling the no.of medals to 13, there is no stopping Indian athletes this year in commonwealth.

 
Shreyasi and Emma were tied at 96 after four rounds which led them to the shoot-off. The Indian hit the target twice while Emma failed to hit one out of the two shots she got. Scotland’s Linda Pearson grabbed the bronze with 87 while India’s Varsha Varman, who was in medal contention till the last round, finished fourth with 86.
 
 

Coming agonisingly close to a bronze medal in her first appearance at the CWG was 23-year-old Varsha Varman, whose total score of 86 was one short of the bronze winner, Linda Pearson of Scotland.

At the Belmont Shooting Centre on day seven of competition at Gold Coast, Shreyasi dominated the very strong 10-member field to earn her second double trap medal after she won silver in the same event four years in Glasgow CWG. In her third trip to the quadrennial Games, the 26-year-old shot rounds of 24, 25, 22 and 25 for a cumulative score of 96 and then edged Australia’s Emma Cox in the shoot-off to upgrade her silver to gold.

A graduate of Delhi University’s Hans Raj College, Shreyasi won two medals at the 61st national shooting championship in New Delhi last year.

Ankur Mittal was tied for the top spot with Scotland’s David McMath at 46/50 but his shooting was not the same after an official walked up to him and had a word before the shooting resumed. For someone had missed only four birds out of 50 shots in the final, the 26-year-old Delhiite who won silver medal in the World Championship in Moscow in September last year, ended up missing three of the next 10 and had to settle for bronze behind McMath and Isle of Man’s Tim Kneale.

 

The last named had a similar score of 53/60 but went to the final round of 10 shots because he had finished higher than Ankur Mittal in the qualification. Mohammed Asab, the Indian bronze medallist from 2014, finished fourth after having shot a creditable 137/150 in qualifying.

This brings India’s medal tally to two after Om Prakash Mitharval won his second bronze at the 2018 Commonwealth Games earlier in the day. He shot consistently to win third place in the 50m pistol final.

Shreyasi Singh Ankur Mittal Gold Coast Commonwealth games