Ramita crowned 10m air rifle junior women's world champion

Ramita crowned 10m air rifle junior women's world champion (Image Source: Google)

India's Ramita was crowned world champion in the 10m Air Rifle Women Junior event, after she defeated China's Ying Shen 16-12 in a close gold medal encounter at the International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) World Championship Rifle/Pistol in Cairo, Egypt.

That performance and a 1-2-3 finish in the 50m Pistol Women Junior competition were the highlights for India on competition day seven at the Egypt International Olympic City (EIOC) Shooting Range, taking India's tally to 25 medals including 10 gold, five silver and 10 bronze medals won so far. They still lie second behind China.

Ramita was tied 12-12 in the gold medal clash against Ying, but finished off with two strong shots of 10.8 and 10.7 to clinch the crown in the junior version of the Olympic event. She was fourth in qualification with 629.6, but topped the ranking round with a 262.8 to make it to the gold medal match against Ying who was second in the ranking round with 262.4.

Tilottama Sen won a second medal for India at the event, a bronze, after she shot 261.0 in the ranking round to finish third. Earlier she had topped qualification with a sizzling 633.4 which equals the current listed world record in the event.

In the same event, Yukthi Rajendra barely missed qualification finishing ninth with a score of 627.1. Hazel was the fifth Indian in the field scoring 622.3 for a 40th place finish.

Indian girls also swept the 50m Pistol Women Junior event after Divanshi topped the field with a score of 547, Varsha Singh came second with 539 and Tiyana was third with 523. The fourth place was also captured by India as Khushi Kapoor shot 521.

Rhythm Sangwan won a silver in the 25m Standard Pistol Women, shooting 573 to finish behind China's Xiao Jiaruixuan who shot 575. A second silver came via Abhinav Choudhary who shot 546 in the 50m Pistol Men Junior event to go down narrowly to Korea's Song Seungho. The Korean had the same score as Abhinav but won on countback.

Vijayveer Sidhu won India's second bronze on the day, finishing third in the 25m Standard Pistol Men. He was behind Tokyo Olympic fourth place finisher Pavlo Korostylov of Ukraine who won gold and Christian Reitz of Germany who won silver. Vijayveer shot 574 while the gold went at 582 and the silver at 575. Anish finished 16th in the field with 566 while Vijay Kumar was 22nd with 562.

In the 10m Air Rifle Men Junior event, India's Sri Karthik Sabari Raj Ravishankar and Divyansh Singh Panwar did make it to the ranking round but eventually finished sixth and seventh respectively. Sri Karthik shot a solid 633.2 in qualifying to finish second while Divyansh shot 627.2 to qualify in seventh position. Vidit Jain was further back in 10thwith 626.5, Shahu Tushar Mane 16th with 623.4 and Abhinav Shaw 19th with 623.3.