National shooting trials: Aishwary Pratap wins gold in 10m Air Rifle

Indian shooter Aishwary Pratap Singh Tomar reigned supreme by winning the gold medal in the men's 10m Air Rifle T2 event at the National Shooting trials.

Aishwary Pratap pipped Deepak Kumar 17-11 in the gold medal match. The Indian shooter was in good form having won the silver medal in the men's 50m Rifle 3 Positions (3P) T1 trial earlier.

Senior shooter Kumar shot 631.6 to finish third in the qualifiers, while Aishwary Pratap was one spot behind with a score of 629.9.

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They met again in the four-man bronze medal round after coming through their semi-finals, where Deepak again topped the table with 42.5 to Tomar's 40.5, setting up a gold medal clash where the young shooter brought out his best to beat Deepak, an Olympian.

Andhra Pradesh's Maddineni Umamahesh also had a good day, making it to the final stages of the senior event as well as winning the junior men's 10m Air Rifle T2 trials with a 17-9 win over Madhya Pradesh's Avinash Yadav.

National shooting trials to select future teams

More than 3,000 shooting stars, including the top shooters in the country, are participating in the national trials in Bhopal.

The national trials were postponed from January this year, because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Indian teams for the upcoming World Cup in Baku and Junior World Cup will be selected on the basis of the ongoing national trials.

Meanwhile, new coaching staff, including foreign experts, are overseeing national camps. The new coaching staff has come onboard after the National Rifle Association of India (NRAI) expressed its disappointment over the performance of the Indian shooting squad at the Tokyo Olympics.

To streamline the system, the Indian shooting federation disbanded its coaching staff and initiated the process of shortlisting a new coaching panel.