Divyansh Singh Panwar missed the gold by 0.4 point in men’s air rifle, but grasped the much elusive Olympic quota place in the shooting World Cup in Beijing, on Friday.
Bristling with confidence after having won the mixed air rifle gold in partnership with Anjum Moudgil a day earlier, the 16-year-old Divyansh, a student of Maheshwari Public School in Jaipur, was brilliant in the individual event, to secure the country’s fourth Olympic quota for Tokyo 2020.
Anjum Moudgil, Apurvi Chandela had won the air rifle Olympic quota in the World Championship last year, while Saurabh Chaudhary had won the air pistol Olympic quota at the Dr. Karni Singh Range, Delhi, in February.
Qualifying in the third place with 629.2, Divyansh was highly accurate in the final in which he shot 10.1 or better with 23 of the 24 shots. A 9.5 on the 14th shot possibly made the difference as he missed the
gold.
As it happened
The medals did not matter as much as the Olympic quota and it was a relief for the Indian camp to add one to the collection, as it would ensure a mixed air rifle entry as well, for Tokyo.
Hui Zicheng won the gold, but China had already won two Olympic quota places in the event. Thus, the Olympic quota went to the bronze medallist Grigorii Shamakov of Russia apart from Divyansh.
Ravi Kumar had won he Asian Games mixed bronze with Apurvi Chandela and Deepak Kumar, the Asian Games silver medallist, placed 44th and 57th respectively.
Another bright junior who is versatile in a string of pistol events, the 17-year-old Adarsh Singh shot 583 in rapid fire pistol and missed the final by two points. After an average of 98.5 in the eight-second and six-second series scores of 94 and 95 in the 4-second series saw Adarsh miss the final.
Commonwealth Games gold medallist Anish Bhanwala (578) and Arpit Goel (575) were not at their best, especially in the 4-second series, and were placed 22nd and 29th respectively.
Whle Lin Junmin of China won the gold with 35 hits in the final, the qualification topper Oliver Geis (589) of Germany won the silver and secured the Olympic quota place. The fifth and sixth placed shooters Henry Turner Leverett of the US and Oleksandr Petriv of Ukraine also won the Olympic quota in the event.
It may be noted that three Olympic quota places have been assigned for the rapid fire pistol event in the Beijing and Munich World Cups, as against the usual norm of two, to compensate for the two quota places withheld in the Delhi World Cup, at the behest of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
The results:
25m rapid fire pistol: 1. Lin Junmin (Chn) 35 (587); 2. Oliver Geis (Ger) 31 (589); 3. Jean Quiquampoix (Fra) 27 (587); 10. Adarsh Singh 583; 22. Anish Bhanwala 578; 29. Arpit Goel 575. MQS: Bhavesh Shekhawat 576.
10m air rifle: 1. Hui Zicheng (Chn) 249.4 (627.5); 2. Divyansh Singh Panwar 249.0 (629.2); 3. Grigorii Shamakov (Rus) 227.5 (628.9); 44. Ravi Kumar 624.1; 57. Deepak Kumar 622.6. MQS: Tejas Krishna Prasad 620.7.
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