Mehuli Ghosh was in irrepressible form as she kept getting better from the women’s event to junior section, notching up a world record score of 254.0 in the National shooting selection trials at the Dr. Karni Singh Range, Tughlakabad, on Monday.
Everything looked normal, as the 18-year-old Mehuli, the Commonwealth Games and Youth Olympics silver medallist, led by 0.4 points ahead of Aakriti Dahiya at the half way stage of the junior final, after having pocketed the women’s top place, 2.6 points ahead of Aayushi Gupta.
With Aakriti shooting 10.8 back to back, Mehuli shot a 10.7 and a perfect 10.9 to retain the same lead.
Over the next 10 shots, Mehuli averaged 10.55 to eventually prevail with a margin of 4.1 over Aakriti.
The world record for women is held by Apurvi Chandela at 252.9 and in the men’s section the junior world record is 252.3. That should give a fair indication of the prowess of Mehuli.
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The overwhelming performance in the finals apart, Mehuli shot a modest 627.8 in the qualification phase, high by her own standards, which matters in deciding the overall averages for national team selection.
It may be noted that Mehuli has been shooting in the MQS section in the World Cups as the three spots in the team were filled by Anjum Moudgil, Apurvi Chandela and Elavenil Valarivan.
Shreya Agrawal who topped qualification 0.1 point ahead of Mehuli, placed third ahead of Manini Kaushik, Anshika Gupta and Nupur Patil.
In the women’s event, Meghana Sajjanar placed third while Shreya slipped to the seventh spot following a string of 9s.
Nupur Patil bagged the honour in the youth section, 0.2 point ahead of Sift Kaur Samra.
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In women’s sports pistol, Chinki Yadav topped as she beat Neeraj Kaur 32-30, after scoring 580 in qualification, three points behind leaders Annu Raj Singh and Abhidnya Patil.
Gauri Sheoran, who had won the gold in the Kumar Surendra Singh Championship on Sunday, shot 569 and missed the final by one point along with Devanshi Rana.
Arunima Gaur won the junior section, with a score of 27, a two-point margin over Sneha Bhardwaj.
Meanwhile, in the 50-metre rifle prone event of the Kumar Surendra Singh Championship, Olympian Sanjeev Rajput won the gold with a total of 623.2. He beat Subhankar Pramanick by 0.7 point in the non-Olympic event which does not feature a final.
Aishwary Pratap Singh Tomar added the junior gold, to the two gold medals that he had won in the 3-position event earlier. Tomar had also won men’s bronze and junior silver in air rifle.
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