ISSF World Cup: India's Vijayveer Sidhu, Tejaswini clinch gold in 25m rapid fire

Another Indian pair - Abhidnya Ashok Patil and Gurpreet Singh - gets silver.

The mixed rapid fire pistol champions, Vijayveer Sidhu and Tejaswani in the World Cup in Delhi on Saturday.

There was no dearth of gold and silver for India, but the trap medals continued to elude the host in the shooting World Cup at the Dr. Karni Singh Range, Tughlakabad, on Saturday. With only two teams in the rapid fire pistol team event, Tejaswani and Vijayveer Sidhu beat Abhidnya Patil and Olympian Gurpreet Singh to claim the gold. The international federation has introduced a series of team competitions including the mixed events, even though they will not be part of the Olympics. The lack of entries did not discourage the organisers from conducting these events, if only to gauge their quality and pace of competition.

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With the addition of gold and silver, India shot up further from the rest of the pack with 13 gold, eight silver and six bronze medals. The US was second with three gold, three silver and a bronze. Italy reached its second gold medal through its mixed trap team of Alessia Iezzi and Valerio Grazzini who beat Slovak pair of Zuzana Stefecekova and Adrian Drobny 39-36. Denmark was the other team to have two gold medals.

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Kynan Chenai and Shreyasi Singh did well to make the bronze match in mixed trap, but were  beaten 38-35 by Turkey in the single barrel competition.

The other Indian team of Rajeshwari Kumari and Asian Games silver medallist Lakshay Sheoran shot 140 in qualification, and missed a chance to fight for a medal by one point. Lakshay was good with 73 out of 75. Kynan also was good in qualification with 72, but was not at his best in the bronze match. The team competition for men and women will provide another opportunity for the host to get its act right in trap on the final of the World Cup. The results: Mixed team: 25m rapid fire pistol: 1. India (Tejaswani, Vijayveer Sidhu) 9 (368) 568; 2. India-2 (Abhidnya Patil, Gurpreet Singh) 1 (370) 569. Trap: 1. Italy (Alesia Iezzi, Valerio Grazini) 39 (145); 2. Slovakia (Zuzana Stefecekova, Adrian Drobny) 36 (143)3; 3. Turkey (Safiye Sariturk, Yavuz Ilnam) 38 (143)2; 4. India-2 (Shreyasi Singh, Kynan Chenai) 35 (141); 6. India-1 (Rajeshwari Kumari, Lakshay Sheoran) 140.