Daijiworld Media Network - Shymkent (Kazakhstan)

Shymkent (Kazakhstan), Aug 25: Double Olympic medallist Manu Bhaker narrowly missed out on adding another individual medal to her haul, finishing fourth in the women’s 25m pistol event at the Asian Shooting Championship on Monday. Bhaker scored 25 points in the final, falling just four short of Vietnam’s Thu Vinh Trinh, who claimed bronze with 29 points. Fellow Indian Esha Singh placed sixth with 18 points in a competitive final lineup.

Despite the close miss in the senior final, India celebrated a remarkable day in the junior women’s 25m pistol category. Payal Khatri led a historic clean sweep for India, clinching gold with a score of 36 points. Naamya Kapoor took silver with 30 points, while Tejaswani secured the bronze with 27. The trio’s stellar performance also earned India the team silver medal with a combined score of 1700 — finishing behind South Korea and ahead of hosts Kazakhstan.

In qualification, Naamya and Tejaswani dominated early on by taking the top two spots, while Payal entered the final in sixth place before delivering a strong comeback to claim gold.

Meanwhile, the senior women’s final saw Chinese shooters Yueyue Zhang and Jiaruixuan Xiao battle it out for top honours, both finishing with 39 points. Zhang edged Xiao 4-3 in a shoot-off to take gold.

India still managed to add to their senior tally in the team event, with the trio of Manu Bhaker, Esha Singh, and Simranpreet Kaur Brar winning bronze with a total score of 1749, placing them behind China and South Korea.

Esha Singh had earlier impressed in the qualification round, topping the field ahead of Manu and the eventual Chinese finalists. Manu, who had already claimed two bronze medals earlier in the competition in the 10m air pistol events (individual and team), continued her consistent run by reaching yet another final.