Olympic champion Abhinav Bindra shot 596 out of 600 and missed the air rifle final in the shoot-off in the shooting World Cup at the Royal Artillery Barracks in London on Saturday.
In fact, it was a lively shoot-off for one spot in the final among 11 shooters, and only the former Olympic champion, the reigning Asian Games champion and the current world No.1, Zhu Qinan of China who made the cut with a score of 51.9 in the shoot-off, but eventually finished eighth.
The reigning world champion Niccolo Campriani of Italy was sixth, 0.9 point away from a medal, and the world championship silver medallist Peter Sidi of Hungary was disqualified for a violation of the jacket rule.
Bindra shot 51.2 in the shoot-off, while Gagan Narang who was also part of the shoot-off shot 51.0.
It was an impressive performance by both Bindra and Narang, as they maintained a high standard throughout. Bindra had a series of 99, 100, 99, 99, 100 and 99, while Narang shot 99, 100, 99, 99, 99 and 100.
Interestingly, Bindra had shot 596 in qualification on way to the gold in the Beijing Olympics while Narang had shot 595, and missed the final on the count-back.
In men's skeet, former national champion Mairaj Ahmad Khan shot 116, following a series of 21, 25, 22, 24 and 24, to be placed 28th in a field of 89.
Asian champion Man Singh recovered after a bad start to end up with 113, with a series of 20, 22, 23, 23 and 25 that placed him 49, 22 places ahead of national champion Allan Daniel Peoples (110).
The results: Men: Air rifle: 1. Pierre Edmond Piasecki (Fra) 701.6 (598); 2. Sergy Rikhter (Isr) 701.1 (597); 3. Illia Charheika (Blr) 700.3 (598); 10. Abhinav Bindra 596; 12. Gagan Narang 596; 81. Satyendra Singh 577.
Women: Skeet: 1. Wei Ning (Chn) 96 (2) 72; 2. Danka Bartekova (Svk) 96 (1) 71; 3. Kimberly Rhode (US) 95 (71); 39. Rashmee Rathore 57.
