Joydeep Karmakar pipped Gagan Narang by a 0.6 point margin for the first place in the free rifle prone event in the National shooting selection trials at the Dr. Karni Singh Range, Tughlakabad, on Friday.
Joydeep had qualified in sixth place with a score of 612.0, while Gagan topped the qualification with a score of 616.3.
World championship finalist Hariom Singh wasthird after finishing second in qualification ahead of Sushil Ghaley.
In women’s air pistol, national champion Malaika Goel beat Gauri Sheoran by three points for the top spot. The 16-year-old Malaika had qualified with the second best score of 380, two points behind Shweta Chaudhary who had to eventually settle for fifth spot.
Gauri pushed Olympian Annu Raj Singh to the third spot.
World Cup Final gold medallist, Asian champion and silver medallist in the last World Cup in Fort Benning, Heena Sidhu opted to skip air pistol and instead focused on sports pistol.
Her string of good performances would ensure her selection in air pistol for the international competitions ahead, thanks to the flexibility of the selection policy.
In women’s rifle prone event, World champion Tejaswini Sawant beat Jayashree Das by 0.8 point for the first place. World Cup silver medallist Lajja Gauswami, World Champinship junior medallist in the event, Rajkumari Rathore apart from Kuheli Gangulee, Raj Chaudhary, Elizabeth Susan Koshy and Anjum Moudgil were pushed down as Meena Kumari took third place.
In centre fire pistol, Mahendar Singh shot 297 in the rapid fire stage to top the list ahead of Olympic silver medallist Vijay Kumar. Both shot 583 as Vijay had made 297 in the precision stage, but Mahendar topped by virtue of having registered more inner-10s, 19x to 17x.
Pemba Tamang was placed third, four points ahead of Samaresh Jung, while other specialists like Harpreet Singh and Gurpreet Singh failed to make an impact.
In the sports pistol junior event, the best junior shooter of the last National championship, Samarjit Singh was pushed to the third place by Neeraj Kumar and Vishwajeet Singh. In fact, Samarjit lost out on the second spot 18x to 13x after being tied on 569, two points behind the topper.
The results: Men: Free rifle prone: 1. Joydeep Karmakar 204.6 (612.0); 2. Gagan Narang 204.0 (616.3); 3. Hariom Singh 183.7 (615.5).
Centre fire pistol: 1. Mahendar Singh 583 (19x); 2. Vijay Kumar 583 (17x); 3. Pemba Tamang 582.
Sports pistol: Junior men: 1. Neeraj Kumar 571; 2. Vishwajeet Singh 569; 3. Samarjit Singh 569.
Women: Air pistol: 1. Malaika Goel 199.1 (380); 2. Gauri Sheoran 196.1 (375); 3. Annu Raj Singh 174.3 (380).
Rifle prone: 1. Tejaswini Sawant 619.0; 2. Jayashree Das 618.2; 3. Meena Kumari 616.3.
