Pooja Ghatkar won the air rifle women’s event in the first shooting trials on Tuesday. She beat Shriyanka Sadangi by 1.7 points in the 20-shot final, conducted in the new format. Pooja had a total of 208.3 in the final, while Shriyanka had 206.6.
Shriyanka, the youth silver medallist in the recent national championship, had to ward off a threat from Elizabeth Koshy of Kerala, after the two tied at 186.1. Shiryanka shot 10.6 to 10.2 by Elizabeth in the shoot-off to progress into the title duel. National champion Apurvi Chandela had to settle for the fourth place, while Mampi Das was seventh and the world record holder and former Asian champion Suma Shirur was eighth.
The trial was conducted with the new decimal scoring system, in which Apurvi Chandela topped with 415.7 points. However, the eight finalists started from zero and the knock-out started after eight shots, when the shooter with the least total got eliminated. The elimination continued after every two shots thereafter. In women’s sport pistol, Anisa Sayeed took top spot ahead of Olympian Rahi Sarnobat and the current national champion Sushma Singh. In men’s 50m free pistol, Jitu Rai prevailed with a total of 194.0.
