Abhinav Bindra clinching the gold medal at the 10m Air Rifle event here on the first day of the Asian Air Gun Championship by overtaking country mates Gagan Narang and Chain Singh.
After the match an ecstatic Bindra said, “There is lot of training and hard work involve in this. I always try to give my 100%, give everything my best shot. I can tell you this much though, that it is not easy as it looks like, it’s much tougher and serious dedication and practice it takes to get there.”
Asked about how he felt after winning, the Indian shooter said, “It’s always good to win medals.
“This event is an excellent platform for preparation for Rio Olympics because there was so much competitition and people from all over the world came here to win the medals. So yes, there was some pressure to win the medal. But I am happy that I won.” he further added.
When quizzed if there’s any rivalry kind of thing with his country mate Narang, Bindra answered, “There is no rivalry with him (Gagan), and it’s only for the media. We are well entertained by our sport.”
Speaking about the significance of the tournament he said, “It will be good preparation for Rio. I’ll be using this competition as preparation for future.
“I am training every day. The range looks better, the lights are more constant,” Bindra, India’s lone individual Olympic gold medal winner had said.
32-year-old Bindra, who won gold in 2008 Olympics in 10m Air Rifle event, shot 208.3 to bag the top prize ahead of Kazakhstan’s world number eight Yurkov Yuriy (206.6) and Korea’s Yu Jaechul (185.3) on the first day of competition.
The Asian Air Gun Championship is the first international shooting competition in India after a gap of almost five years.
The last time when fans were able to see their shooting stars in top-level action was during the 2010 Delhi Commonwealth Games.