Pistol ace Jitu Rai won India their first gold medal of the International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) World Cup in the men's 50m pistol event, and it was double delight for the home fans as compatriot Amanpreet Singh also won silver in the same event to make it the only 1-2 finish for the hosts in the competition. Their effort meant that with a total of one gold, two silver and two bronze medals, India are placed fourth in the medal tally behind leaders China (six gold, six silver), Italy (two gold, one bronze) and Australia (two gold).
It was deja vu for the vociferous home crowd as twice in two days, Jitu started tentatively in the finals before slowly but surely creeping up on the leaders to snatch gold in a classy display. In the eight-man, 24 shot final where shooters are progressively eliminated after every two shots beginning the 12th shot, Jitu shot a horror 6.6 in the first 5-shot series to lie at the bottom of the table at one stage. Amanpreet on the other hand hit the front from shot one and stayed there till the 22nd shot, before Jitu stole a march on him in the last two shots. Amanpreet's last two shots were scores of 8s and Jitu shot a 10.0 and 10.5 to finish in pole position. In the end equation, Jitu's gold came with a finals world record score of 230.1, Amanpreet finished with 226.9 while Iran's Vahid Golkhandan who shot a score of 208.0 in the finals won the bronze medal.
Earlier in the day, Jitu had qualified for the Final in second position shooting 559 in his allotted quota of 60 shots while Amanpreet had topped qualifying with a score of 561. Tuesday's winner in the men's 10m air pistol and two-time former World Champion Tomoyuki Matsuda of Japan also made it to the 5m final while Olympic silver medalist in the event, Xuan Vinh Hoang of Vietnam could not make it passed qualifying.
Jitu finishes this World Cup with one gold (50m pistol), one bronze (10m air pistol) and one Grand Prix gold in the mixed air pistol team event along with Heena Sidhu.
Unable to stop his emotions after winning a dream gold in front of his home crowd, one of Jitu's first natural reactions was "Maza aya, Maza aya" accompanied with a child-like clapping of hands. When speaking to the media later he said, "I wanted to win this gold as a combined World Cup was happening for the first time in India and I wanted to see the tricolor fly the highest in front of the home fans."
In the two other medal events of the day on competition day six, Thailand won their first gold medal of the competition, when Naphaswan Yangpaiboon won gold in the women's 25m pistol. Naphaswan shot 38 in the finals to overcome World No 3 and former World Champion Jingjing Zhang of China who shot a score of 30. The bronze went to Germany's Michelle Skeries who shot 27. India's effort in the qualifying rounds was led by the 15-year old Muskan, who finished 12th with a score of 576 and could not make it to the six-woman final. Among the other Indian participants, Rahi Sarnobat and Surabhi Pathak shot 571 and 570 to finish 23rd and 24th respectively.
In the women's Skeet, American shotgun legend and former three time Olympic Champion Kimberly Rhode of the USA turned up a virtuoso performance to win gold with a finals score of 56. The silver went to Thailand's Sutiya Jiewchaloemmit who shot 51 and New Zealand's Chloe Tipple won the bronze with a score of 42. Among the three Indians in the fray, Rashmee Rathore was the best finisher shooting 66 out of a possible 75 in qualifying to end in 17th place. Aarti Singh Rao shot 63 to finish 24th while Saaniya Sheikh shot 60 to end in 27th position.
Day seven of competitions on Thursday will see the final of the men's skeet where Indian interests lie with Sheeraz Sheikh, Angad Veer Singh Bajwa and Mairaj Ahmad Khan.