Swapnil Kusale handled with admirable composure the trials and tribulations of a gruelling Olympic qualification round in the Men’s 50m Rifle 3 Positions (3P), making it to the final and giving India the fifth shot at a medal in the shooting competitions in 33rd Olympic Games here on Wednesday.
Shooting a top-drawer 590 over 20 shots each in the Kneeling, Prone and Standing positions, Kusale took the seventh place in the elite 44-man field and maintained his hopes of winning a medal in his maiden outing in the Olympics.
Manu Bhaker has helped convert two of the previous four shots earned by India into bronze medals, first in the women’s 10m Air Pistol and thereafter, partnering Sarabjot Singh in the Air Pistol Mixed Team event. These are India’s only two medals at the Paris Games so far.
While Swapnil, a seasoned 3P shooter, made his first final in his debut Olympics, two-time Olympian Aishwary Pratap Singh Tomar missed out narrowly. His score of 589 put him in the 11th spot in the pecking order, as Czechia’s Jiri Privratsky took the eighth and final qualifying spot at 590. China’s Liu Yukun topped the field with 594.
This is also the first time that an Indian male shooter has reached the final of the Rifle Three-Position event at the Olympics.
In the qualification round on Wednesday, Swapnil came up with an impressive performance, starting with two scores of 99 in the kneeling position before scoring 98 and 99 in prone.
The 29-year-old from Pune shot scores of 98 and 97 in the standing position for a total of 590, which was enough to bag him a place in the top eight and the final.
In the other shooting event of the day, Rajeshwari Kumari and Shreyasi Singh shot identical scores of 113 in the Women’s Trap to garner 22nd and 23rd spots respectively.
On the sixth day of competitions on Thursday, the men’s 3P final precedes the women’s 3P qualification round featuring Anjum Moudgil and Sift Kaur Samra in action for India.
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