The Indian shooters kept the medals flowing at the ongoing Asian Games 2023 as the duo of Sift Kaur Samra and Ashi Chouksey secured Gold and Bronze in the 50m Rifle 3 Position Women's Final (individual) on Wednesday, September 27. Leading the line was Sift Kaur, whose 469.6 broke the World Record, Asian Record at the Asian Games record in this event.
Ashi Chouksey fell behind China's Qiongyue Zhang to win Bronze with her 451.9, but it was a lovely comeback after she fell behind in the prone position of the event.
Samra achieved a score of 469.6 points, surpassing the previous world record of 467. Meanwhile, Chouksey initially held the sixth position but managed to rise to second, eventually finishing third with 451.9 points.
China's Qiongyue, with a score of 462.3 points, edged out Chouksey to secure the silver medal.
Earlier, both Chouksey and Samra were integral members of the Indian squad that triumphed in the women's 50m Rifle 3P team event. While Manini Kaushik was also part of this victorious team, she had a less stellar performance in the individual category, finishing 18th.
India's cumulative score was 1764, trailing China by nine points, who clinched the gold. The Republic of Korea secured the bronze with 1756 points.
Samra established a new national benchmark with 594 points, securing a spot in the individual final. Although she had an identical score to China's Xia Siyu, Xia took the top spot in the qualification round due to a higher count of inner 10s.
Chouksey also progressed to the individual final, ranking sixth with 590 points, while Kaushik settled for the 18th position with 580 points.
Subsequently, Esha Singh, Manu Bhaker, and Rhythm Sangwan clinched the gold in the women's 25m rapid-fire pistol team event, narrowly outperforming China.
With these achievements, India has surpassed their previous medal count of ten from the 2018 Jakarta Asian Games.
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