Palak Gulia clinches India's 20th Olympic quota in shooting with bronze in World Qualifier

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Asian Games champion Gulia won bronze in the Olympic qualifier to clinch India’s 20th overall quota in shooting as well as their second in the women’s 10m air pistol event.

Palak Guliya on Sunday helped India clinch an unprecedented 20th quota in shooting for this year’s Paris Olympics after her exceptional performance in the ISSF World Olympic Qualification Tournament in Rio de Janiero.

Asian Games champion Guliya won bronze in the Olympic qualifier to clinch India’s 20th overall quota in shooting as well as their second in the women’s 10m air pistol event.

Palak finished at the third spot after 22 shots with a final score of 217.6. Thailand’s Kamonlak Saencha won gold with a score of 221.6 while Armenia’s Elmira Karapetyan won silver with 220.4.

India will be sending its biggest Olympic shooting team ever for the Paris Games that takes place in the months of July and August in the French capital, surpassing the 15-strong team for the Tokyo Olympics in 2021.

The 18-year-old from Jhajjar, Haryana, who had won an individual gold and team silver in the 10m air pistol at the Hangzhou Asian Games, overcame a slow start in the 24-shot final, displaying nerves of steel to climb steadily up the leaderboard and eventually end up scoring 217.6.

She eventually bowed out after the 22nd shot to settle for third place.

Armenia’s Elmira Karapetyan won gold, while Thai teenager Kamonlak Saencha clinched the silver and the second available quota place.

India have now clinched a maximum of 16 Paris Olympic spots available to a country in pistol and rifle events.

The country’s shotgun shooters can still earn four Paris berths in men’s and women’s trap and skeet events when the ISSF Final Olympic Qualification Championship (Shotgun) commences in Doha on April 19.

Palak and Sainyam had qualified for the eight-woman final on Saturday placed sixth and seventh respectively with identical scores of 578.

Save Karpetyan, who had already booked her quota in earlier competitions, all other finalists could claim the available Paris berths.

Both Palak and Sainyam had a forgettable start to the final, but came back strongly even as Saencha and the experienced Veronika Major of Hungary threatened to pull away from the field in the early stages with some sublime shooting.

Palak and Sainyam were struggling to get past the fifth position before the eliminations started.

However, things turned the Indians’ way as Major suffered a meltdown.

Ahead of the 19th shot, Palak took a 0.6 lead over Major with Sainyam exiting in fifth position.

The Hungarian could not hit the 10-ring as the Indian did it once and sealed the quota place.
Karapetyan (240.7) clinched gold on the final shot as Saencha (240.5) crumbled with a poor shot which fetched her 8.6.

With PTI inputs



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