India won the men’s 50m pistol team gold at the ISSF World Championships in Doha with 1,659, 11 points clear of China. Ravinder Singh added individual silver and Elavenil Valarivan’s team took women’s air rifle silver, but India missed 10m air rifle Olympic quotas.
Doha, Qatar: India came away from Tuesday’s programme at the ISSF World Championships with a gold and two silvers, a medal haul that did not include the Olympic quotas the squad came for.
Ravinder leads the pistol trio
Ravinder Singh, Saurabh Chaudhary and Amanpreet Singh combined for 1,659 in the men’s 50m pistol team event. Ravinder shot 559, Saurabh 551 and Amanpreet 549. China took silver on 1,648, with Zhang Bingchen (555), Lyu Junyi (549) and Feng Linlang (544), and South Korea won bronze on 1,643, five points behind China.
Ravinder also took the individual silver with 559, two points behind Authorised Neutral Athlete Anton Aristarkhov, who won with 561. Romania’s Luca Joldea took bronze on 558. The 50m pistol is not on the Olympic programme, so neither medal carried a quota place.
Women’s air rifle team takes silver
Elavenil Valarivan, Sonam Maskar and Shambhavi Kshirsagar shot 1,894.4 in the women’s 10m air rifle team event to win silver. China won gold on 1,899.8 and Japan took bronze on 1,892.6.
Quota near-miss in the air rifle finals
The individual air rifle events were the ones that mattered for Los Angeles 2028. Elavenil qualified third with 634.2 for the eight-woman final but finished sixth on 167.3, and sixth was not enough for a quota. Sonam placed 19th in qualification on 630.5 and Shambhavi 32nd on 629.7. In the men’s event none of India’s three shooters reached the final.
Doha is the first Olympic qualifying event of the cycle and the largest, offering 36 quota places, three in each of the 12 individual Olympic events, with each nation limited to one per event. The championships run until 14 November.
Men’s 50m pistol team, ISSF World Championships (3 November): 1. India 1,659; 2. China 1,648; 3. South Korea 1,643. Individual: 1. Anton Aristarkhov (AIN) 561; 2. Ravinder Singh (India) 559; 3. Luca Joldea (Romania) 558. Women’s 10m air rifle team: 1. China 1,899.8; 2. India 1,894.4; 3. Japan 1,892.6.
