NEW DELHI: Sift Kaur Samra won India their sixth quota place for the 2024 Paris Olympics, finishing fifth in the Women’s 50m Rifle 3 Positions (3P) at the International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) World Championship (All Events) in Baku, Azerbaijan.
Aiming for the Baku Shooting Centre early on Monday, Sift won the quota after she qualified for the final with a national record score of 589, which she shot twice on Monday. She, however, missed a coveted World Champion-ship medal despite heroic shooting.
It was yet another China 1-2 in Women’s 3P, with Zhang Qiongyue winning gold with a score of 465.3 in the fi-nal, while her compatriot Han Jiayu won silver with 463.5. American Sagen Maddalena won bronze while Sift fin-ished with a score of 429.1, the National Rifle Association of India (NRAI) informed in a release on Monday.
Sift said after the match, “I am feeling so excited about winning the quota and it was really a fun match for me. The experience was really great because my (shooting) in the Kneeling position was not that good in qualification, but my standing was very good. I am proud of how I did in the Standing position today. It means a lot to me and the country as it’s the first 50m quota among women.”
India now have won three quota places for Paris at the Baku World Championships with Mehuli Ghosh in the Women’s 10m Air Rifle and Akhil Sheoran in the Men’s 50m Rifle 3 Positions winning quotas and world champi-onship bronze medals in the previous days. India now have six quota places overall in shooting for the Paris games. India also find themselves third on the medal tally with four gold and three bronze medals behind powerhouses China and the USA. A total of 24 of the 101 participating nations have bagged medals so far. (IANS)
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