Indian shooters train gun on Olympic berth

Panaji: Around 45 shooters from India will look to seal Olympic quota places on behalf of their country when the 51st ISSF World Shooting Championships commences in Granada, Spain, from September 7 to 20. In a total 15 events, nine for men and six for women, stalwarts like Abhinav Bindra, Gagan Narang, Vijay Kumar, Heena Sindhu and Rahi Sarnobat will throw down the gauntlet against the best shooters in the world in the first of many qualifying events for the Rio Olympic Games 2016.
Out of 357 qualification places overall, 64 will be up for grabs in the Spain championships. However, a country (National Olympic Committee) cannot get more than the 30 quota and a maximum of two shooters per event for the Games. The next qualification events -- ISSF World Cups, Continental Championships and Continental Games -- will offer the remaining 293 places.
India will start their campaign on September 8 with Bindra taking centre stage in the 10m Air Rifle. The Commonwealth Games gold medalist at Glasgow, who represented India in the last four Olympics, recently trained in Germany under his long-time coach Heinz Reinkemeier. “It’s against my principle to talk about Abhi’s preparation before the event as it is bad for shooting karma,” said Reinkemeier when TOI contacted him.
The rest of the Indian team also went through the paces in Hannover for two weeks before reaching Granada on Wednesday. India’s silver medalist at the London Games, Vijay Kumar, who has been nursing a persistent shoulder injury, feels determination is an open sesame to success. “I’m not fit but I am determined and won’t let my country down. I will undergo a surgery as soon as this championship gets over,” said Vijay. He will be seen in action in the 25m rapid fire pistol on September 13 and 14.
Gagan Narang, who will not be seen in his pet 10m Air Rifle event, will hope to make it count in the 50m Prone and 50m 3-position, which are slated for September 11,12 and 13 respectively.
All finals will be live-streamed on the ISSF website www.issf-sports.org.
Olympic qualifiers
Event categories and shooters
10m Air Rifle: Abhinav Bindra, Sanjeev Rajput, Ravi Kumar (6)
50m Pistol Men: Jitu Rai, Gurpal Singh, Om Prakash (4)
Trap Men: Manavjit Singh Sandhu, Kynan Chenai, R. Prithviraj Tondaiman (3)
10m Air Rifle women: Ayonika Paul, Raj Chaudhary, Kiranjit Kaur (6)
25m Pistol women: Anisa Sayyed, Rahi Sarnobat, Pushpanjali Rana (5)
50m Rifle Prone Men: Gagan Narang, Hariom Singh, Joydeep Karmakar (5)
10m Air Pistol Men: Jitu Rai, P.N. Prakash, Om Prakash (6)
50m Rifle 3 Pos Women: Lajja Gauswami, Tejaswini Muley, Anjali Bhagwat (5)
50m Rifle 3 Position Men: Sanjeev Rajput, Gagan Narang, Chain Singh (5)
10m Air Pistol Women: Heena Sidhu, Shweta Chaudhary, Rahi Sarnobat (6)
Trap Women: Shreyasi Singh, Shagun Chowdhary, Seema Tomar (3)
25m Rapid Fire Pistol Men: Vijay Kumar, Harpreet Singh, Gurpreet Singh (2)
Double Trap Men: Ankur Mittal, Mohd Asab, Sangram Dahiya (2)
Skeet women: Arti Singh Rao (3)
Skeet Men: Mairaj Ahmad Khan, Man Singh, Arozepal Singh Sandhu (3)
Number of quota places within brackets