Tamil Nadu’s Gaayathri Wins Women’s 50m Rifle 3 Positions National Crown

New Delhi, Dec 22, 2016: The highly talented, Tamil Nadu’s Gaayathri N, capped of a brilliant year winning the Women’s 50m Rifle 3 Positions event at the 60th National Shooting Championship Competitions (NSCC), being held at Pune’s Balewadi Sports Complex. Gaayathri, who won Bronze medals at both Junior World Cups held in the year, shot 450.3 in the Finals to get the better of Kerala’s Elizabeth Susan Koshy who shot 445.3. Veteran shooter Anjali Bhagwat of Maharashtra won the Bronze shooting 431.9.

In the qualification, former Rifle Prone World Champion Tejaswini Sawant of Maharashtra had shot 586 to lead a field of eight women into the Final. Both Gaayathri and Elizabeth had shot 577 to qualify in fifth and fourth position respectively. Tejaswini, Anjali and Priyal Keni however secured the Team Gold in the event for Maharashtra shooting a combined score of 1729. Haryana and Tamil Nadu won Silver and Bronze respectively.

In the Junior Women’s 50m Rifle 3 Positions event, Haryana’s Aditi Singh shot 444.2 to strike Gold and pip Gaayathri, who managed 436.7 to settle for Silver. Interestingly, they had finished in the same order in the qualification as well shooting a score of 578 and 577 respectively. Dilreen Gill of Punjab won the Bronze shooting 422. Gaayathri’s second Gold of the day came in the Team Junior section where her Tamil Nadu team also comprising Sandhya and Srinithi totaled 1707 to win. Haryana won the Silver and Maharashtra won the Gold.

A day earlier Olympian and former world number one Heena Sidhu had also won her second Gold of the competition when she secured the Women’s 10m Pistol title after her 25m Pistol crown in the early days of the championship.