India’s Akhil Sheoran clinches Gold at the ISSF World Cup

Indian shooters have always been regarded as the pride of the country, as the likes of the current sports minister Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore, Abhinav Bindra and Gagan Narang have proved at the biggest stage in the years gone by. So as tradition dictates, the current crop of young Indian shooters like 16-year old Manu Bhaker and 20-year old Anjum Moudgil have also managed to do the country proud at the ongoing ISSF World Cup.

Another Indian youngster in the form of 22-year old Akhil Sheoran has managed to bag a Gold medal for the Indian contingent at the World Cup in Mexico. Sheoran shot 455.6 points in total in the men's 50m Rifle 3-Position event to emerge as the winner. He finished 3.6 points ahead of second-placed Bernhard Pickl of Austria. Hungarian counterpart Istvan Peni got 442.3 points in total as he took home the Bronze medal at the event.

Sheoran was the youngest amongst the three Indian shooters who qualified for the finals of the vent, along with veteran’s Sanjeev Rajput and Swapnil Kusale, but he didn’t let that hamper his impressive display. Rajput himself missed out on Bronze as he shot 430.9 points, which meant he was 11.4 points short of Peni’s total of 442.3. Kusale, on the other hand, ended the tournament in sixth place as he shot a total of 407.2 points.

22-year-old Sheoran, who hails from Uttar Pradesh, managed to get 151.6 points in kneeling, 155.1 in prone and 148.9 in the standing elimination round of the shooting event. Although silver medalist Pickl took 151.9 points in the kneeling rounds, the Austrian was far behind Sheoran in the prone rounds, as he collected 152.1 points in total which proved to be the difference between the two.

In the standing singles shots, Sheoran shot scores of 9.3, 10.8, 9.4, 9.5 and 10.5 - which amounted to a total of 49.5. This helped Sheoran bag India's ninth medal in total so far in this edition of the shooting World Cup.

Meanwhile, teenager Manu Bhaker missed out on another medal at the World Cup, as she finished fifth in the women's 25m pistol.