New Delhi: India’s Zoravar Singh Sandhu defied age and conditions to win trap bronze at the ISSF World Championship (Shotgun) in Athens, Greece on Friday.
The 48-year-old finished behind former Olympic champion and world champion Josip Glasnovic of Croatia, who won gold with 44-hits, and junior world champion Andres Garcia of Spain who bagged silver with a score of 39.
Zoravar shot down 31 of the first 40-targets in the 50-shot final despite rain and fading light at the Malakasa shooting range. The seasoned trap shooter delivered his career’s best performance, 27 years after making his debut at the senior world championships.
A medal in the championship came 19 years after Olympian Manavjit Singh Sandhu became trap world champion in Zagreb in 2006. Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore had won the bronze in the double trap event in 2003.
“It was a great experience. It was a tough range, tough conditions to shoot but that’s how it is and here we are. I would like to thank my family and my coaches and teammates for their support,” said a Zoravar.
In the qualification, Zoravar scored 122 (24,25,25,25,23) over five rounds. Former world championship silver medalist Anton Glasnovic equaled the world record with a perfect score of 125, to top the table. Anton’s brother Josip qualified second with 124, while American world number two William Hinton was sole third with 123. Zoravar, Andreas Garcia and Frenchman Antonin Desert went into a three-way shoot-off. The Indian was placed sixth and last shooter in the final after the shoot off.
In the final, Zoravar missed his second target but hit nine out of the first 10 to be placed fifth in the initial stages. After the first 15 shots, Zoravar was tied second with 13 hits when rain started. The Indian had three misses over the next 10 shots, but survived as world number two Hinton was first to exit after 25 targets.
Desert was next out and Anton missed four of his last 10 shots to bow out in fourth after 35 targets, assuring Zoravar of a world championship medal.
NRAI president Kalikesh Narayan Singh Deo called it a historic moment for Indian shooting.
“Zoravar helped us win only a second individual world championship medal in trap. It shows the level of confidence of our shooting squad.”
