Asian Archery Championships: Ankita Bhakat, Abhishek Verma qualify in top-five
World championship medallist Jyothi Vennam was also in the top-five in the compound categories. Tokyo Olympian Pravin Jadhav was sixth.
India’s Ankita Bhakat and Abhishek Verma were among the top-five qualifiers on the opening day of the Asian Archery Championships 2021 in Dhaka, Bangladesh on Sunday.
Youth world champion Ankita Bhakat finished fifth in the individual recurve women’s qualifying with a score of 657.
Madhu Vedwan also scored 657 but hit 10s and bulls-eye 24 times compared to Ankita’s 26 and was thus placed sixth. India’s Ridhi and Komolika Bari finished seventh and eighth, respectively.
Ankita Bhakat, Madhu Vedwan and Ridhi will compete in the recurve women’s team event and are seeded second behind South Korea. With the top-two qualifiers receiving a bye in the quarter-finals, the Indian women’s team has been slotted directly in the semis.
In the individual recurve men, Kapil was the highest-placed Indian archer, finishing fifth with a total of 675.
Pravin Jadhav, who made his Olympics debut at Tokyo 2020, was sixth with 670. National champion Parth Salunke came in seventh with a score of 670 but hit 31 inner 10s as opposed to Pravin Jadhav’s 33. India’s Sukhchain Singh was placed 11th.
The trio of Parth Salunkhe, Pravin Jadhav and Kapil - as the three-highest placed Indians - will compete together in the recurve men’s team event and were placed second overall.
Indian compound archers impress in qualifying
Archery World Cup gold-medallist Abhishek Verma was placed fourth in the individual compound men’s event with a score of 707. However, he was overshadowed by Rishabh Yadav, who was third with 708.
Aman Saini and Mohit were 13th and 16th, respectively, in qualifying.
Rishabh Yadav, Abhishek Verma and Aman Saini will compete together in the compound men’s team event.
World championships silver-medallist Jyothi Vennam was the best Indian in the individual women’s compound, finishing fourth with a total of 701.
Parneet Kaur and Priya Gurjar finished with identical scores of 700 but Parneet, on the back of 24 shots in the 10s came in fifth ahead of Priya, who had 19 shots in the 10s and was sixth.
India’s Muskan Kirar was seventh with a score of 697.
Jyothi Vennam, Parneet Kaur and Priya Gurjar will take part in the compound women’s team.