ISSF World Cup Final 2024: Sonam Maskar opens India’s medal account with silver in 10m air rifle

India’s Sonam Maskar secured the silver medal in the women’s 10m air rifle shooting event at the ISSF World Cup Final 2024 in New Delhi on Tuesday.

The 22-year-old Indian shooter finished second, scoring 252.9 in the 10m air rifle final, behind Paris 2024 mixed team gold medallist Yuting Huang of the People’s Republic of China. Huang shot 254.5 for a new world record, eclipsing her compatriot Jiayu Han’s mark of 254.0 set at the Baku World Cup last year.

French shooter Oceanne Muller took home the bronze with a score of 231.1. India’s Tilottama Sen was sixth with a score of 167.7, behind former world record holder Jiayu Han, who placed fifth with a total of 188.5 at the Dr Karni Singh Shooting Range.

In the qualifying round, Sonam Maskar shot 632.1 for fourth place among 11 shooters. Tilottama Sen claimed seventh place with a total of 628.9 to make the final.

The top eight shooters advanced to the final. Germany’s Anna Anssen shot a qualifying world record of 636.9 but finished seventh in the final.

This was Sonam’s third medal at the ISSF World Cup. At the ISSF World Cup in Cairo earlier this year, Sonam combined with Arjun Babuta for a silver medal in the 10m air rifle mixed team and also claimed an individual silver in the 10m air rifle.

On Tuesday, competitions were held in the men’s and women’s 10m air rifle and 10m air pistol events. Each event featured two Indian shooters.

The women’s 10m air pistol event saw Olympian Rhythm Sangwan top the qualifying round but miss the podium after finishing fourth in the final, scoring 197.2. The gold medal went to Camille Jedrzejewski (240.8) of France while Heng Yu Liu (237.4) of Chinese Taipei and Hala Elgohari (215.7) of Egypt rounded off the podium.

Surbhi Rao, fourth in the qualifying round, came fifth in the women’s 10m air pistol final after shooting 176.6.

Arjun Babuta, who finished fourth in the men’s 10m air rifle at the Paris 2024 Olympics, scored 188.3 for fifth place at the ISSF World Cup Final in the same event. Tokyo Olympian Divyansh Singh Panwar was the first to face elimination in the men’s 10m air rifle final after scoring 124.0.

Paris 2024 Olympian Arjun Singh Cheema finished eighth in the men’s 10m air pistol final with a score of 109.9 while Varun Tomar could not make the final after finishing 10th in the qualifying round.

Competitions in the ISSF World Cup Final are being held across rifle, pistol and shotgun categories. The season-ending event will conclude on Thursday.