Indian shooter Sift Kaur Samra secured her first individual ISSF World Cup gold medal in the women’s 50m rifle 3 positions final in Buenos Aires, Argentina on Friday. The 23-year-old world record holder from Faridkot overcame a 7.2-point deficit to claim India’s first gold of the season-opening World Cup stage event.
Samra finished with 458.6 points in the 45-shot final, while Germany’s Anita Mangold took silver with 455.3 points. Kazakhstan’s Arina Altukhova earned bronze with 445.9 points, exiting after the 44th shot.
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The victory helped India move to second place in the standings with a gold and a bronze medal, following Chain Singh’s earlier bronze in the men’s 3P event. China currently leads the standings with a gold and silver medal each.
Samra qualified in first place with a score of 590, surpassing notable competitors including Olympic champions Chiara Leone and Nina Christen from Switzerland, who failed to reach the top eight. Olympic medalists Alexandria Le of Kazakhstan and Mary Tucker of the US also missed the qualifying cut.
Despite a challenging start in the Kneeling position, Samra found her rhythm in the Prone position, reducing the gap with leader Nele Stark to 4.3 points while remaining in eighth place. She made a remarkable comeback in the Standing position, scoring 52.3 in the first series to climb to joint third.
Samra took the lead with a steady second series score of 51.2. She maintained her composure to finish with scores of 10.5, 10.3, 10.5, 10.0, and 9.7 for a commanding victory.
In the Skeet competitions, Paris Olympian Raiza Dhillon emerged as India’s top performer after four qualification rounds. Dhillon holds sixth place with a total of 94 points after rounds of 25, 22, 24, and 23, just two points behind the leader.
Other Indian shooters in the women’s skeet include Ganemat Sekhon in 11th place with 92 points and Darshna Rathore in 18th with 89 points. In the men’s skeet, Bhavtegh Gill scored 94 for 18th position, while Anant Jeet Singh Naruka and Gurjoat Khangura scored 93 and 91 respectively.
The final round of 25 targets and the finals for both men’s and women’s skeet events will be held on Saturday.
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