Elavenil Valarivan doubles gold, wins mixed 10m air rifle with Arjun Babuta

Elavenil Valarivan doubled her gold tally at the Asian Championships by adding the 10m air rifle mixed team medal on Saturday. Ela, who had won the women’s 10m air rifle individual gold with an Asian record on Friday, paired with her Paris Olympics teammate Arjun Babuta to win the mixed title. The duo defeated the Chinese pair of Xinlu Peng and Dingke Lu 17-11. “In the individual round, I was shooting with a new rifle but it seems it didn’t suit me well. I shot with my old rifle in this match and I could score well,” Arjun told TOI. Ela, who won the gold with a record Asian score, said she was feeling better after being under the weather. “I shot better in the qualification round today, though it could have been better in the final. I think Arjun pitched in at the right time. I am glad to have this medal,” she said. The Indian pair had made the cut for the gold-medal match after finishing first in the qualification round with a combined score of 634 (Elavenil 316.3, Arjun 317.7). The second in qualification round was another Indian pair of Rudrankksh Patil and Mehuli Ghosh. In a world event, Mehuli-Rudrankksh pair would have entered the gold-medal match. However, as per the Asian Shooting Confederation rules, only one team from one country can enter a medal round. Mehul and Rudrankksh totaled 632.6 (Mehuli 317.7, Rudrankksh 314.9). The two bronze medals went to the South Korean pair of Eunji Kwon and Hajun Park, who defeated the Kazakhstan duo of Yelizaveta Bezrukova and Nikita Shakhtorin 16-10. The second bronze was taken by Japan’s Hinata Taichi-Naoki Hanakawa, who defeated Iran’s Amirmohammad Nekounam-Shermineh Chehel 16-10. Peng-Dingke pair, being third in ranking, advanced to the gold-medal match. It was gold for India in the junior section as well. Shambhavi Kshirsagar and Pranav Naraen won gold after beating their Chinese opponents Huiqi Tang and Yinan Han 16-12. Shambhavi and Pranav were third in qualification, behind two Chinese teams.