Arya-Arjun pair win ISSF World Cup gold

Munich

India’s Arya Borse and Arjun Babuta delivered a commanding performance to clinch the gold medal in the 10m air rifle mixed team event at the ISSF World Cup in Munich on Saturday, defeating China’s Zifei Wang and Lihao Sheng 17-7 in the final.

The Indian pair qualified for the gold medal match after scoring 635.2 in the qualification round, narrowly behind Wang and Sheng’s 635.9 — which equaled the qualification world record. In the qualification stage, Borse registered a score of 317.5, while Babuta shot 317.7.

Earlier this year, Borse had partnered with Rudrankksh Patil to claim silver in the same event at the World Cup in Lima, Peru. Meanwhile, the second Indian duo of Elavenil Valarivan and Ankush Jadhav finished sixth in the qualification round with a total score of 631.8.

Norway’s Jeanette Hegg Duestad and Jon-Hermann Hegg secured the bronze medal after edging out the USA’s Sagen Maddalena and Peter Matthew Fiori 16-14 in a closely-fought contest.

With this victory, India has now bagged four medals at the ongoing World Cup in Munich — two golds, including Suruchi Singh’s triumph, and two bronze medals won by Sift Kaur Samra and Elavenil Valarivan in their respective individual events earlier in the week.