National shooting championship: Manu Bhaker defends 10m air pistol title

Haryana's Manu Bhaker was crowned the women's 10m air pistol champion for the second successive time. However, she shoots 241.6 in the final of the ongoing 64th National Shooting Championship here on Saturday. Bhaker has now won three of the last four nationals in the event, losing once to Esha Singh in the 62nd edition of the tournament.

Esha won the bronze in the event behind the second-placed Shri Nivetha of Tamil Nadu. But Bhaker could not be dislodged in the senior category. Bhaker had made it to the eight-woman final with a fifth-place finish in qualifying and a score of 576.

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Esha had topped the qualifiers with a solid 582. In the final thought, Bhaker was in her elements from the get-go, leading from start to finish to leave Nivetha 1.7 points behind after the allotted 24-shots. Esha bowed out third with 215.4.

In the qualifying stage of the National Shooting Championship, Esha Singh topped the field with 582 points. Meanwhile, Manu Bhaker (576) was the fifth-best shooter. The top eight from the qualifiers made it to the finals.

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On Thursday, Bihar's Shreyashi Singh won the women's trap event held at the New Moti Bagh Gun Club Ranges in Patiala, Punjab.

Shreyashi Singh, the reigning Commonwealth Games double trap champion. She scored 34 in the finals, beating Madhya Pradesh's Pragati Dubey (31) and ONGC's Shagun Chowdhary (27). This was Shreyashi's fifth national title overall and second in women's trap.