New Delhi: India capped off a successful week at the ISSF Junior World Cup Rifle/Pistol/Shotgun New Delhi 2025 as the leading nation on the medals table, adding a silver in the junior women’s 25m pistol through Tejaswani Singh, who won gold at Suhl junior world cup, on final day of the competition, at Dr. Karni Singh Shooting Range here on Wednesday.
Individual Neutral Athlete Aleksandra Tikhonova claimed the junior women’s 25m pistol gold, while Czechia’s Tereza Zaviskova and Tomas Nantl edged compatriots Lea Kucerova and Kamil Bednar to win the Trap mixed team junior gold.
Tikhonova was steady from the start in the 25m pistol women junior final, hitting 33 to secure gold. Tejaswani, who had dominated the qualification with 580-17x, kept pace but finished with silver on 30, while Italian athlete Alessandra Fait completed the podium with 28.
Among other Indians in the final, Naamya Kapoor (21) finished fourth, and Riya Shirish Thatte (16) was fifth. Individual Neutral Athlete Iuliia Tretiakova was sixth with 9, while her teammate Viktoriia Kholodnaia finished seventh with 4. USA’s Mehr Chanda rounded off the final in eighth place with 1 hit.
The trap mixed team junior final produced a close all-Czech duel, with Zaviskova and Nantl edging compatriots Lea Kucerova, who won trap women junior gold yesterday, and Kamil Bednar 39–38 for gold.
European junior champions Irene Del Rey Ruiz and Isaac Hernandez from Spain defeated Italy’s Sofia Gori and Luca Gerri 7–6 in a shoot-off to win bronze after a 40–40 tie in the bronze medal match. India’s Addya Katyal and Arjun narrowly missed the bronze medal match by a single hit, finishing fifth with 136, while Bhavya Tripathi and Arya Vansh Tyagi ended tenth on 132.
In the 25m pistol men junior individual, a non-Olympic event, junior world champion Mukesh Nellavalli from India built on his precision stage score of 289-9x from yesterday with a superb 296-14x in rapid fire to finish with 585-23x for gold.
AIN’s Aleksandr Kovalev, already a 25m rapid fire pistol champion earlier in the competition, took silver with 577-17x, and Sahil Choudhary ensured another medal for India with bronze on 573-21x.
India finished on top of the medals table with 19 medals in the Olympic events, including 6 gold, 8 silver, and 5 bronze. AIN followed in second place with 10 medals (4 gold, 2 silver, 4 bronze), while Italy was third with 5 medals (2 gold, 2 silver, 1 bronze). In addition, India added 2 gold, 2 silver, and 3 bronze medals in the non-Olympic events of 50m rifle prone (men and women) and 25m pistol men junior individual.
A total of eight countries won medals across seven competition days, with five: India, AIN, Italy, Croatia, and Czechia, securing gold.
The 11th edition of the ISSF Junior World Cup, and the first ever hosted in India, featured 208 shooters from 19 federations across 15 Olympic medal events and three non-Olympic medal events.
Other Indians in action:
25m Pistol Women Junior Qualification
Divanshi – 568-15x (6th)
Payal Kuldeep Khatri – 564-13x (8th)
25m Pistol Men Junior Individual
Sameer Gulia – 573-19x (4th)
Somil Chaudhary – 572-15x (5th)
Raghav Verma – 572-13x (7th)
(IANS)
