Lima, April 22 (HS): On Monday, Simranpreet Kaur Barar won the silver medal in the women's 25-meter pistol event on the final day of the International Shooting Sports Federation (ISSF) World Cup, marking her first medal in her senior international career. The competition took place at the Las Palmas shooting range in Lima, Peru.

Indian shooter Simranpreet scored a total of 33 accurate shots in the final series of 10 rapid-fire shots. She finished just one point behind China's Sun Yujie, who won the gold medal in this event for the second consecutive time. Sun's compatriot Chinese, Yao Qianxun, secured the bronze medal with 29 points.

Earlier in the day, two-time Olympic medalist Manu Bhaker, mixed team pistol world champion Asha Singh, and Simranpreet—all three Indian shooters—delivered outstanding performances to qualify for the final.

In the qualifying round, Manu Bhaker scored 585 points to secure second place, Simranpreet scored 580 points for fifth place, and Asha Singh finished eighth with 575 points. Asha had previously won a silver medal in this event at the Argentina World Cup.

Three Chinese shooters also made it to the final, along with Germany's Doreen Vennekamp and multiple continental champion Andrea Perez Pena.

In the first series of the final, the Chinese players took the 1-2-3 positions, while the Indian shooters seemed to gain momentum in the second series. Simranpreet scored 4 points in the second series, and Asha scored 5 points in the third series.

After the sixth series, Manu and Simranpreet both earned 5 points, while Asha scored 4 points. Following this, the first shoot-off occurred between Manu, Asha, and Dorin, in which Asha was eliminated. In the next shoot-off, Manu defeated Dorin, pushing her into fifth place. By this time, Simranpreet had moved to 23 points, placing her between Sun (25 points) and Yao (22 points).

In the next series, Manu's luck seemed to abandon her, and by the end of the competition, there was only a one-point gap among the top three players.

This was India's fourth silver medal in this competition. In addition, India has also secured two gold medals and one bronze medal so far.

Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar