Indian shooters dominate Games warm-up

Indian shooters have continued their medal-winning spree at the Australia Cup in Melbourne, marking themselves as the team to beat in Shooting during the Commonwealth Games.

Gagan Narang and Samresh Jung were the latest to bag gold medals, winning in the Men's Air Rifle and Free Pistol events respectively.

Gagan shot a score of 700.2 (597+103.2) to win his second gold in the competition, being held at the same venue as next month’s Commonwealth Games.

The top Indian marksman shot three perfect rounds in his series of 100, 100, 100, 99, 99 and 99 for his personal best score.

Olympian Abhinav Bindra, who did not compete in the final, was also impeccable in his effort in three of the six qualification rounds but totalled 593 (100, 97, 99, 100, 100, 97) to be content with eighth position.

Samresh fired 565 for the top place in the free pistol event while Vivek Singh, who was fourth after the qualification round, shot well in the finals to win bronze.

His victory comes a day after he picked up top honours in the Men's Air Pistol, firing 582 in the qualifying and 100.4 in the final rounds.

The silver in that events also went to India, Vivek Singh shooting 579+99.9.

Harveen Srao was impressive with her performance of 485.7 (389+96.7) in the Women's Air Pistol event.

And Pemba Tamang's effort of 575 followed by 192.7 in the Men's Fire Pistol was enough for the top place finish while Joydeep Karmakar (581+103.1) won the Men's Rifle Prone event.

India got off to a strong start at the event, with Jaspal Rana cracking the world record in the Centre Fire event, scoring 591 out of 600 on his way to bag the gold, ahead of compatriot Samresh Jun who shot 585 to win the silver.

But the record will not enter the official record books, with the Australia Cup outside of the International Sports Shooting Federation Calendar.

The Shooting program at the Melbourne 2006 Commonwealth Games will take place across three venues – the Melbourne Gun Club, the Wellsford Rifle Range and the Melbourne International Shooting Club – from 17 – 25 March.