Telangana teenager Esha Singh prevailed over big names such as Manu Bhaker and Heena Sidhu to win three gold at the 62nd National Shooting Championships in Thiruvananthapuram on Thursday.
Esha upstaged quality fields on her way to sweeping the women's air pistol events.
Esha won the Women’s, Youth Women’s and Junior Women’s 10m Air Pistol competitions, leaving behind the likes of Heena, Manu and Shweta Singh in the process.
Esha shot 241.0 in the Women's final to leave behind Youth Olympic games champion Manu who finished with 238.9. Shweta, representing ONGC, won bronze with a score of 217.2.
Esha qualified seventh in the eight-woman finals field with a score of 573 in qualification. Manu topped with 578 and the final had such names as champion shooter Heena, former junior world champion Yashaswani Singh Deswal and India international Shri Nivetha among others.
Esha was third after five shot with a score of 48.9 and maintained it with a score of 119.7 after 12 rounds. She took the lead after 14 shots with a score of 139.6. At the end of 20 shots she was in the second position but finished strongly to take the gold. In all, the eight standard student of Bolton School in Secunderabad, had 16 10s in the entire 24 shots.
Esha made full use of her good form with a virtuoso performance in the Youth Women's and Junior Women's events and also got the better of Manu. In all Esha won five medals on Thursday.
(With inputs PTI)
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