Sarabjot Singh and Varun Tomar started India's home World Cup on a high, with a double podium finish in the first event of the International Shooting Sport Federation World Cup in Bhopal.
Sarabjot beat Ruslan Lunev of Azerbaijan 16-0 in the gold medal match of the men's 10m air pistol to give India their first gold medal while Tomar won bronze.
It was an end to end win for Sarabjot, who first topped the 60-shoof qualification round with a score of 585. In the 25-shot ranking round between the top eight, he topped again with a score of 253.2 before blanking his opponent in the gold medal match. The cherry on top was the perfect 10.9 on his final shot to win his first-ever World Cup medal in some style. Tomar, on the other hand, had a mixed campaign. At one stage it looked like it could be an all-India gold medal match, but finished with 250.3 to finish third. Sumit Raman, the third Indian in the field, shot 577 to finish 10th in qualification. In the women's 10m air pistol, China'a Li Xue won gold while Qian Wei won bronze, ensuring that both China and hosts India ended competition day one with an identical medal tally.
Among the Indians, Rhythm Sangwan and Manu Bhaker shot scores of 572 and 568 in qualification to finish 10th and 12th among medal contenders respectively.
The second competition day will see the air pistol shooters come back for their mixed team event on Thursday.