Indian shooters dominated the country’s medal rush on Day 4 of the competitions at the 19^th Asian Games claiming two gold, three silver and two bronze medals with a world and Asian record for Sift Kaur Samra, en-route to her top-of-the-podium finish in the women’s 50m rifle 3 position event.

Sailor Vishnu Saravanan claimed a bronze in the men’s ILCA 7 dinghy to aggregate India’s overall tally to 22 medals.

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Samra nailed the women’s 50m Rifle 3 Positions (3P) gold with a world record score of 469.6 in the final. She also won a team silver in the event, even as the 25m Pistol women picked up a team gold and Esha Singh and Anant Jeet Singh Naruka won silvers in the Women’s 25m Pistol and Skeet Men’s competitions respectively.

Ashi Chouksey picked up three medals at the Games, winning bronze in the Women’s 3P with a score of 451.9 and the Indian Men’s Skeet team also won a bronze to round-off a fruitful day.

Earlier, the trio of Manu Bhaker, Esha Singh and Rhythm Sangwan dished out a clinical performance to bag the gold in the women’s 25m Pistol team event. Bhaker also topped qualification in the women’s 25m pistol event, with Esha finishing in fifth place and Rhythm taking seventh. The Chinese bagged the silver medal with 1756, while the shooters from South Korea settled for the third position with a total score of 1742.

Esha also bagged a silver medal in the women’s 25m pistol event even as Manu Bhaker missed out on a medal spot, eventually finishing fifth. China’s Rui, who also has set an Asian Games record, took the top spot on the podium.

Earlier in the women’s 3P final, Sift and Ashi combined with Manini Kaushik to ensure a second place for India on the podium. Sift and Ashi made the eight-woman final after the 60-shot qualification round of 20-shots in each of the Kneeling, Prone and Standing positions. Sift was second, a few inner 10s behind China’s Xia Siyu, as both broke the Asian and Games record with a sizzling 594. Ashi was sixth with 590 while Manini Kaushik’s 580 for 18th spot, meant that the Indian trio finished nine behind China’s 1773 in the team event to take silver. South Korea bagged the bronze with a total score of 1756.

Meanwhile, at the Shotgun ranges, the Men’s Skeet team also won a team bronze as Anant Jeet Singh Naruka, Gurjoat Khangura and Angad Vir Singh Bajwa totalled 355 to finish behind China and Qatar. Anant Jeet had moved on to the individual final with a qualification round score of 121, which saw him finish fourth. Also, in the top six was Kuwaiti 60-year-old legend Abdullah Al-Rashidi and Qatari legend Nasser Al-Attiya.

Anant Jeet also took the individual silver in men’s Skeet competition after finishing second behind Kuwait’s 60-year-old Abdullah Alrashidi with a two-shot deficit to the Kuwaiti world record score of a perfect 60.

Elsewhere, Vishnu Saravanan ended India’s sailing campaign with a bronze in the men’s ILCA 7 dinghy. With a net score of 34, Vishnu finished behind Singapore’s Lo Jun Han Ryan (gold) and Ha Jeemin of Korea (silver) with respective scores of 26 and 33.

Meanwhile, in wushu, India’s Roshibina Devi guaranteed at least a silver medal after beating Vietnam’s Thi Thu Thuy Nguyen 2-0 in the women’s 60Kg semifinal. Roshibina has already won a bronze in the 2018 Jakarta edition. Earlier, Rohit Jadhav finished in eighth place in the wushu men’s Daoshu final.

In boxing, reigning World and CWG champion Nikhat Zareen recorded a thumping 5-0 Unanimous Decision verdict win over Korea’s Chorong Bak in their Round of 16 bout to make her way into the quarterfinals of the women’s boxing 50kg division.

However, it was the end of the campaign for the men’s duo of six-time Asian championships medallist Shiva Thapa (63.5kg) and former Asian champion Sanjeet (92kg).

While Thapa crashed out of the Round of 16 after losing the Round of 16 tie against Kyrgyzstan’s Askat Kultaev 0-5 on points, Sanjeet suffered an identical loss in the men’s 92kg category Rd of 16 bout. The 26-year-old from Haryana, who won a gold medal at the Asian Championships back in 2019, lost the tie by a 0-5 margin against his Uzbek opponent, Lazizbek Mullojonov.

In tennis, India’s Ramkumar Ramanathan and Saketh Myneni assured themselves of a medal after beating Chinese pair Zhang Zhizhen and Wu Yibing 6-1, 7-6 in the quarterfinals of the men’s doubles event. However, the country’s campaign ended in men’s singles after Sumit Nagal lost his quarterfinal fixture.

In swimming, Nina Venkatesh failed to qualify for the women’s 100m butterfly final, finishing 14th in the heats.