India tops in Commonwealth shooting

India won the fourth Commonwealth shooting championship, finishing at the top of the medal tally with 13 golds, on Friday, the concluding day, in Bisley, England.

India won four more medals on Friday to take their tally to 13 gold, six silver and eight bronze and finish ahead of Australia and England.

Jaspal Rana won the gold in the Centrefire Pistol on Friday to take his medal haul in the championships to five -- four gold and one bronze.

Abhinav Bindra, who won two gold, Anjali Vedpathak (three gold and a silver) and Kuheli Ganguly (two silver and one bronze) along with Rana emerged as India's star performers.

India also set three new championship marks, through Bindra, in the 10m Air rifle, Vedpathak, in Sport Rifle, and the Air Rifle men's team event, national coach Prof Sunny Thomas informed from Bisley.

In the centrefire pistol, Rana took the gold with 583 points. Pengelly of Wales won the silver with 575 points and Yelavic was third with 570 points.

India's Ved Prakash scored 569 to miss the bronze by a single point and Naresh Kumar finished with 568.

In the 3-Position men's event, A P Subhaiah won the silver with a best score 99.8 points in the final. He missed the gold, which went to Australia's M Brown (1249.4 points), as he could manage only 1153 going into the finals for a combined score of 1235.8.

Kuheli Ganguly missed the silver in the women's 50 metre Rifle Prone and had to settle for the bronze. Kuheli scored 586 with scores of 96 97 99 98 98 and 98 to tie with Lindsell Susan of Australia (95 97 100 98 98 and 98) but lost the second place in the count back.

With the two tied on identical scores of 98 in the last three rounds. Kuheli lost the silver as her score was 99 in the third round to Lindsell's 100.

England's Linda Smallbone won the gold with a score of 587.

Sushama Rana won India's second bronze of the day in women's Sport Pistol event. She finished on the podium with a superb effort in the final after languishing behind with a first round score of 560.

Sushama fired 99 in the final for a combined score of 659 pipping Jones of Australia who was third after the intial round with a score of 564.

Linda Ryon of Australia won the gold with 681.6 points (581, 100.6) and her compatirot Mckinsey took the silver with a total of 663.1 (566, 97.1).

India's Saroja Kumari finished fourth with a combined score of 656.1 (556, 100.1).

In the men's skeet, Harinder Singh Bedi failed to make the final even after a superb effort of 118/125. The cut-off score for the final being 120.

Two other Indians in the fray, Sandeep Mann and Hari Simran Singh Sandhu finished with scores of 115 and 110 respectively.