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The week in Indian sports

SHOOTING
Abhinav Bindra gets Olympic berth
Andorra, July 4:

New Delhi, July 22: India will have at least two shooters at the Sydney Olympics in September with teenaged air rifle shooter Abhinav Bindra landing a berth on Friday. The 18-year-old Chandigarh lad's trip was clinched with the International Sports Shooting Federation granting a wild card for the men's air rifle event. The world body's intimation by fax was received by the National Rifle Association of India. Men's trap shooter Anwar Sultan, who earned India a qualifying berth by winning silver at the Asian meet in Langkawi, Malaysia in January, is already confirmed to travel Down Under.

The wild card follows brilliant performances by Bindra, including his shooting 596 out of a possible 600 points in the World Cup in Munich last month. The effort equalled the junior world record. The shooter, hailed a big talent, in fact was at the top entering the final but one poor round in the final spoiled his medal chances as he finished fourth by an agonising 0.1 point margin. He had shot other scores of over 590, which proved crucial in gaining the nod from the ISSF.

India has made a representation for wild cards in the men's trap, women's air rifle and men's air pistol and the NRAI is still hopeful of landing more berths for Sydney. They also feel there is a bright chance for Anjali Vedpathak to gain a berth through a hardship quota in the women's air rifle, where she has come up with a series of brilliant efforts of late. "Some countries are returning their extra quotas. Even the air rifle berth was decided by ISSF pretty early and we can't rule out more," NRAI spokesman Rajiv Bhatia said.

In men's trap, young Manavjit Singh, veteran Mansher Singh and Zorawar Singh are in the reckoning if India gain a wild card. Pistol ace Jaspal Rana, who took part in the 1996 Atlanta Games thanks to a wild card, expects one for the men's air pistol. ISSF is expected to make their decision in a week's time.

Bindra is credited with nerves of steel like Rana. India's Hungarian rifle coach Laszlo Szucsak said recently that his effort of 596 was a great step. "There are 10-15 who are capable of scoring higher. Consistency is the key, but Abhinav has the talent and our job is to prepare him for the Games."

Meanwhile, Deepali Deshpande finished a creditable tenth in air rifle with a score of 393 in the World Cup shooting championship in Atlanta. Deepali had a series of 97, 98, 100 and 98. The gold went to Cho Hyun Kang of Korea who equalled the World record with a 399 out of 400, and followed it up with a 100.6 in the final. Emily Caruso of the US missed the gold by 0.1 point. Dae Young Choi of Korea took the bronze.

In the men's air pistol event, Jaspal Rana shot a 575 out of 600 to finish joint 18th. Jaspal had a series of 96, 97, 94, 96, 100 and 92. Frank Dumoulin of France took the gold with a 687.6. Viglio Fait of Italy and Artur Gevorgjan of Germany won the silver and bronze with totals of 684.8 and 684.4, respectively. With a below par fare in the last World Cup before the Olympics, Jaspal has virtually ruled himself out of the race for the hardship quota for the Sydney Games. Jaspal had shot 582 twice in World Cups.

BOXING
Indian team wins Test series
Mauritius, July20: An Indian boxing squad comprising second string seniors and some top juniors won a three-Test series 2-0 and drew 6-all in a dual competition against the Mauritius national team during a training-cum-competition stint at St Louis from July 6 to 18. In the dual meet held on July 15 against the Mauritius national squad, which included three qualifiers for the Sydney Olympics, junior pugilist Santosh Thakur beat senior rival Boosan Dutta Rajcoomar on points in the 48 kg class. In the 57 kg category, Praveen Kumar downed fellow junior Michael Medov on points.

India lost all three bouts against the Olympic qualifiers. In 54 kg, Zotham Mawia went down on points to Riaz Durgahed while Narendra Rana, who had narrowly failed to clinch an Olympic qualifying spot himself, also went down on points to Giovanni Frontin in the 60 kg division. In the plus 91 kg class, Harpreet Singh, an 81 kg pugilist, entered in the higher class to provide competition to the hosts, lost when the referee stopped the contest in the second round against Michael Macaque of Mauritius.

Team manager Ashok Mukherjee said the trip, under the cultural exchange programme, was to provide useful competition for the host boxers. "Our juniors proved too good against their age-group boxers and then they included all seniors in the competition," he said. The Indian management accepted this as they found the leeway was not too much, Mukherjee added.

In the first Test on July 9, India were 1-3 down in terms of bouts fought, but received two walkovers to finish on level. In the next on July 11, it was 4-1 in India's favour, with two of the three seniors winning while the final Test was by and large one-sided with the margin being 4-2. The Indian squad included three coaches Chandralal, Kulwinder Singh (both SAI) and S N Mishra (RSPB), Rajan Sharma (Referee-judge, J and K) and Dr P S M Chandran (doctor - SAI).

Meanwhile, an eight-member Indian squad, including the four who have qualified for Sydney, will complete its five-week stint in Cuba with the Cardin Cardova competition in Havana this week. Light-fly Suresh Singh, Ng Dingko Singh (bantam), Jitender Kumar (middle) and Gurcharan Singh (light-heavy), who made it to the Olympics alongwith Md Ali Qamar (lt-fly), Dalbir Singh (fly), K Sanjit Singh (lt welter) and Jeevan Fernandez (middle) are those undergoing the training-cum-competition scheme.

ATHLETICS
4 national marks as third circuit meet

Bangalore, July 17: Four new national records were set in the third domestic circuit athletics meet at the Sree Kanteerava stadium in Bangalore last week. For the first time at the national level mandatory dope tests were conducted on the each winner and runner-up at the meet. The move follows the recent outburst by veteran P.T.Usha who said no new national records should be ratified unless it is ensured that they are the result of 'clean' performances. Five new national marks including one Asian record were set at the second circuit meet at Bangalore on the July 5. Two of those belonged to Usha.

Ishtiaq Ahmed became the first Indian to cross the 70-metre barrier in the hammer throw at the meet. His best effort of 70.13 metres erased his own previous mark of 69.58 metres set at Trivandrum last year. Although Ishtiaq's effort was well short of the qualifying norm laid down for the Olympics he is confident of improving the distance even more in the coming months. The most spectacular national record of the day fell to Anil Kumar in the 200 metres. Anil had broken his own 100 metre record at the second circuit meet and gave the event a miss to attack the 200 metre mark. The move paid off as he shot off the blocks to record a time of 20.73. In the process he became the first Indian sprinter to break the 21-second barrier and also smashed Ajay Raj Singh's national mark of 21.04 seconds, set at Lucknow last year.

The third national record of the day fell to Gurmeet Kaur in the women's Javelin throw. Gurmeet, who had set a new mark of 58.00 metres recently at an international meet in Kiev, bettered her own mark with a throw of 58.64 metres. The men's short relay team completed the tally of national records by crossing the finish line in 40.02 seconds.

Besides the new national records, there were several other notable performances at the meet. Shakti Singh, who had set an new Asian mark of 20.60 metres at the second meet in the Shot Put showed that he is in prime form going into te Asian Track and Field championships in Jakarta at the end of August. The 39-year-old won the event with a best effort of 20.31metres. Notably, he had two other throws of over 20 metres on the day. In the Discus throw, Asian Games silver medallist Anil Kumar came up with a stellar show to claim top honours with a distance of 59.65 metres. The Javelin event was won by the ever improving B.S. Dubey who threw a distance of 77.47 metres, edging out national record holder Satbir Singh who could only manage 73.10 metres with his best effort.

On the track, Rajiv Balakrishnan took full advantage of Anil Kumar's absence to take the race in a slow 10.46 seconds. In the absence of Paramjeet Singh and P.Ramachandran, K.Manoj Lal won the 400 metres in a time of 46.41 seconds. Gulab Chand won the 1500 metres in 3:53.23 seconds.

On the distaff side, Neelam J. Singh threw her most consistent series of the season to take the Discus throw with an effort of 61.30 metres, marginally short of her own national record. All her six efforts on the day were over 58 metres with three efforst crossing 60 metres, which is encouraging news ahead of the Asian Track and Field championships. In the hammer, Jibeshwari Devi could not complete a hat-trick of national records after improving her marks at the previous two meets but still won with a distance of 55.08 metres. G.G. Pramila won the women's long jump with a personal best of 6.54 metres. On the track, Rachita Mistry could not repeat her national record breaking effort of the previous meet in the 100 metres and took the title in 11.53 seconds.