New Delhi witnessed a remarkable display of superiority by India in the 10m air rifle junior women’s event at the ISSF Junior World Cup 2025, held at Dr. Karni Singh Shooting Range on Monday, achieving a clean sweep of the podium. Ojasvi Thakur claimed the championship with a score of 252.7, impressively firing two 10.9s on her 8th and 16th shots to secure the gold medal. Her teammate Hrudya Shri Kondur took home the silver with a score of 250.2, while Shambhavi S. Kshirsagar, who led in qualification, rounded out the Indian podium with a score of 229.4.
The trio had previously dominated the qualification round, finishing as the top three, with Shambhavi leading at 632.0, followed closely by Ojasvi at 631.9 and Hrudya at 629.8. Croatia’s Anamarija Turk, despite qualifying eighth, was the nearest competitor but finished fourth in the final with 206.6. The other finalists included Individual Neutral Athletes Lidiia Vasileva (184.5), Varvara Kardakova (164.2), and Mariia Kruglova (142.8), alongside Slovakia’s Kamila Novotna (122.1). In the men’s 10m air rifle junior final, India’s Himanshu, who had topped the qualification with 633.7, maintained his performance to win gold with a remarkable 250.9. Individual Neutral Athlete Dmitrii Pimenov secured silver with 249.9, while India’s Abhinav Shaw earned bronze with 228.4.
Another Indian competitor, Naraen Pranav Vanitha Suresh, finished fifth with 187.0. AIN’s Kamil Nuriakhmetov finished fourth with 208.3, while his teammate Sergei Novoselov took sixth with 165.9. Croatia’s Darko Tomasevic (144.8) and Oman’s Khalid Mohammed Ali Khalaf Al Kalbani (123.5) completed the lineup. The men’s 25m rapid fire pistol junior final concluded with a thrilling finish as individual athlete Aleksandr Kovalev of AIN edged out India’s Mukesh Nelavalli in a shoot-off for the gold medal. Both competitors ended with 27 hits, but Kovalev triumphed 3-1 in the decider. Mukesh, who qualified third with 571-20x, settled for silver, while India managed a double podium as Suraj Sharma, the qualification leader with 577-15x, took bronze with 21 hits.
Sameer finished fourth with 15 hits, while Great Britain’s Toby Aberdeen (10) and AIN’s Georgii Tarasov (7) completed the field.
