Shooter Vijayveer Sidhu strikes maiden individual senior gold at Buenos Aires World Cup

PUNE: Vijayveer Sidhu joined the World Cup gold brigade winning the 25m rapid fire event in Buenos Aires on Tuesday evening. Vijayveer, 22, who had participated in the Paris Olympics, had earlier won a World Cup silver and an individual gold was missing from the Chandigarh shooter’s cabinet.

Despite managing only one valid shot in the first series of five shots, the Indian shooter managed to top the 6-shooter final to win gold. Vijayveer scored 29 in the final. The silver medal was won by Italy’s Riccardo Mazzetti with 28 and bronze went to Yuhao Yang of China, who shot 23.

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This was the first big tournament that the shooter was participating in after the Paris Games, where he had finished ninth.

“There are days when you shoot well, like today (Tuesday), and then there are days when you can’t hit the target despite trying your best. I don’t think about it after that day. I am glad that I won gold but after tomorrow, this will be forgotten. Same for the Paris Games performance. I feel I did well but that was not my day,” he told TOI.

Vijayveer started shooting with his twin brother Udhayveer in 2012. Udhayveer is also an international pistol shooter and competes in the 10m air pistol and 50m events. The brothers started shooting with a rented pistol.

“It was their father’s dream to see Vijay and Udhay do well in the sport. We lived in Mansa in Punjab but shifted to Chandigarh for better facilities,” Vijayveer’s mother Rano, who is a history lecturer, told TOI.

Their father passed away in 2017. The loss made the brothers more determined to work hard and achieve their goals.

“It isn’t an easy sport to pursue financially. They rented a pistol in the initial four years of their career and could buy their own after they started doing well. To save money, they used to do dry practice (training without firing bullets or pellets). They both got selected in the Khelo India Games in 2019 and started getting stipends that gave us some relief,” the mother said.

Vijayveer is also supported by the Target Olympic Podium Scheme (TOPS).

About the Buenos Aires gold, Vijayveer said the scores were low because of the conditions. “It has been very windy here. I tried to negotiate the conditions better and I am glad I won the gold,” he said.

Vijayveer scored 579 to qualify for the final. Veteran armyman Gurpreet Singh and Paris Games participant Anish finished 10th and 13th respectively.

With Vijayveer’s gold, India went on top of the points table with 4 gold, 1 silver and 1 bronze. China is second with 3 gold, 2 silver and 3 bronze medals.

Silver in air rifle mixed team

In the 10m air rifle mixed event, the pair of Rudrankksh Patil and Arya Borse settled for silver after losing the gold medal match to Chinese pair of Buhan Song and Zifei Wang 9-17.

The other Indian pair of R Narmada and Arjun Babuta lost the bronze medal match 13- 17 to Argentine pair of Fernanda Russo and Marchello Gutierrez.


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