Shardul Vihan became the third Indian teenager to win an Asian Games medal when he stunned an experienced field to win the silver in men’s double trap final on Thursday.
The 15-year-old from Meerut in Uttar Pradesh scored 73, just two short of gold medallist Shin Hyunwoo of Korea, to make the podium. He was in the lead till the first 40 shots.
Earlier in the qualification, he had topped the charts with a brilliant score of 141, shooting 28, 28, 29, 27, and 29 in five rounds. Ankur Mittal, the other Indian in the event, finished ninth with 134 points and didn’t make the cut in the six-man final.
In the final, the teenager started with a perfect round of 10/10. He missed a couple of shots in the next three series and fell second by a narrow margin. He kept his cool and kept shooting a consistent score but the Korean barely missed after that and the lead stayed.
In the series to decide the bronze medal, Vihan was tied second with the Qatari shooter Hamad Ali Am Marri but the 15-year-old pulled ahead to ensure a top-two finish.
Before the series to decide gold, Shin was just a point ahead but another miss from Vihan meant he had the silver.
At the 61st National Shooting Championship in 2017, the teenager came into the limelight when he won four gold medals in a single day. On that day, he bagged the gold in both the senior and junior men’s double trap individual and team event. In the men’s seniors, he got the better of world number one double trap shooter Ankur Mittal.
He is coached by former Asian Championship double gold medallist Anwer Sultan, after starting to compete in 2015.