Thirteen-year-old Esha Singh went to the 62nd National Shooting Championship with an aim to execute what she has learnt for the last four years.
She will return with five medals, including three gold and bragging rights after beating the likes of Commonwealth Games and Youth Olympics medallist Manu Bhaker twice among a plethora of other Indian stars.
“I didn’t think so much about whom I was shooting with. I just tried to focus on my job as pressure started to build in the final,” said Esha, who clinched the Air Pistol junior, youth and women’s gold in Thiruvananthapuram on Thursday.
The Telangana shooter shot 241.0 in the women’s final to leave behind Bhaker, who finished second with 238.9. Shweta Singh, representing ONGC, won bronze with a score of 217.2.
Esha qualified seventh in the eight-woman field with a score of 573 in qualification. Manu topped with a 578 and the final had such names as champion shooter Heena Sidhu, former junior world champion Yashaswani Singh Deswal and India international Shri Nivetha among others.
Esha, a product of Gun for Glory’s Project Leap, took up shooting at the age of 9 after watching a friend of her father shoot and was picked for advance training at the Hyderabad centre two years ago.
“I tried my hand with various sports but liked the way it felt when I shot,” said the daughter of a national level rally driver.
Esha made full use of her good form with a virtuoso performance in the youth women’s and junior women’s events as well, where again she got the better of Manu in the latter and pushed her to third in the other.
Esha won a total of five medals on the day to turn out as the absolute star of the day.
In the day’s other events, Army’s Satyendra Singh won the Men’s 50m Rifle 3 Positions crown leaving behind Haryana’s Sanjeev Rajput. Satyendra shot 454.1 in the finals to Sanjeev’s 452.5. Air Force’s Parul Kumar shot 442.4 to clinch the Bronze medal.