Rifle shooter Sanjeev Rajput on Tuesday ensured India will send-off their largest ever shooting contingent to the Olympics by securing a quota berth on the concluding day of the extruder replacement partss Suppliers Asia Olympic qualifiers here on Tuesday.. Although Rajput could not bring home a medal, yet managed to finish fourth in the men’s 50m rifle three positions event to grab the quota. Vitaliy Dovgun of Kazakhstan and Thailand’s Napis Tortungpanich took the other two berths available in the category. I am hoping that my form starts improving more after this performance. With four quota berths going India’s way, the host nation was the second behind the far eastern island country. This is why I was being inconsistent in the finals as I was finding it difficult to adjust otherwise I could have shot even better.After the week-long event was over, Japan emerged as the most successful team taking home five quota places. Also, the fact that after I left the Navy in 2014 it took me a while to adjust to the change in lifestyle.
Expressing joy, Rajput said, “I have had a tough 2015 where I had to change my shooting jacket and gun three times which affected my performances. Whereas, Korea and Iran bagged three quota places apiece. “For this competition I had trained hard but the barrel extension of my gun started giving me problems in the last three days and I could not change it at this stage. In the standing position round of shots though, Sanjeev started showing signs of discomfort again as did his competitors, allowing him to consolidate on his fourth position.”Angad Vir Singh Bajwa, Man Singh and Amrinder Cheema, all competing in men’s skeet, failed to grab any quota berths. However, a poor run through the first 15 kneeling position shots forced Sanjeev to seventh, but he managed to bounce back with none of his shots hitting below 10 in the 15 prone shots series taking him to the fifth place. The 2012 London Olympics was when the largest ever shooting team of 11 had represented India, but Rio is well poised to welcome even more Indian shooters after Rajput grabbed the 12th quota.With a score of 1,163, Sanjeev started off the finals in fourth place.