Olympian ShagunChowdhary wins women's trap at shooting nationals

Shagun Chowdhary, the first Indian woman trap shooter to win an Olympic berth, bagged her national women's trap champion crown at the 61st National Shooting Championship here on Thursday.

Shagun of ONGC, overcame the challenge from Punjab's Rajeshwari Kumari, to prevail 41-38 in the final.

Defending champion Shreyasi Singh, representing Bihar, came in third with a final round score of 29.

The day began with Shreyasi leading the qualification round and went on to top the list of qualifiers with a score of 72 while Shagun with 67 qualified third and Rakeshwari shot 62 to qualify in fourth place for the six-woman final.

N. Nivetha of Tamil Nadu, who was also one of the finalists in the senior Women's Trap, won the Junior Women's title in the same event shooting 37.

She got the better of Shefali Rajak of Madhya Pradesh in a shoot-off after both had ended the final on the same score.

Delhi's Soumya Gupta came in third with 26 to claim Bronze.

Overall, it was a good day for the states of Punjab and Madhya Pradesh as Rajeshwari led a team comprising of Sukhreet Kaur and Inaya Vijaya Singh to claim the Women's Team Trap Gold as well while Madhya Pradesh won medals both in the senior and junior women's team events besides Shefali's individual Silver.

In the Men's Trap event, former world champion Manavjit Singh Sandhu continued to lead the qualification field at the end of day two of the competition, shooting 73 out of 75.

Indian internationals Zoravar Singh Sandhu and Kynan Chenai were also in line for qualification, standing at third and fourth respectively with scores of 71.

Friday will see the Men's Trap finals at the Shotgun nationals.

-ANI