Pilsen [Czech Republic], July 23 (ANI): Indian para-archers completed the World Archery Para Championships 2023 with three medals in Pilsen, Czech Republic, as per Olympics.com.
They have additionally secured six quota locations for the Paris 2024 Paralympics.
At the world championships, India’s medal complete included one gold, one silver, and one bronze, making it the all-time efficiency for the nation on Saturday. The earlier excessive for India was two silvers in Dubai final 12 months.
On Saturday, Sarita and Rakesh Kumar gained India’s first-ever gold medal within the World Archery Para Championships after clinching the highest podium within the compound combined group open occasion. The Indian duo beat Brazil’s Jane Gogel and Reinaldo Ferreira 152-146 within the ultimate.
Sarita additionally gained bronze within the compound ladies’s group occasion with Jyoti. They beat the Iranian pair of Farzaneh Asgari and Maryam Yavarpoor Shahrbabaki 147-142 within the bronze medal match.
Archer Sheetal Devi, solely 16, accounted for India’s solely particular person medal in Pilsen – a silver in ladies’s compound.
Sheetal, who shoots along with her foot, went on a dream run within the competitors earlier than being halted by Turkey’s Oznur Cure, the defending champion, by a 140-138 scoreline within the ultimate.
Having began archery coaching solely a couple of 12 months in the past, Sheetal is the primary feminine armless archer to win a silver medal on the para world championships.
Sarita additionally made the bronze medal match within the particular person ladies’s compound occasion however misplaced to Jane Gogel 142-139. It was Sheetal who defeated Sarita within the semi-finals.
Earlier within the rating rounds, Indian para archers set three world information and Sarita was a part of all of them. Sarita set the brand new world file within the ladies’s particular person compound with a rating of 697. Sarita and Sheetal’s mixed world file tally of 1386 helped them high ladies’s compound group {qualifications}.
Rakesh and Sarita paired as much as high the compound combined doubles rating spherical with a brand new world file rating of 1398.
Along with the medals, Sarita, Rakesh Kumar and Sheetal Devi additionally gained quota locations for the 2024 Paralympics in Paris for reaching the finals.
India gained three extra quota locations for Paris 2024 at Pilsen, courtesy males’s compound archer Shyam Sundar Swami, ladies’s recurve archer Pooja and males’s recurve archer Harvinder Singh, who can be a bronze medallist from the Tokyo 2020 Paralympics.
A complete of 13 Indian archers participated on the World Archery Para Championships Pilsen 2023. (ANI)