New Delhi, Dec 21 (PTI) Abhay Singh Sekhon beat Olympian Mairaj Ahmad Khan 20-19 in an exciting shoot-off in skeet competition of the National Shotgun selection trials 2 here on Thursday.

An epic 40-shot shoot-off, probably the longest ever in national domestic skeet shooting, played a vital role in separating Sekhon and Khan. Eventually, Sekhon beat Khan 20-19, after both were tied at 59-hits in the 60-shot finale.

Earlier during the day, Olympian Khan had topped the qualification round, also by a shoot-off win, with a tally of 122/125.

Sekhon from Punjab had made it to the top six with a fifth-place finish, registering a score of 119 before going down in a three-way shoot-off for bib numbers to Man Singh, who finished third in the final.

Among women in the same category, Parinaaz Dhaliwal won the final with 53-hits.

Like in the men’s final, Uttar Pradesh clinched the second place, with Areeba Khan scoring 52-hits.

Ganemat Sekhon made it a second double podium for Punjab with a tally of 42 in the final.

In the rifle/pistol trials, Paarth Makhija (Delhi) took the men’s 10m air rifle T1 trial honours with an effort of 251.3.

Olympian Aishwary Pratap Singh Tomar finished in second place with 250.9, while Sandeep Singh (Army) was third with 229.7.

The qualification round was topped by Samarveer Singh (Haryana), who tallied 631.7 over 60-shots.

In the wome’s 50m rifle 3 positions (3P) T1, world record holder Sift Kaur Samra recorded 462 for an easy victory.

Army Marksmanship Unit shooter Priya was second with 459.6, while Bhakti Bhaskar Khamkar (Maharashtra) was third with 447.7.

Sift’s top qualification score of 593 was just three below the world qualification record.

As for the men’s 25m rapid-fire pistol T2, Anish Bhanwala (Haryana) demolished the field with a classy effort for the second successive day.

Having won the T1 a couple of days earlier, he shot a supreme 592 to top the qualifications by a distance before shooting 31 with three series of perfect 5s in the final, making it two trial wins in two.

The final field was almost equivalent to T1, with new entrant Sameer finishing second with 26-hits and Abhinav Choudhary (Rajasthan) third with 22.

Udhayveer Sidhu, who was fourth in the final was second in qualification with a score of 580.

Source: PTI News