ASTANA(KAZAKHSTAN): Shooter Maheshwari Chauhan capped a stellar performance on the fifth day of the ongoing 7th Asian Championship Shotgun by bagging an individual bronze in women's skeet competition here on Friday.
It was made sweeter when she led India in combining with compatriots Rashmmi Rathore and Saniya Sheikh to win the silver medal in the Team event. The trio shot a total of 190, finishing behind gold medallists China, who shot 195. Hosts Kazakhstan won the bronze, shooting 185 in total.
India's day was all about Maheshwari though, when she shot 68 out of 75 earlier in the day to finish on top of the qualification pile of 22 shooters. She led a group of six shooters into the final round. Among them was teammate Rashmmi Rathore, who qualified sixth with a score of 64.
It was a quality top six in the final rounds having the likes of Olympic finalists and World Cup Gold medallists Meng Wei of China and Sutiya Jiewchaloemmit of Thailand among others. Meng is currently ranked fourth in the world while Sutiya is ranked fifth.
Reputations held as Maheshwari bowed out in third place on a score of 40 while China's Meng won gold shooting 55 and Sutiya claimed silver finishing a point behind Meng. Rashmmi also put up a spirited display to finish fourth ending with a score of 32.
India started the day with four medals in the kitty, thanks to Ankur Mittals's double gold effort in the men's Double Trap and Kynan Chenai's double bronze effort in the Trap shooting events.
India's tally now stands at two gold, one silver and three bronze medals.
The competition concludes with the men's Skeet and the mixed team Skeet events over the weekend.