Gold Coast
Anish Bhanwala broke Games record on Friday as he earned a gold medal in the Men’s 25m Rapid Fire Pistol to take India’s medal tally to 34 on Day 9 of Commonwealth Games 2018 in Gold Coast, Australia. With the feat, the 15-year old became the youngest medalist for India in the history of CWG.
The teenager shot a score of 30/40 in the final after topping qualification to give India 16th gold medal, surpassing Glasgow CWG 2014 tally of 15 golds. His score of 30 is the same as that of Rio Olympic silver medallist in 2016.
Anish, who needed a perfect five, got all the shots right in the final round to break the Games record in his debut. India have now taken six gold medals in shooting after Jitu Rai, Manu Bhaker, Heena Sidhu, Tejaswini Sawant and Shreyasi Singh.
On becoming the youngest athlete in the Indian team, Anish said, “I’m very excited that I became the Commonwealth champion. I am the youngest athlete from India to win Commonwealth gold at 15.”
On his next target, Anish said, “Next are the world championships (in South Korea) and Asian Games (Indonesia). I will celebrate with my coach.”
The Junior World Cup gold medalist shooter, who is a Class X student, got permission from the Central Board of Secondary Education to take his Board exams next month. The National Rifle Association of India wrote to CBSE since the Class X and shooting dates were overlapping.
