Olympics 2024: Shooter Manu Bhaker wins first medal for India

Ace pistol shooter Manu Bhaker won a historic bronze medal in the women's 10m air pistol event on Sunday at Chateauroux and opened India's medal tally at the 2024 Paris Olympics.

Following her bronze medal-winning show, Manu became the first-ever Indian woman to win a medal in shooting at the Olympic Games.

Before Manu achieved the feat, India won four medals in shooting at the Olympics. All of them came in men's shooting, with Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore (2004 Athens, silver medal), Abhinav Bindra (2008 Beijing, gold medal), Gagan Narang (2012 London, bronze medal), and Vijay Kumar (2012 London, silver medal).

Adding to this, she became the second-ever Indian pistol shooter to win a medal at the Olympics after Vijay Kumar.

Playing in her second Olympics, Manu dazzled in a strong field of shooters to finish third. She missed the silver medal by a whisker.

In her first series, Manu scored 50.4 and followed it up with 49.9 in the second series. She was placed in third place after the first two series when the elimination round started.

The Korean shooter Oh Ye Jin shot two poor shots of 9.2 and 9.5 while Manu shot 10.5 and 10.4 to jump to second place.

In the next series, Manu shot two 9.8 while Ye Jin bounced back with a couple of good shots to reclaim the second spot. Manu held on to her third spot till the last series.

Manu jumped to the second spot in the penultimate shot but Korean Ye Jin shot 10.5 as compared to Manu's 10.3 and moved to the gold medal deciding shot.

Manu finished with a score of 221.7 and created history.

Korea’s Kim Yeji won the silver medal with an aggregated score of 241.3 while her compatriot Jin Ye Oh clinched the gold medal with a Games record of 243.2.