 "India's Manu Bhaker competes in the 10m air pistol mixed team bronze medal match at the 2024 Paris Olympics. AP")
Manu Bhaker’s golden run in the 2024 Paris Olympics ended on Friday with a fourth place finish in the women’s 25m pistol final . She had earlier won two bronze medals.
Bhaker bowed out of the 25m pistol final outside the podium places, going out in a shoot-off against Hungary’s Veronika Major.
By missing out on the podium, the 22-year-old shooter from Jhajjar narrowly missed out on the chance of winning an unprecedented third medal - something no Indian has ever done.
Bhaker had won women’s 10m air pistol bronze on Sunday, ending India’s 12-year drought in shooting at the Olympics. Two days later, she would win the 10m air pistol mixed team bronze medal with Sarabjot Singh.
Paris Olympics: News, schedule, medals tally and more
In the process, both Bhaker and Sarabjot redeemed themselves; Sarabjot made up for the disappointment of finishing ninth in the men’s individual qualifying round, failing to qualify for the finals as a result.
Bhaker, on the other hand, bounced back in style in Paris after her heartbreak in Tokyo 2020. She had suffered a pistol malfunction in the 10m air pistol individual qualifying round, as a result of which she finished seventh and failed to reach the final round. Bhaker had failed to reach the finals of the team events as well.
With her heroics at Chateauroux’s shooting range, Bhaker has cemented herself among India’s all-time sporting greats.
With Bhaker winning two medals, we take a look at all the records broken and feats achieved by the 22-year-old in the Paris Olympics:
Impact Shorts
View All— Bhaker became the first Indian woman to win an Olympic medal in shooting by winning the 10m air pistol individual bronze on Sunday.
— By winning the mixed team bronze in the same event, Bhaker became the first Indian athlete post-Independence to win two medals in the same edition of the Olympics. She’s only the second Indian to do so after Norman Pritchard (200m sprint and 200m hurdles) in the 1900 Games in Paris.
— Bhaker and Sarabjot won India’s sixth Olympic medal in shooting, and the first ever in a team event.
— Bhaker became the fourth Indian athlete to win multiple medals in the Olympics after Pritchard (athletics), Sushil Kumar (wrestling) and PV Sindhu.
— Bhaker becomes first Indian woman to win two medals at a single Olympics edition. Sindhu had won silver in Rio 2016 and bronze in Tokyo 2020.
— On Friday, Bhaker became the first Indian to qualify for the final of three events in the Olympics.