World Archery Championships: Champia seals Rio 2016 berth, Chauhan eyes gold

Copenhagen: Mangal Singh Champia earned India an individual Olympic quota berth, while Rajat Chauhan and Laxmirani Majhi remained in the gold and bronze medal hunt in the World Archery Championships in Copenhagen on Thursday. The 31-year-old former Olympian secured an individual berth for the 2016 Rio-bound squad when he entered the recurve quarterfinals defeating sixth seed Antonio Fernandez of Spain 6-2. India have also secured a team quota berth in the women’s section from the ongoing World Archery Championships. [caption id=“attachment_2370570” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Mangal Singh Champia. Reuters[/caption] Champia however lost out on medal contention after bowing to Elias Malave of Venezuela 4-6 as the 2008 Beijing Olympian surrendered a 2-4 lead for an unfortunate last eight exit. After the men’s team failed to earn a quota earlier, the Jharkhand marksman kept India’s Olympic hopes alive as he began his day ousting another Spaniard Miguel Alvarino Garcia in the last 32. Champia lost the first and third set to trail 2-4 before making a glorious comeback aided by some luck en route to a 6-4 win. Having shot two perfect 10s, the Spaniard misfired in the third end of fourth set for a poor one while Champia shot two 10s and one nine to make it 4-4. Under pressure, Alvarino Garcia had another string of failures in the fifth set while Champia held on to the momentum and shot 10, 9, 9 to clinch the issue. Chauhan ensured India a medal by making the final of the compound section, while Laxmirani Majhi advanced into the bronze playoff earlier in the day. The 2014 Asian Games team gold medallist, Chauhan, thrashed Camilo Cardona of Colombia 143-138 in a one-sided contest to set up a clash against local challenger Stephen Hansen in the final which will be held Saturday. Laxmirani gave India a second medal hope in the individual section as she will take on Misun Choi of Korea in the bronze medal play-off in recurve Sunday. After her teammate and former world number one Deepika Kumari crashed out in the first match of the day, Laxmirani kept the Indian flag high. She secured a straight set win over Kristine Esebua of Georgia in the fourth round before upsetting fifth seed Alejandra Valencia of Mexico in a tense quarterfinal shoot off which she clinched 9-8. However top seed Shih-Chia Lin of Taipei denied Laxmirani a final berth by securing 6-4 win in a hard-fought battle. Locked 2-2 after second set, Lin shot a bull’s eye in the third to clinch it 28-26 and open up a decisive 4-2 lead which saw her through as she levelled the next two. Earlier, Chauhan faced the toughest challenge of the day against Aussie Robert Timms in the last 16 as both were locked 145-145 till the fifth set. The stalemate prevailed in the shootoff but Chauhan was adjudged winner as his arrow was closer to the centre. In the quarters, Chauhan edged out Kevin Tataryn of Canada 146-143. PTI