A dramatic women's 25m pistol final saw Josefin Eder win a historic first ISSF World Cup gold at the Dr Karni Singh Shooting Range.
Josefin Eder won a scintillating women's 25m pistol final full of drama, to secure her first-ever ISSF World Cup gold medal in New Delhi, India.
Elsewhere, 50m rifle 3 positions titles would go to Hungary's Istvan Peni and Rikke Maeng Ibsen from Denmark. Day two ended with the men's 25m rapid fire pistol final, which was won by Olympic champion Li Yuehong from China.
Women's 25m Pistol Final
There was drama throughout the competition - starting with the early departure of Yang Ji-in, the Olympic champion and 2024 ISSF Athlete of the Year, who was eliminated in seventh place after Hungary's Veronika Major.
Then came a three-way shoot-off for sixth place between Germans Doreen Vennekamp and Josefin Eder and India's Simranpreet Kaur. Vennekamp hit all five targets and Eder scored three. However, Kaur's two meant she would leave the competition there.
Despite that momentum, Vennekamp would be the next to leave in fifth, before another three-way shoot-off came.
France's Camille Jedrzejewski, India's Rhythm Sangwan and Feng Sixuan of China were aiming to stay in the final, with Eder one shot ahead.
Jedrzejewski scored four from five, Feng who hit all of her shots, meaning once again it was a defeat for India as Sangwan hit just one.
The top three all missed one shot in the next series, meaning Feng, the defending World Cup Final champion, and Jedrzejewski would go to another shoot-off. Tied in their final shot, the French athlete scored and the Chinese missed.
Eder had the one-shot advantage, but going into the final shot, it seemed as if another shoot-off was on the cards. However, Jedrzejewski missed her last shot, while Eder scored hers, reviving the advantage to give the German an important win in her career.
Women's 50m Rifle 3 Positions Final
Rikke Maeng Ibsen had a close battle with Scandinavian rival Jeanette Hegg Duestad to claim the gold medal in the women's 50m rifle 3 positions final.
It was Ibsen's second ISSF World Cup gold in the event and an improvement on her 2022 ISSF World Cup Final bronze medal.
Ibsen's start was modest - sitting fourth after the kneeling stage, led narrowly by Zhang Qiongyue of China over the Norwegian Duestad and followed by Jolyn Beer of Germany. The Dane remained in that position after prone shooting had ended, a far distance in front of a struggling Han Jiayu from China.
So it was the standing stage that saw Ibsen shine - heading into the eliminations a distant second to Duestad, having overtaken Beer and Zhang, with the latter struggling greatly and falling down to fifth.
Anna Janssen of Germany and Xia Siyu from China were the early eliminations, followed by Yesugen Oyunbat from Mongolia.
A 9.2 on the single shots saw the once-leader Zhang eliminated in fifth, followed by Beer in fourth. A strong showing from Han in the standing section brought her into third place, but too far back to make it to the final shot.
Meanwhile, Ibsen had been slowly eating into the lead of Duestad, who struggled on the standing shots. A score of 8.3 with just two more to go, saw the Dane bring the lead down by 1.4. With very little now separating them, Ibsen's score of 10.8 in the penultimate shot gave her the lead, which she refused to relinquish from there. Ibsen's quality under pressure shone through and she finished with a total of 466.2 to Duestad's 465.2.
Men's 50m Rifle 3 Positions Final
After narrowly missing the gold medal in the men's 10m rifle final yesterday, Hungary's Istvan Peni made amends today in the men's 50m rifle 3 positions event.
He was narrowly defeated by Sheng Lihao yesterday, but was never in doubt today, leading from the opening series.
Peni's lead was 1.2 points after the kneeling stage and that increased to 4.1 after the prone stage, with his closest challenger being Konstantin Malinovskiy from Kazakhstan, followed by Jiri Privratsky of Czech Republic and India's Akhil Sheoran.
While standing was the Hungarian's weakest stage, his gap was difficult to overcome in the end, finishing on a total of 465.3 to Privratsky's 464.2.
Sheoran would narrowly claim the bronze medal, beating the Olympic champion and 2024 ISSF Athlete of the Year Liu Yukun by 0.2 points.
Malinovskiy's struggles in the standing section saw him drop to fifth, ahead of Austria's Alexander Schmirl, India's Chain Singh and Finland's Aleksi Leppa.
Men's 25m Rapid Fire Pistol Final
In a day marked by favourites losing, it was an expected victory for Li Yuehong, the Olympic champion, to win the gold medal in the ISSF World Cup Final too.
His teammate Wang Xinjie and the German trio of Florian Peter, Oliver Geis and Christian Reitz were also in the final alongside Massimo Spinella from Italy.
Li's victory looked inevitable as the elimination stage was underway. He successfully hit his first 25 targets, holding a five-point lead over Peter and Wang, by which point Spinella had bowed out in sixth. Reitz would lose a shoot-off with Geis too, finishing fifth.
With the three-point deficit too much to claw back, Geis was the next to lose out, albeit Wang scuppered any chance of taking the silver - missing seven of his last 10 targets and taking bronze.
Back in front, Li went 28 shots before missing the next two. With Walter remaining resilient, it took the lead down to four. However, the key for the Chinese athlete was matching the results of the German. Despite four misses from his last 10 shots, Li kept the gap to Walter to secure the gold medal, ending the season on a memorable, dominant, high.