Abhinav Bindra bags India its first Olympic gold

BEIJING, AUG 11: After participating in the Olympics for 108 years, India today earned its first-ever gold medal in an individual event when shooter Abhinav Bindra won the 10 meter air rifle event at the Beijing Games on an eventful third day when shuttler Saina Nehwal moved a step closer to a medal.

The historic victory for the 25-year-old pro from Chandigarh in one of the most thrilling shooting finals in Olympic history came against heavy odds as he entered the event ranked number 17 in the world and pitted against Athens Olympic champion Zhu Qinan of China and Henri Hakkinen of Finland rated much higher than him.

But Bindra proved that reputation and history counted for little as he came from a two-point deficit against Zhu and Haikkinen after the qualifying round and annexed the title.

Bindra emerged triumphant in the 10-shot final with a finish of 104.5, taking his tally of points to 700.5 as against Zhu's silver winning performance of 699.7 (597102.7) and 699.4 (598101.4) by Hakkinen, which gave the Finn Army marksman the bronze.

His first shot in the final a 10.7 saw him move to third place and by the time he was preparing to fire his fourth, the Indian had risen to the second spot.

A 10.6 on his seventh attempt earned Bindra the lead and in the deciding shot he got 10.8, way ahead of 10.5 by the Chinese and 9.7 by the Finn to bring India the first ever gold medal by an individual since the country first participated in Olympics in 1900.

The businessman from Chandigarh also ended India's 28-year-old gold drought since the hockey team fetched the top honour in the Moscow Olympics in 1980.

"It can't better than this. Can it? It's the best feeling of my life", an elated but composed Bindra said soon after achieving the feat.

"I sincerely hope my medal changes the face of India's Olympic sports," the bespectacled shooter told reporters.

As Bindra bowed his head to receive the gold medal from the Princess of Lichtenstein, a small country in central Europe, and the Indian national anthem was played out for the first time in this edition of Olympics, the shooter had his feet firmly on the ground, betraying little emotions.

"For me, life will go on as usual but I sincerely hope Olympic sports get a leg-up. It's not a priority back home and I hope more focus is paid to these events like shooting," said the recipient of the country's highest sporting award Arjuna and Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna in 2001 and 2002.

Asked about his scorching run in the finals, Bindra said it was a conscious plan to pull out all stops and it paid off.

"I entered the final as fourth, which means I had to go all out for it. That's why I was so aggressive and it paid off in the end. I guess it was my day," he said.

Bindra, whose career at one stage was jeoparadised by a nagging back injury, said it was not easy to keep himself keyed up all along.

"I worked hard, left home and trained in Germany. It only proves that if you keep working hard, you would have your day someday and fortunately, it was my day today.

"My parents, family and coaches stood by me all along and I owe it to them," he said.

Even in his hour of supreme glory, Bindra was magnanimous towards his rival when he applauded Zhu for his performance and said "he should be happy that he won a medal".

Bindra's compatriot Gagan Narang too almost made it to the final but was ruled out on countback. Gagan scored 595, levelled at the fifth place but lost out on a final place in countback.

There were more celebrations in the Indian camp as Saina Nehwal stunned world number five Wang Chen's feet to move into the quarterfinals of the women's singles event of the badminton competition.

Saina, a dark horse here, delivered on her pre-Olympic promise to scalp a few higher ranked players and came up with a sublime performance to tame her illustrious opponent from Hong Kong 21-19 11-21 21-11 in 52 minutes to reach the last eight stage.

In the quarter finals, Saina meets Maria Kristin Yulianti, who is world number 16 and was part of Indonesia's Uber Cup runners-up team.

Saina's quarterfinal encounter is expected to be a mouth-watering contest as Yulianti too looked in good form after edging out sixth seed Tine Rasmussen 18-21 21-19 21-14 in an hour-long gruelling battle.

Saina today proved why she is a force to reckon with in the badminton court as she seized early initiative, withstood a setback before delivering the knockout punch to upstage fourth seed Wang.

With two quality shuttlers engaged in a no-holds-barred contest, lead kept changing in the first game and Saina, trailing 16-19 looked in trouble before she reeled out five points on the trot to snuff out Wang's challenge.