Pakistan’s Kishmala (shooting), Faiqa (athletics) bow out of Paris Olympics

By Special Correspondent

PARIS: Pakistan’s sole markswoman Kishmala Talat bowed out of the Paris Olympics not with a bang but a whimper after placing 22nd in the Women’s 25m pistol with a final score of 579-18x at the Chateauroux Shooting Centre on Friday. Friday’s afternoon’s event marked the third and final shot at Olympic glory for 22-year-old Talat. On Monday, she and compatriot Gulfam Joseph placed 14th in the 10m Air Pistol Mixed Team event, while she placed 31st in the Women’s 10m Air Pistol on Saturday. A 289 in the precision round (95, 99, 95) and 290 in the rapid round (98, 93, 99) was miles away from a place in the final, led by Hungary’s Veronika Major with a 592-27x which equalled the Olympic Record. The second seed in Saturday’s final is India’s shooting icon Manu Bhaker with a 590-24x. The 22-year-old has had a historic run in Paris so far after clinching India’s first medal in Paris with a bronze in the Women’s 10m Air Pistol, repeating the feat alongside Sarabjot Singh in the 10m Air Pistol Mixed Team just days later. Earlier this year, Talat made history as the first Pakistani woman to directly qualify for the Olympics when she nabbed a silver and bronze at the Asian Shooting Championships in Jakarta. Her all-time best in the 25m pistol is a 583 at the 2023 Shooting World Championship in Baku last year, where she placed ninth overall.

Meanwhile, in Paris, Faiqa sped through her Olympic debut with a 12.49 in the Women’s 100m, but it wasn’t fast enough to progress her to the next round. Only the top three finishers in each heat advance to the next round, which was well out of Faiqa’s reach with a sixth-place finish in Heat 2 of the preliminary round ahead of sprinters from Oman, America Samoa, and the UAE. Faiqa ranked 24th out of 36th participants in Friday morning’s prelims, her first international event of the year. The reigning national champion was eyeing the national record after unofficially clocking 11.70 while training under coach Seemi Rizvi in Islamabad. But a 12.49 leaves the decade-old 11.80 record completely unscathed. The top seed going into Saturday’s semi-final is Ivory Coast’s Marie-Josee with a massive 10.87, the only sub-10.9 time of the day. Up in second place is five-time Olympian Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, who stormed into the semi-finals with a 10.92. The Jamaican sprint queen has dominated the event since her Olympic debut in 2008, picking up a gold in Beijing and London, a silver in Rio, and a bronze in Tokyo. Britain’s Daryll Neita is tied for second seed with Fraser-Pryce. Meanwhile, American icon Sha’carri Richardson —the fastest woman in the world this year— is seeded fourth after clocking an easy 10.94 in her Olympic debut.