Palak and Mukesh win gold with a world record at the ISSF World Cup

As per the new mixed team final format, the top four teams will fight for medals, instead of just the top two as it was earlier. The new final format sees a mixed team firing five shots each in 250 seconds in the first three series before three elimination series consisting of three single shots each.

Nelavalli came into the final with 11 inner tens in the qualification and his first series of 50.7 as compared to Gulia’s series of 49.4 meant that the Indian team (100.1) led the Chinese pair (99.7) by 0.4 points with the Hungarian pair placed at the third spot (98.8) and the American pair of Nathalia Tobar and Nickolaus Mowrer placed at the fourth spot (96.6).

The Indian pair would extend their lead over the second-placed Chinese pair to 2.6 points with Gulia shooting a series of 51.3 and Nelavalli a score of 51.6 after the second series. The last five-shot series saw the Indian pair extending their lead over the Chinese pair to 4.3 points with Gulia shooting a score of 51.4 and Nelavalli a score of 51.0 for a total score of 305.4 with the Chinese trailing at 301.1.

The elimination series would see the USA pair bowing out first followed by Hungary, with the Indian pair in the lead by 3.3 points over the Chinese after the fourth and a lead of 2.6 points after the penultimate series. Gulia, who had won the 10m air pistol title in 2023 Hangzhou Asian Games, shot the highest total in the elimination series with a score of 31.5 while Nelavalli shot 30.5 for the Indian pair to win the title.

“This was my first senior international and I am happy that I did my best. Final was good and I was focusing on the next shot. I was only competing with Palak and we were looking at each other’s scores and my thought was to be better than her,” Nelavalli would tell ISSF TV. The Andhra Pradesh shooter had become the 25m pistol junior world champion in 2024 and also won the 10m Air Pistol mixed team title at the Asian Junior Championships this year. He has been training under Commonwealth Games medalist and World Military games medalist Chandrashekhar Choudhary at Gun For Glory Academy in Pune and Hyderabad for the last six years. “Mukesh’s biggest strength has been his willpower and the no fear attitude. We had been working on his trigger movement in recent years, and it has helped him in hitting those high scores,” Chaudhary said.

Gulia also said that Nelavalli’s consistent shooting made the task easier for her. “In mixed teams, the pairings can be different depending on who has qualified for the event from India. And this new format is very challenging with all the four teams in with a chance for a medal. But then it also means that we start afresh. Right from the first shot, I was competing against myself. Mukesh’s shooting definitely made it a lot easier for the team and he actually shot better than me for most of the series in the final. That was the cherry on the cake,” Gulia said.

Except the first series, where only one shot out of the ten by Gulia and Nelavalli was above 10.5, the Indian pair made sure that they maintained their lead throughout the final. The remaining two five shot series and three elimination series saw Gulia hitting six scores of 10.5 or more with a 10.9 off her penultimate shot. Nelavalli, on the other hand, shot nine shots of 10.5 or more with three shots of 10.8 each.

“Our team was leading from every stage and in this format, it was really hard to maintain this advantage. But both Palak and Mukesh not only maintained the lead but they also kept increasing the lead. There were a couple of moments where they slipped slightly, but they had plenty of stamina left, and they managed to pull through and regain the advantage. We have been spending time breaking this format down and how to better the level of shooting on our way to the LA Olympics,” India’s foreign coach Jelena Arunovic said.