"VAN" (Sports Desk - 08.12.2025) :: Czechia's Jiri Privratsky won his first gold medal at the ISSF World Cup Final, overcoming a late challenge in the men's 50m rifle 3 positions final from India's Aishwary Tomar in Doha, Qatar.
A new-look finals format - which consists of 10 shots of kneeling and prone each, two series of five standing shots and five series of double elimination shots - saw them joined on the podium by Olympic and world champion Liu Yukun of China.
Qualification
China's Tian Jiaming set the standard and made a statement in qualification, with a new world record of 598 with perfect scores in the prone and standing positions.
Aishwary Tomar of India led a group of four athletes - Liu Yukun and Zhao Wenyu of China and Jiri Privratsky of Czechia - on a total of 595, as world bronze medallist Romain Aufrere of France and Jon-Hermann Hegg of Norway scored 592, followed by Istvan Peni, who took the final spot.
AIN athletes Dmitrii Pimenov and Ilia Marsov were ninth and 10th, just missing out, followed by Qatar's Khalid Abdulrahman A H Sharshani and Abdullah Zain M Al-Sunaidi.
The Final
Qualification means nothing if you cannot deliver in the final, and unfortunately for Tian Jiaming, it was a difficult start with a score of 99.8, with Jon-Hermann Hegg in seventh on 100.9. But at the front, Jiri Privratsky led by a massive gap on 105.3, with Olympic champion Liu Yukun in second on 103.7 and Romain Aufrere in third on 103.2. Aishwary Tomar was fourth on 102.8, followed by Zhao Wenyu on 102.1 and Istvan Peni on 101.1.
Privratsky again scored the highest in the prone position, with a total of 105.7 to extend his lead to an incredible 3.3 over Tomar on 211.0 and 207.7 respectively. Tomar was marginally ahead of Liu and Aufrere, who sat on 207.5 and 207.0.
Peni would sit marginally ahead of Zhao of China and Hegg on 206.0, with 0.7 separating them. Tian required a miracle to stay in the competition, and after the two series of five standing shots, would exit in eighth place. Joining him was the defending champion Peni, who struggled in the standing section with two 49.8s. Zhao would remain sixth on 307.3, while Hegg recorded the joint-best section along with Tomar to move level with Aufrere in fourth.
Heading into the elimination shots, Privratsky would lose 1.8 to the Indian who excelled after the changeover. Tomar had started to bridge the gap to the leader, but had also pulled away from the chasers. The top two sat on 312.9 and 311.4, followed by Liu on 309.2 and Aufrere and Hegg on 309.0. 1.7 adrift at this stage, Zhao would be the first to go in the double shot elimination stage.
Tomar Takes Lead, Privratsky Rebounds for Win
Momentum was with Aishwary Tomar as he started the double shots with two 10.6s, taking another point out of the Czech. Now a gap of 0.5, it became an advantage of that size for Tomar in the next series, who scored 10.2 and 10.8 to Privratsky's 9.4 and 10.6.
Meanwhile, Hegg would lose touch with two sub-10 shots in the first series, as Liu and Aufrere were separated by 0.1. Now 1.3 behind, the Norwegian would finish on a 10.7, but Aufrere and Liu had a large enough gap to remain in the top four.
Aufrere's hopes of adding to his world bronze from Cairo ended with an 8.7. Liu, who scored 9.7 breathed a sigh of relief and followed up with a 10.2 to ensure he would secure the bronze medal.
It would take a disaster from the top two to fall behind Liu, who were now level with each other, 4.2 ahead. For Tomar, he scored two 9.9s, while Privratsky delivered another 10.6 beside a 9.7. In the penultimate series, Tomar again scored below 10 with 9.9 and 9.7, given the Czech another chance to increase the lead. A 10.5 would be followed by a 9.4 - a missed opportunity to create a large gap. Instead, only 0.3 separated them.
Both scored well in the final series. The leader scored 10.3 to Tomar's 10.1 to create a 0.5 cushion and would secure the win with a 10.6. Privratsky finished with a total of 414.2 for the victory, with Tomar on 413.3.
What the Athletes Had to Say
Jiri Privratsky: "This is something I've never achieved before so it's another milestone and I'm super happy about it. It was a different format for sure. I was trying to watch my time, I was trying to be really fast to save up some time for standing sighters and it was a good thing I did because I needed that time in prone because I struggled in the sighters for a few more shots than I'd prefer, but I still had enough time to get ready. I think it was a cool final to watch.
"I think I need more time to process what happened in every competition because I've had some highlights and some competitions that didn't go well, so I just need to get ready for the rule changes that are coming and see what I need to work on."
Aishwary Tomar: "I have enjoyed it and it was my first World Cup Final. I shot well in qualficiation with a 595. In the final it was good, but I shot four 9s, but I am happy.
"At the beginning of this year it was not that good, but at the end of the year it was really fantastic because I made the Ningbo World Cup and won the world silver, Asian champion and now this silver."
Liu Yukun: "It's a little bit difficult for me to suit the new format, but the new format is good. Good value for me, it was a short season, but two medals."
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