PALEMBANG, Indonesia, Aug. 21 (Xinhua) -- The 16-year-old Saurabh Chaudhary from India claimed the gold medal in the men's 10m air pistol at the 18th Asian Games on Tuesday.
Chaudhary put on a nerveless performance to take the title with a new Asian Games record score of 240.7 to finish ahead of former world champion Tomoyuki Matsuda from Japan, with India's Abishek Verma claiming the bronze medal.
Matsuda led for much of the competition, but the 2010 world champion's wayward shot in the penultimate round allowed Chaudhary to take the lead for the first time and the Indian shooter secured the gold medal with his final attempt.
"I'm very happy," said Chaudhary. "I didn't think I'd win the final but I was determined to do what I could and just focus on my technique."
"Before the last shot I wasn't thinking about winning the gold, but I knew I had the silver. That's all I was thinking about. I knew I was number one after the last shot, but I had no idea what was going to happen before that because it was so close.
"I wasn't thinking about the fact I was facing a world champion or an Olympic champion. I was just focusing on my own technique."
Chaudhary's gold medal winning performance came in his first appearance at a major Games.
The teenager will next travel to South Korea at the end of the month, where he will compete in the junior world championships.
