Rai clinches men's 50m pistol gold, Gurpal silver

Shooters Jitu Rai and Gurpal Singh opened India's medal count Monday by clinching the men's 50-metre pistol gold and silver respectively in the finals of the Commonwealth Games at the Barry Buddon Shooting Centre here.

It was once again shooting that brought India more laurels as the duo bagged the country's 10th and 11th medals from the discipline at the 2014 Games. India are now placed fourth in the standings behind Australia, England and Scotland with a total of 24 medals -- 7 gold, 10 silver and 7 bronze.

Armyman Rai won the gold in style setting a Finals Games Record (FGR) collecting a total of 194.1 points. Earlier, Rai also broke the Commonwealth Games record in the qualifiers where he again topped, amassing 562 points, a sizeable 15 points ahead of Englishman Kristian Callaghan in second.

In the finals, the 26-year-old Rai, who hails from Lucknow, took off brilliantly with 29.7 points in the first round and kept his lead till the end.

With 187.2 points, Gurpal, who hails from Bathinda, came in second ahead of Australia's Daniel Repacholi, who clinched the bronze with 166.6 points. Repacholi had won the men's 10m air pistol gold last week.

Gurpal had finished sixth in the qualifiers with 538 points.