Paris Paralympics 2024: Sheetal Devi, Rakesh Kumar equal meet record to win bronze in mixed team compound open archery

Sheetal Devi became the youngest-ever Indian medallist with the bronze medal at Paris Paralympics 2024.

India’s terrific duo of Sheetal Devi and Rakesh Kumar scripted history by winning the bronze medal in para-archery mixed team Compound Open event at Paris Paralympics 2024. The pair equalled the Paralympics record of 156/160 points from the Tokyo games to take home the mixed doubles bronze medal after heartbreaks in the singles events.

This was India’s first-ever medal in compound archery and only second in Paralympic or Olympics. Harvinder Singh was India’s first-ever medallist in archery at the Paralympics, when he clinched bronze in men’s individual recurve open event at Tokyo while the nation is yet to win an archery medal at the Olympics.

Sheetal and Rakesh were up against Italy’s Eleonora Sarti and Matteo Bonacina in the fight for the third place at Paris Paralympics 2024. Ironically, Sariti holds the World Record for the category, making the Itaians the favourite to clinch the title.

Also Read: Who is the youngest Indian athlete to win medal at Paralympics?

But the Indians showed extraordinary resolve to stage one of the greatest comebacks and finish with a medal. It wasn’t an easy start as the Indians gave a two-point lead at the end of first set of four arrows. But the Sheetal and Rakesh was quick to respond with 40/40 in the next four arrows to equal the score at 78-78.

The third set saw India go a point behind the World record holders. But it says—when the going gets tough, the tough get going—and Sheetal and Rakesh once again produced a perfect 40/40 in the final round against their opponents’ 38.

The Indians had to wait for a brief moment as the target judge was looking into Sheetal Devi’s target sheet with a magnifying lens to confirm if her penultimate arrow had hit the 10-point mark.

With suspense prevailing, the judge spent a close look to find out that the arrow had touched the outer edge by barest of all-margins to confirm the medal for India. The pair of Sheetal Devi and Rakesh Kumar are chalk and cheese as the 17-year-old armless archer had a 41-year-old Rakesh Kumar as her partner. But the determination to succeed for the nation united them to bring laurels to the nation.

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