Explained: How a mixed team can still make it to Tokyo

Divyansh Panwar and Anjum Moudgil won gold in the 10m air rifle mixed team event at Beijing World Cup.

Olympic qualification for the mixed events are not granted at every World Cup, like they are for the individual events. The only tournament that granted direct entry into the mixed shooting events at Tokyo 2020 was the World Championships in Changwon last year, where China and Russia picked the quotas in both pistol and rifle. Indian teams had finished 7th and 25th failing to make the finals back then.

The top two teams in all three mixed disciplines – air rifle, air pistol and trap – were granted qualification. Thereon, a country can field a mixed event team at Tokyo only from the athletes that qualify in their respective individual discipline. As it stands, India has won two quotas in the women’s 10 m air rifle. But for the country to field a mixed team, its athletes must win at least one quota in the men’s individual 10 m air rifle event.

Similarly, Saurabh Chaudhary’s lone quota from the men’s 10 m air pistol will require one of the women’s 10 m air pistol shooters (Heena Sidhu, Manu Bhaker or Yashaswini Deswal failed to win quotas at Beijing) to secure a spot for Tokyo to grant the country a berth in the mixed air pistol event. Chaudhary and Bhaker did claim the mixed team gold beating Russia in the semis, the same team that’s won the quota at the World’s.