Rahi Sarnobat: From career-threatening injury to Asian Games glory, Indian shooter defies all odds

The Indian contingent at the ongoing Asian Games has been putting up a pretty solid show.

While there have been quite a few notable performances, one of the most prominent feats by an Indian came on August 22 when 27-year-old shooter Rahi Sarnobat went on to clinch the gold medal for India in the Women's 25m pistol shooting.

By doing so, she has become the first Indian woman shooter to win a gold medal at the Asian Games.

Hailing from the Kolhapur district of Maharashtra in India, Sarnobat is no stranger to winning medals at multi-sports events. She is a two-time Commonwealth Games Champion and had won back-to-back gold medals in the 2010 (Delhi) and 2014 (Glasgow) editions of the quadrennial multi-sport event.

She had also earned a World Cup gold in Changwon in 2013 - the first Indian pistol shooter to do so. Prior to that, she clinched gold at the 2008 Commonwealth Youth Games in Pune, India. This was barely a year after she had started training with a pistol.

Around the time she had won the gold at the Glasgow Commonwealth Games, Sarnobat was considered one of the best pistol shooters in the country and in 2015, she was recommended for the prestigious Arjuna Award by the National Rifle Association of India (NRAI).

However, a freak elbow injury in 2015 had almost ended her career. In a practice session in Pune, Sarnobat had tripped over a step and had injured her shooting elbow which was later diagnosed as a hairline fracture.

By 2016, she could barely pick up a gun due to the extreme pain in her elbow. It took her some rigorous training – both mentally and physically – to overcome this tough phase.

Fortunately, after a year-long break, Sarnobat returned in action. Unfortunately, her form took a dip and many thought that she may never regain her former glory. But Sarnobat has proven everyone wrong and that too in such an emphatic fashion.

Not many know that through the early years of her career, Sarnobat didn't have the cushion of a specialist coach.

Today, however, Sarnobat credits a lot of her present success to her current coach, Munkhbayar Dorjsuren – a Mongolian-German shooter and a seven-time Olympian. The coach had a huge positive influence on her and has even said that the two share a "mother-daughter relationship".

Rahi Sarnobat has clearly faced plenty of ups and downs in her career and has waded through it all with her prodigious talent and unflinching dedication towards the sport she loves.

The gold in the Asian Games 2018 would come as a major fillip to India's ace shooter and she would hope she can continue building on this.