Hamad Al Kendi shares second place with four other shooters at the end of the first round of qualifying in the men's Trap event.
It was a day of mixed fortunes for the U.A.E. contingent on Saturday as Hamad Al Kendi kept the Emirati flag flying at the 2014 Asian Games at Incheon in South Korea.
Al Kendi shared second place with four other shooters at the end of the first round of qualifying in the men's Trap event at the Gyeonggido Shooting Range. Fahad Al Deehani, Asian record holder, and Andrey Mogilevskiy of Kazakhstan occupied the top spot.
The U.A.E. shooter recorded rounds of 23, 24 and a perfect 25 for a total of 72 and was tied with former Asian Games silver medalist Manavjit Singh Sandhu of India, Kuwaiti Abdul Rahman Al Faihan, Walid Al Najjar of Lebanon and Yu Du of China.
Asian Games record holder Al Deehani and Kazakhstan's Mogilevskiy scored 74 points each to stay ahead of the pack.
Two other U.A.E. shooters failed to emulate Al Kendi's feat. Abdullah Al Falasi and Walid Al Aryani are virtually out of the race for a spot in the final. Al Falasi (67 points) finished overall 22nd and Al Aryani was 37th with a score of 64.
The 46 shooters will compete in two more rounds in the men's trap event on Sunday. They will shoot at 25 targets each and the best eight will move in the final, to be held later on Sunday afternoon.
While the shooters have something to cheer for on Sunday, fencers saw one among them crash out of the competition at the Goyang Gymnasium.
Abdullah Al Hammadi won only one of his six Group E duels when he downed Nepali Omkar Singh 5-2. However, Nicola Lu Min (Hong Kong China), Dong Chao (China), Elmir Alimzhanov (Kazakhstan), Nguyen Phuoc Den (Vietnam) and Saudi Arabia's Khalid Al Hamoud got the better of the U.A.E. fencer.
Al Hammadi had his moments in other duels. He briefly led against Phuoc Den and Al Hamoud but lost out due to poor defence.
"I expected more from him, but I really cannot blame him as he comes here with very little competition below his belt,” coach Mohammad Rabia told media persons after the event.
"Hopefully, there are a few things that he has learnt,” he said.
The second U.A.E. fencer, Majid Al Mansouri, will compete in the men's individual foil on Monday.
Later in the evening, the cycling team of Majid Al Baloushi, Badr Mirza, Ahmad Al Mansouri and Yousuf Al Hammadi advanced to the main round of the men's team pursuit at the Incheon International Velodrome.
The U.A.E. quartet clocked 4 minutes, 28.516 seconds to occupy the eighth and final position and advance to the final round.
Source: WAM