Every champion has a defining starting point before they can take on the world and establish dominance. Twenty-two-year-old shooter Sakshi Padekar possesses the kind of calmness that has started to impress people far and wide. In a sport where a single inaccuracy can throw a shot off by a millimetre and completely alter the course of the game, this young rifle shooter from Maharashtra has turned composure into her strongest weapon.
Her stunning senior debut at the ISSF Munich World Cup, where she outshot several Olympic champions to qualify for the final, was not just a flash in the pan. It was undoubtedly the arrival of India’s newest shooting prodigy.
Her early years were marked by financial struggles, even renting guns and purchasing basic equipment proved difficult. According to Punjab News Express, her family’s financial condition was such that her parents had to mortgage her mother’s jewellery to help her get started.
She is the daughter of a security guard who works at a manufacturing unit in Pune and faced hardships long before she began tasting success. Padekar initially explored several sports, including judo and taekwondo, before taking up shooting as a full-time career during an NCC camp shortly after the Covid-19 lockdown. Currently, she trains at the prestigious Gun for Glory Academy in Pune, an elite facility founded by Olympic medallist Gagan Narang.
Padekar competed among 146 elite shooters in the women’s 10m air rifle event at this year’s ISSF Munich World Cup and produced a highly impressive score of 635.1, falling just short of Elavenil Valarivan’s national record of 635.9. Her remarkable effort advanced her to the final in third place, just behind world No. 1 Zifei Wang (637.1) and Paris Olympics gold medallist Ban Hyojin (635.5).
As the final commenced, she opened strongly with a 10.5 in the opening shot but then suffered minor setbacks with scores of 9.7 and 9.8. However, she recovered quickly, registering 10.8 and 10.7 in the next two shots to finish the first series with a score of 51.5 in sixth position.
In the second series, she displayed excellent consistency, recording scores of 10.6, 10.4, 10.6, 10.0, and 10.5 in succession, holding on to sixth place with a total score of 103.6.
From shots 11 and 12, Padekar fired consecutive 10.3s to strongly retain her sixth position with a score of 124.2. She also established a narrow 0.4-point lead over France’s Oceanne Mueller, who was in seventh place, by firing two brilliant 10.5s. However, in the shoot-off round, the French shooter mounted a strong comeback by responding with scores of 10.9 and 10.7 to Padekar’s consecutive 10.5s.
The audience cheered and waited with bated breath during the individual shoot-off round, but Padekar was ultimately eliminated, securing seventh place in her senior debut campaign. She finished with a score of 145.2.
“I shot fearlessly in the qualification round and did not think much about the scores,” Sakshi told The Times of India. “However, I felt pressure in the final as I started expecting a good result from myself. I made some mistakes and couldn’t recover.”
Prior to this, she had secured gold in the women’s 10m individual event with a commanding performance at the Khelo India University Games in Rajasthan in 2025. Additionally, she had led the Lovely Professional University team to victory.
A seventh-place finish may seem heartbreaking, but Padekar’s debut tells a far bigger story. Competing fearlessly among the world’s best, she proved that she belongs at the highest level. The loss will sting, but the composure, resilience, and promise she displayed truly signal the rise of a future champion in the making.
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