Bull’s eye, not a tough bet for these shooters

At the recently-concluded 43rd

State Trap and Skeet Shooting Championships

, the team from

Royal Pudukottai Sports Club

(RPSC) caught everyone’s attention. The Trichy-based club made a clean sweep as they won all the three rolling trophies in trap, skeet and double trap events as well as the ‘His Highness Rajah of Pudukkottai Rolling Trophy’ — the overall rolling trophy. The last edition of this competition too saw

RPSC

putting up a similar show.

What makes the club unique is that it specialises in training women shooters, especially in the shotgun category. International shooter Prithviraj Tondaiman and his father R Rajagopala Tondaiman have been instrumental in setting up this club in 2015. The facility, spread over 14 acres, is situated around 35km off Trichy and houses trap and skeet shooting ranges.

Prithviraj says one of the goals of the club was to produce a woman shooter of international repute. "My father spent `1.5 crore from his pocket to make this range possible. There is no dearth of talent in our state. It is all about providing opportunities and this range was built for shooters in the shotgun category to make a mark. The likes of Radha Niranjani, Bhuvana Shree, Cathrine, Uthra and Taniya Shri Arun have all been doing well and we expect them to achieve their goals on the international stage too," Prithviraj says. While 14-year-old Bhuvana won 17 medals at the competition — the maximum by an individual - her club-mate Uthra, the youngest in the field at 12, bagged seven. Out of a possible 60 medals in the tournament, RPSC won 45.

While RPSC charges Rs2 lakh for life-long membership, the training is free of cost for female shooters, except the cost for ammunition. The club has also waived the fees for a few talented shooters. "Cathrine, who hails from Nagapattinam, has been fully-supported by RPSC. From her travels to her use of the ammunition at the club, we have provided her everything free of cost. National shooter Nivetha, currently a part of the Indian team, too trains at our facility," says Prithviraj, who personally trains the shooters.

In a bid to improve the quality of training at the facility, RPSC even roped in ace shooter Manavjit Singh Sandhu for conducting clinics. "Manavjit, one of the best trap shooters from India, agreed to be part of this initiative. He conducted a week-long camp last week and didn’t charge anything for the same," says Prithviraj.

World-class facilities available at the club, makes it an ideal place for other aspiring shooters, many of whom come from Chennai to train. Chennai-based Sakthi Sivaraj, who won gold in the trap event and silver in double trap category, believes training at the facility has only made him a sharper shooter. "We drive to Trichy twice a month and make use of the facility there. It has definitely made us get better in this sport," Sakthi says.

Rajsekar Pandian, co-producer at 2D Entertainment, who trains with Prithviraj at the club, had his share of success at the meet. "Handling the production of our soon-to-be-released film (Magalir Mattum) and practising for the event was a tough ask. But we were trained well and I could bag three medals at the tournament," says Rajsekar.