Vivaan Kapoor wins trap silver in a Doha shoot-off and books India's third LA28 Olympic quota

Indian shooting has a new name to remember for Los Angeles 2028. Vivaan Kapoor won silver in the men's trap final at the ISSF World Championship in Doha on 12 November, matching Kuwait's Abdulrahman Al-Faihan hit for hit before losing the gold medal in a sudden-death shoot-off. The medal also earned India a quota place for the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles – the country's third of the championship.

How the final played out

Both Kapoor and Al-Faihan finished the final on 29 hits, so the title went to a shoot-off. Al-Faihan hit three targets to Kapoor's two, and the gold went to Kuwait. China's Qi Ying took bronze with 22 hits, well behind the two leaders. All three medallists earned Olympic quota places for their countries.

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Getting to the final was a battle of its own. Kapoor shot 120 out of 125 in qualification (25, 24, 24, 24, 23), one of several shooters tied on that score, and had to come through a shoot-off just to claim his place in the top eight. Great Britain's Nathan Hales topped qualification with 123.

A good day, with one near-miss

India had two men in the final. Udaivir Singh Jaijee also shot 120 and also came through a shoot-off to reach the final, where he finished sixth with 11 hits. In the team event, Kapoor (120), Jaijee (120) and Zoravar Singh Sandhu (114) totalled 354 – level with Poland and Czechia, who took silver and bronze. India finished fourth on countback, the kind of margin that will sting for a while. Kuwait won team gold with 356.

India's LA28 quota count so far

Kapoor's silver follows two other quota-winning medals in Doha. Jaypal Malviya won silver in the men's 10m air pistol on 5 November to secure India's first LA28 quota, and Niraj Kumar added the second with bronze in the men's 50m rifle 3 positions on 11 November. Earlier in the championship, the women's 25m pistol team of Esha Singh, Manu Bhaker and Divya Thadigol Subbaraju won team gold, and Ankur Goel won silver in the men's 25m centre fire pistol.

Quota places belong to the country, not the shooter, so the National Rifle Association of India will still decide who fills them in 2028. But a world championship medal is the strongest case any shooter can make.

Why trap matters for India

Trap is the shotgun event where clay targets fly out at speed from a trench in front of the shooter, and one miss can decide a final – as this one showed. India's pistol and rifle shooters usually grab the headlines, so a shotgun medal on the world stage is a welcome change. The ISSF World Championship in Doha runs until 14 November, with more medals still to be decided.

The FHM take

Losing gold 3-2 in a shoot-off is cruel, but tying the eventual world champion over a full final is the real headline. Kapoor came through two shoot-offs in one day and kept his nerve in all of them. If India's shotgun programme can keep producing finals like this, LA28 might be the Games where trap finally stops being the forgotten event in Indian shooting.