Gurpreet Singh: The art of precision, from hard work to smart work

The first glimpse of Olympian Gurpreet Singh comes in silhouette.

The 25m range of the Army Marksmanship Unit (AMU) in Mhow, Indore, is partly open to the elements. A hint of sunlight creeping in from the far end, where the electronic targets stand guard like sincere custodians of age-old secrets, casts long shadows across the firing lanes.

At this end stands a burly figure, pistol raised and attention fixed on the target. He is entirely absorbed in the task, shutting out everything around him.

Lieutenant Colonel Laxman Singh Bisht, the Unit’s Training Officer, calls out to the 38-year-old marksman, hoping to draw him away for a sit-down interview with Sportstar. There is no response. He calls again, but Gurpreet remains engrossed in his routine, seemingly oblivious to the voice cutting through the quiet of the range.

This correspondent asks the Lt. Col. to let him be, opting instead to watch in silence as the veteran works his way through his shots.

The same man who would soon speak at length about the art of precision is, for the moment, unreachable, his world narrowed to his pistol and the 10-ring.

Only when he is done does Gurpreet turn his attention to the waiting party. The intensity gives way to warmth as he walks over to greet everyone and exchange pleasantries before settling down for a chat.

The transition is striking. On the firing line, there is little room for distraction; away from it, he is an affable presence, ready to reflect on a career spanning nearly two decades and talk about the upcoming World Championship in Doha, scheduled from November 1-14.

Air pistol, centre fire, rapid fire, standard — you have largely completed the pistol shooting syllabus. These events obviously have different demands. How do you ensure that training for one does not hamper the regimen for another?

The thing is, all these events have slightly different basics. But if you train, you can get used to all of them. It’s not that one event disturbs another or you get distracted.

When you are standing on the lane, whether it is centre fire or standard, you need to fight just as much as you do in rapid fire or air pistol. In air pistol, if I am not ready, I can cancel the shot. There is no such scenario in 25m [RFP]; whether you are ready or not, you have to pull [the trigger]. So, sometimes, shooting in rapid fire events gives you an advantage in air pistol.

Oh, how so?

Basically, it’s all a game of the trigger. So, you get used to the triggering [routine] in rapid fire. As a result, you end up cancelling fewer shots in air pistol. And air pistol is basic. The sight radius is a bit larger as well, so we feel the sight is much more stable. That allows you to squeeze the trigger more easily.

Every shooter must have a completely different preparation routine. How do you decide how much time and energy to allot to the different events? Do you do it yourself, or do the coaches at AMU help you plan?

We do it together. When shooters start out, they have to be very specific about how much time to give to a particular event and how many times a week they will repeat the routine.

Once you reach a certain level, you can get used to the routine of whichever weapon you pick up within a week, even if you haven’t practised for two or three months. It’s just muscle memory.

Does competing in all these different events make you a complete shooter? Or do you think specialisation — which you didn’t opt for — is a safer bet?

If you want to play it safe, then you should compete in all of them. That’s what I feel. Because even if you are stuck in one event, you may be at a different level in another.

When I competed at the Olympics [Rio 2016], I missed the quota in rapid fire on the first day. The next day, I secured the air pistol quota. So, if I had pursued only rapid fire, I wouldn’t even have been there.

‘Once you reach a certain level, you can get used to the routine of whichever weapon you pick up. It’s just muscle memory’ — Gurpreet Singh | Photo Credit: Getty Images

In Doha, you will be participating in RFP. Which aspects of your technique will you concentrate more on in the lead-up to the World Championship?

It’s not like you can focus more on just one aspect of the technique. You have to work on all of them.

For instance, in rapid fire, the firing happens in three different time intervals — eight, six and four seconds. You can’t just practise for four seconds and expect eight and six to happen easily. You have to train specifically for each of those intervals as well. Only then will you be able to execute them.

Yes, there will be a slight variation — a 19, 20 or 21 kind of difference. If I’m firing 50 shots in four seconds, I could probably complete eight and six in 30 shots. Apart from that, neglecting one won’t improve the other.

You have been shooting for 20 years now. How have you kept yourself motivated to continue chasing medals and going through the grind every single day?

Motivation — what is there to it? You just have to do it, so you do it. There’s no need for motivation once you stand on the lane. It’s like that dialogue [from the web series Mirzapur]: ‘ Shuru majboori mein kiye thhe, ab mazaa aa raha hai [I had started out of compulsion, but now I am enjoying it].’

You were part of the 2010 Commonwealth Games and then, of course, competed at Rio in 2016. How do you think your understanding of the sport has evolved over the years? And has the sport itself changed a lot?

The rules keep getting updated every year, but that’s not a big deal. People’s perspective on the sport, however, has changed with the advent of sports science. Earlier, in shooting, these things weren’t given the importance they are today. We didn’t feel that physios or anyone else had a role to play. But now we understand that all these things are necessary. As sports science became more involved, the emphasis on ‘smart work’ increased. In our time, hard work accounted for more.

So, how are you adapting to these changes?

By doing ‘smart work’ and gradually adopting a lot of it. Earlier, when we left after a hard day’s work, we wanted to be clear in our heads that no one had worked harder at the range than we had. I knew I was going to beat all of them and win because the thinking used to be that whoever worked the hardest would win. But now a lot of things have changed. Sports science is involved, and people have started understanding psychology much more deeply.

At this stage of your career, do you think your experience gives you an upper hand against the kids coming in now?

No, nothing like that. Everyone is equal. However, when we started, we did so from a very low level and gradually improved our scores. We raised the bar slowly. These youngsters, on the other hand, have seen the sport from a much higher baseline and operate accordingly.

There is now a mindset that a certain score is the minimum one should achieve. In our time, it wasn’t like that. We even shot with KF [Kirkee Factory] ammunition, which was Indian-made. Today, there are plenty of facilities, and very few people use KF ammunition. The sport is now completely dominated by imports.

Things like barrel testing were done occasionally, and only by the top five or six rifle shooters. It was only after watching foreign athletes that we learnt such practices existed. Now, pistol shooters have also started doing it and are reaping the rewards.

Gurpreet won silver in 25m centre fire pistol at the 2025 World Championships in Cairo. | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement

What is something you understand now but wish you had known much earlier in your career?

I don’t think there is anything like that. Largely, I had the Army behind me, so there weren’t any problems. Even if you look at my struggles, you can’t call them struggles; that was just hard work. And I don’t think it’s right to call hard work a ‘struggle’.

No one stays at the top continuously, whoever they are. It’s just that if you find the right people to support you when you are down, you benefit a lot. It’s not like I have always been at the top. I have fallen many times along the way as well. But making a comeback, leaving all of that behind and moving forward — that is what mattered.

If we had started availing ourselves of the services of psychologists and doing ‘smart work’ earlier, maybe that slump wouldn’t have happened, or may not have been so deep, and the comeback could have happened faster.

Could you tell us a bit more about how the AMU has grown during your time here? What changes have taken place, and how has the quality of the institution improved?

A lot has changed. Earlier, we used to bring in shooters after they had shot 9mm [centre fire]. After that, they would take up air pistol before moving on to 25m.

That changed when shooters started coming in through air pistol. The 9mm shooters used to be much stronger in 25m because the events are almost similar. Their basics were already clear.

When we bring them in through air pistol now, we have to put in more hard work with them. First, candidates have to be selected and shortlisted. Then, by observing their reactions and getting them to shoot, we assess whether they have what it takes to be successful. We might get five out of 10, or we might not get anyone at all. But the selection process has to be kept broad.

After that comes the ‘smart work’ I mentioned. We now have the involvement of several specialists, like psychologists and nutritionists. Earlier, diet wasn’t given this much attention.

Is your diet very strict now?

Yes, I am following it quite strictly now. It’s not as if you need a specific diet for shooting. That’s just up to me, to bring my body fat percentage down.

One great thing about shooting is that you don’t have to stick to just one kind of food. There are no such restrictions. You can eat anything. It’s just that rifle shooters are affected more because of their jackets. If their weight increases or decreases, they won’t fit them properly.

When we were [competing earlier], they wouldn’t let us go to the gym. They’d say, “No weight training.” We were asked to do only cardio because they thought our muscles would hurt and get sore. They also thought well-developed muscles were not needed for shooting. A friend of mine who went to the gym regularly built a very good physique. He was also a good shooter. We were sitting here one day when he said, “Bro, nothing happens.” I asked him, “How many hours do you shoot?” He said, “Six hours.” So, I started going to the gym too.

Now I see a lot of shooters in the gym, and the workout plans given to us by our Strength and Conditioning (S&C) coach include weight training. This is another aspect of ‘smart work’ that has gradually been incorporated into our training.

Earlier, people used to suffer a lot of injuries, too. I think one reason was that their muscles weren’t built for the demands of the sport.

So, these revised plans, which include gym workouts, along with dietary changes, have had a big impact.

Gurpreet and Omkar Singh won gold in the 10m air pistol pairs event at the 2010 Commonwealth Games. | Photo Credit: Getty Images

When you prepare for a major competition, do you follow a particular cycle? For instance, for the World Championship, did you work on a six-month plan and try out different things?

No. If training is going fine and you are doing well in matches, you don’t need to make any changes.

But if things are not under control during a competition and you feel changes are needed, you discuss them with the coach.

For us, these scenarios are discussed with the OIC [Officer-in-Charge]. If a change works well, we continue; otherwise, we drop it. But it’s not like we drop something after trying it just once.

Sometimes, a new approach works very well the first time. But when it becomes part of your process and routine, it stops working for some reason. That’s when you have to re-evaluate. That’s why we don’t decide whether to keep or discard something based on a single trial. We try it two or three times.

What would you say is the most difficult aspect of RFP?

If we compare ourselves with other international shooters, they are also shooting good scores. So, why aren’t we able to do the same? It’s not as if it’s difficult. If it were difficult, no one would be able to do it. The world records that have been set have also come from good scores, right?If you manage your time properly, there’s nothing like it. Even a slight mismatch or hesitation can cost you, as one of your shots might not get counted.

In eight and six [seconds], you can control it, but in four [seconds], you don’t have time.

Whether you are ready or not, you don’t even have time to think whether you should fire the shot here or there. You just have to fire it, period.

When we are shooting rapid fire and the target opens up, whether you have a thought in your mind or not, the target doesn’t know. Your pistol doesn’t know either.

The light will turn on and off when it is supposed to. This game is about controlling your nerves. Whoever has better control over their nerves performs well.

How important is this World Championship, keeping in view the Olympic Games in two years’ time? Do you see it as an important step along the way?

Yes, this is extremely important. The Olympic cycle starts here. The first LA 2028 quotas will be awarded here.

Given your experience, how much would a medal in Doha mean to you? After all, India is yet to win a senior World Championship gold medal in a pistol event.

All medals mean a lot. It’s not like this one would mean more than the others. Yes, it’s a big tournament. After the Olympics, perhaps the World Championship is the biggest competition. So, it’s a major event, and everyone participates. Actually, countries that don’t have quotas cannot make it to the Olympics. But that’s not the case at the World Championship, which I feel is tougher than the Olympics because you have to win a quota there.

As far as medals are concerned, I already have two World Championship silver medals. One came in 25m standard, which I won in 2018, and the other in 25m centre fire in 2025.

Published on Nov 04, 2026

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