British shooter Seonaid McIntosh and Croatia’s Petar Gorsa dominated the shooting circuit at the recent ISSF World Cup in Rio de Janeiro; the last World Cup stage of 2019 for rifle / pistol events.
The pair of ELEY shooters each took home two medals, a silver in the air rifle discipline and gold in the 50m 3P rifle event.
Seonaid kicked things off with the 10m air rifle women’s event taking place on the first day of the competition. The pressure was on. Yet, despite being the weaker of her two disciplines, Seonaid maintained a calm composure to smash the scoreboard. A final shot scoring 10.1, brought her total to 250.6 – enough to take home the silver medal.
It was, however, her second event, the 50m 3P rifle women’s final where Seonaid came into her own. A steady performance meant she remained atop the leaderboard for the majority of the match. Punching tenex through the target, the Scottish shooter secured first place and the gold medal. This win makes it the first ever World Cup gold for a GB female rifle shooter. An amazing performance!
Using ELEY tenex, Kim Jehee finished narrowly behind in second place with a score of 458.8.
Petar Gorsa’s first final took place on day two of the World Cup. Here, he stepped up to the start line to compete in the men’s 50m 3P rifle. A tightly fought battle between Gorsa and India’s Sanjeev Rajput saw it come down to the final shot. Rajput’s 8.8 wasn’t enough to compete with Gorsa’s 10.0 which meant Petar Gorsa just clinched the gold medal with a 0.2 lead.
Nevertheless, second place for Sanjeev Rajput was enough to secure him a quota place for India. In addition, Simon Clauseen of Norway took the other available quota also using ELEY tenex.
Gorsa’s second event help add to his medal tally with a silver win in the 10m air rifle discipline.
Best in the world
At the end of the ISSF Rio World Cup, the world rankings have been updated to reveal that ELEY shooters account for four of the WORLD NUMBER ONES!
Congrats Petar Gorsa (50m rifle 3P men’s, 10m air rifle men’s), Anna Korakaki (10m air pistol women’s), Artem Chernousov (10m air pistol men’s) and Seonaid McIntosh (50m rifle 3P women’s).
Despite the summer coming to an end, the shooting season is still in full swing with the next competition taking place 14th September in Bologna. The Italian city will host the European Championship 25/50m with over 500 athletes expected to compete.
