Rio Olympics : Shooting

Air rifle qualification.

Right, sport that I have paid actual money to watch, admittedly not much, forty reais in fact.  An early start, and a long ride to the Deodoro Olympic park... hum, maybe should have looked at accommodation near here, it's nice and a lot of sport is happening, never mind.  I wander into the shooting centre, people are practicing with various weapons, and there is qualification in the men's 10m air rifle.  No Brits involved here, I track down two of the leaders, Vladimir Maslennikov of Russia and Italian Niccolò Campriani, and watch for a while.  It's oddly hypnotic, the men stand quite motionless, just the occasional 'thut'  indicating a shot, while big screens show the scores which gradually climb higher as the event progresses.

Edward Ling taking a shot.

Out into the open air, where there are some big stands for spectators viewing the men's trap, now this is what I am here for really, as we have Team GB involvement, Edward Ling is shooting now in fact, again it's a qualifying round.  He's doing well, currently in third place... very little margin for error here, each round involves twenty-five targets, and it's common for even one of the lower ranked sportsmen to hit all twenty-five.  Ed has a chance to go top, but a clay that breaks on the way up seems to put him off, one miss and third is as good as he can do.  Enough to get to the final this afternoon though.

Bronze medal, can''t be bad.

Back indoors, the medal ceremony for the air rifle competition is happening, seems that Campriani won.  Not sure my cheap ticket lets me see this but nobody checks... I love the Italian national anthem, so upbeat.  A couple of hours to kill, time for a wander about the Olympic park, people of all nations are here, drinking overpriced beer.  I watch some swimming on a big screen, teams from one of the sponsors exhort passers by to play keepy-uppy - which it seems, many random Brasileiros can do pretty well.

Good to see the Union Flag.  It's even the right way up!

So, the trap final, just six competitors, and now they only get to use one of the two shotgun barrels.  Ed starts very strongly, but then misses twice, before recovering to finish equal fourth with Egyptian Ahmed Kamar.  The format however is that all medals are decided with head to head rounds...  So, first he faces a shoot-off (no sniggering please) against Kamar, then after winning that, the bronze medal match against Czech David Kostelecky.  It's nail biting stuff, my nerves are in shreds, no idea how Ed keeps cool but he does, taking the medal in style.  Then the gold medal match, ending in another tense shoot-off, as Josip Glasnovic takes the gold for Croatia, the silver going to another Italian, Giovanni Pellielo.  Great to see a Brit on the podium for the medals ceremony, I won't see many of these as they tend to attract premium prices.  Then back to Santa Teresa, it's a long, long ride, next time I come out here it'll be on the train.

Photos to go with this post can be found here.