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(BEIJING, August 12) — US shooter Walton Eller’s first Olympic medal is golden.

“It felt awesome. I’ve been working at this for God knows how long now. The last two times I finished 17th and 12th, so I’m glad I finally made a final,” said the 26-year-old Texan.

All his hard work could be witnessed in the qualification rounds, when he hit 145 targets out of a maximum 150, a new Olympic qualification record. Italian Francesco D Aniello finished the qualification rounds in second place, four points less than Eller. The other four shooters who qualified for the final were US shooter Jeffrey Holguin (140), China’s Hu Binyuan (138), Sydney 2000 gold medal winner Richard Faulds of Great Britain (137) and Atlanta 1996 gold medal winner Russell Mark of Australia (136).

The final round saw Eller miss five targets, equal to the amount of targets he missed in the three qualification rounds. After Eller missed the first two targets, his opponents had some hope of victory, but the lanky American recovered and hit a total of 45 targets in the final, a good enough score to set a new Olympic record for the final score. Eller’s 190 overtook the 189 targets hit by Ahmed Almaktoum of the United Arab Emirates at Athens 2004.

D Aniello and Hu both hit 46 targets in the final, earning the silver and bronze medals respectively with finals scores of 187 and 184.

Holguin (182), Mark (181) and Faulds (180) finished in the last three places. Mark’s path to the final was tumultuous as he needed to win a shoot-off against three other shooters. All four shooters had hit 136 targets in the qualification rounds.

Mark needed to hit six targets in the shoot-off, eventually beating Athens 2004 gold medalist Almaktoum.

(BEIJING, August 12) — China’s Tan Zongliang will regret his first and last shot in the final of the Men’s 50m Pistol for a long time.

The 7.9 points from his first shot, the worst among all his shots in the final, wrote off the two-point lead that he gained in the qualification round. In the qualification round, Tan shot a total of 565, while the other five shooters were tied on 563.

Tan’s mistake gave Jin Jong-oh of the Republic of Korea the opportunity to win the gold medal with a final score of 660.4. The silver medal was won by Kim Jong-su of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, who shot a final score of 660.2, while Tan won a consolation bronze with a final score of 659.5.

Jin still gave Tan a chance to win the gold medal though. Kim only scored 8.2 on his last shot, which meant second-placed Tan could still win gold if he scored more than 10.1 on his last shot. Tan, however, could only shoot 9.2 and instead of winning gold, Tan bid farewell to silver as well because Kim overtook Tan with an outstanding 10.5 on his last shot.

The bronze medal is 37-year-old Tan’s first medal from four Olympics.

(BEIJING, August 11) — Upsets marked the third day of competition in the Olympic Shooting tournament.

India’s Abhinav Bindra surprised all by winning the gold medal in the Men’s 10m Air Rifle. Bindra shot a total of 700.5 to defeat favorite Zhu Qinan of China and Henri Hakkinen of Finland, who won the silver and bronze medals respectively.

Bindra’s gold medal is the first time that an Indian athlete has won an individual Olympic gold medal. India’s previous eight gold medals were all won in Hockey.

Athens 2004 gold medalist Zhu will be disappointed at not winning his second Olympic gold medal, but he has a lot more Olympic competition ahead of him — Zhu is only 23 years old.

At 25, Bindra is not much older than Zhu, so today’s event could be the start of a promising rivalry between the shooters from the world’s most populous countries.

Bindra, who secured the gold medal with a 10.8 on his last shot, managed to block out the pressure of being India’s first individual gold medalist.

“I was trying to concentrate on shooting. I wasn’t thinking about making history. I mean I was two points behind at one stage. I was just trying to concentrate. I just wanted to shoot well, I just wanted to shoot aggressively, and that’s what I did,” said Bindra.

Zhu on the other hand, shot well below his best and was probably affected by the huge expectations placed on him to win gold.

“My desire for getting another gold medal for my motherland was so strong that I was under so much stress before the Games,” said Zhu.

Finland’s Satu Makela-Nummela won the gold medal in the Women’s Trap, making her only the third Finnish woman to win an Olympic gold medal.

To win gold, Makela-Nummela was forced to defeat Slovakia’s Zuzana Stefecekova, who is a world recorder in the event.

Makela-Nummela shot a final score of 91, two more than Stefecekova. The United States’ Corey Cogdell won the bronze medal after winning a shoot-off.

The gold medal was an open race after the two favorites, San Marino’s Daniela Del Din and China’s Liu Yingzi failed to make the final.

(BEIJING, August 11) — Tomorrow’s Olympic Shooting competition will see gold medals handed out to the winners of the Men’s 50m Pistol and the Men’s Double Trap.

Athens 2004 gold medalist Mikhail Nestruev of Russia will be looking for another gold medal in the Men’s 50m Pistol, but will need to once again confront the Athens 2004 silver and bronze medalists, Jin Jong-oh of the Republic of Korea and Kim Jong-su of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

The field actually has another couple of shooters who have won Olympic gold medals in the event – Sydney 2000 gold medalist Tanyu Kiriakov of Bulgaria and Barcelona 1992 gold medalist Kanstantsin Lukashyk of Belarus.

Possible challengers to the Olympic medalists include Joao Costa of Portugal, Matsuda Tomoyuki of Japan and Lin Zhongzai of China.

The United Arab Emirates’ Ahmed Al Maktoum will look to defend the gold medal that he won in Men’s Double Trap at Athens 2004. Al Maktoum won his country’s first Olympic medal by setting an Olympic record in the qualification round and equaling Russell Mark of Australia’s Olympic record for the final.

Al Maktoum’s main competition will come from Great Britain’s Richard Faulds. Faulds won a gold medal in the event at Sydney 2000 and is currently World No. 1.

Mark will also be competing tomorrow, representing Australia for the fifth time at the Olympic Games. Mark won the gold medal in the event at Atlanta 1996 and a silver medal at Sydney 2000. The experienced campaigner may cause an upset and defeat Al Maktoum and Faulds.

(BEIJING, August 11) — Despite missing four targets in the final, Satu Makela-Nummela of Finland did enough to win a gold medal in the Women’s Trap in Beijing on August 11. Makela-Nummela finished with a final score of 91.

Makela-Nummela started strongly in the final to hit her first 11 targets. Her major opponent was Slovakia’s Zuzana Stefecekova, who was tied in first place with Makela-Nummela after the qualification round on 70 points and missed three targets in her first 11 shots and fell behind Makela-Nummela in the opening stages of the final.

Though Makela-Nummela missed four of her last 14 targets, Stefecekova missed three targets herself and lost the opportunity to win the gold medal. Stefecekova finally finished with a silver medal after hitting a total of 89 targets.

The other four shooters in the final were tied on 86 hits, so a four-way shoot-off was held. The United States’ Corey Cogdell won the bronze medal after being the only shooter to hit the target on her first shot in the shoot-off.