Skeet Men – Terras back upon Beijing’s podium
France’s Terras won Gold at today’s Skeet Men Final, the last match of this year’s ISSF World Cup Final in Beijing. Terras caught up the Olympic Champion Hancock, overtaking him at the forth station to claim the title.
The 2008 Olympic Bronze medallist Anthony Terras of France stepped back upon Beijing’s podium, winning the Skeet Men Final held on the same range of the Games. This time, the 24-year old athlete climbed up to the highest step of it, claiming Gold with an overall score of 145 hits (121+24).
Terras, who had started in third with a qualification score of 121 hits, turned the match in his favour throughout the final round, hitting 24 out of 25 targets. As his opponents started missing, he climbed in the lead, securing his first ISSF World Cup Final Gold medal.
First Terras tied and overtook the 2007 World Champion Georgios Achilleos of Cyprus, who lost four targets on the fourth station, and then USA’s Olympic Champion Vincent Hancock as he missed a clay on the second station and two on the fourth.
Leading with three targets of advantage after the fifth station, Terras lost one clay on the sixth, but then cleared the seventh and the eighth, finishing on the highest step of the podium with two targets of advantage on his followers.
Vincent Hancock, one of the favourite shooters to win this match as he leaded the ISSF World Championship last July, landed in second place with a total of 143 hits (122+21). “This is my third World Cup Final Silver medal – he said at the end of the match – I had won Silver last year, in Minsk, and Silver in 2005, in Dubai… there has been an issue with the targets, today. There should be a standard for flash targets, around the world.”
Cyprus’ Georgios Achilleos, 28, closed the final with 20 hits, and a total score of 142 targets, tying Norway’s Olympic Silver medallist Tore Brovold. The two athletes had to pass through a shoot-off, won by Achielleos, who secured Bronze by 8 hits to Brovold’s 7. The Norwegian shooter, who had entered the final match in sixth with 118 targets after the qualification, placed in fourth with a total score o f 142+7 hits.
Jabn Sychra of Czech Republic and the second Norwegian Finalist Harald Jensen finishd in fifth and sixth place with 140 and 139 targets, respectively.
