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Jamie Beyerle and Amy Sowash won Gold and Silver defeating the wind at today’s 50m Rifle 3 Positions Women final. France and Poland secured the Olympic Quota Places.

The wind has been a true protagonist of today’s 50m Rifle 3 Positions Women final, at the 2011 ISSF Combined World Cup in Sydney. A strong breeze blowing from the front-right side of the shooting range, twisting right in front of the targets. All the finalists had problems to hit the 10th ring, today. All but one: USA’s Jamie Bayerle, the winner of the match, who finished upon the podium with a total score of 685.3 (589+96.3) points, almost not affected by the gusts.

“It has been a crazy final, with the wind coming form the right side and into the hall. I hadn’t seen such a match since a while!” Beyerle said right after the final “The wind was affecting the body, not only the shots. And shooting in standing position you can’t compensate it much.”

“Generally, when it’s windy, you look thru and wait for the target to look good. Not today. It never looked good with this wind!” Added Beyerle, who finished atop of the podium with 8.9 points of advantage on the Silver medallist, her teammate Amy Sowash.

“Two Americans on the podium? Phenomenal!” Commented Beyerle, stepping on the podium next Sowash, 26, who secured the Silver medal with a total of 676.4 (586+90.4) points.

Beyerle started the new shooting season as she had finished the previous one: in the lead. The 26-year old American shooter had indeed won the 2010 ISSF World Cup Final held in Munich, last October, and she starts the 2011 season by winning Gold at the first Rifle&Pistol World Cup Stage of the year, in Sydney, today.

It was China’s Yi Siling who won the Bronze medal, finishing in third place with a total score of 675.9 (581+94.9) points. The 21-year old air rifle world champion shot with confidence in the wind. Climbing up the scoreboard from the seventh place she had on the start-list after the qualifications, she left behind Germany’s top shooter Barbara Lechner, who closed the match in fourth with 673.8 (582+91.8) points.

Olympic Quota Places to France and Poland

As the first four countries had already filled their Quota Places plan for this event, the two Olympic Quota Places to be assigned in this event went to France and Poland. It was Laurence Brize, 34, who secured the first Quota for France, by finishing in fifth place with 670.5 (581+89.5) points. At the same time, the second Quota went to Poland’s Sylwia Bogacka, a 29-year old two-time Olympian, who closed the match in sixth with 668.9 (582+86.9) points.

USA’s Jamie Beyerle won the 50m Rifle 3 Positions Women final, closing the 2010 shooting season with more than 4 points of advantage on her followers.

USA’s Jamie Beyerle won the 50m Rifle Three Positions Women event at the ISSF World Cup Final in Munich, today. The 26-year old shooter, who placed in third at last year’s ISSF World Cup Final in Wuxi, had qualified for this year’s Final by winning her home match (the Fort Benning’s World Cup Stage) and a Silver medal at the first Stage of the year, in Sydney.

Starting today’s final round in first place with a score of 590 points, Beyerle shot solidly throughout the final, ending up on the highest step of the podium with a total score of 690.7 points.

The title defender, the winner of the 2009 World Cup Final, Serbia’s Lidjia Mihajlovic (42), made it into the final round with a qualification score of 590 points, tied to the qualification leader Bayerle. But by firing a frustrating 7.7 on her fourth competition shot, the Serbian shooter lost her chances of victory, leaving the Gold medal to Beyerle.

Fighting against Germany’s Pfeilschifter to save at least the second place, Mihajlovic ended up the final with a score of 96.5 points, grabbing the Silver medal with a total score of 686.5 points.

Germany finished again in the spotlights, during this 50m Rifle 3 Positions Women final. Three German shooters, Lechner, Pfeilschifter and Friedel entered indeed the final match, and tried their hardest to find a spot on the podium.

The home hero, Bavaria’s Sonja Pfeilschifter, confirmed to be one of the leading rifle shooters of the world once again, today. Winner of a World Cup Title in the 10m Air Rifle event yesterday morning, she battled her opponents since the first shot to climb up in second place.

Starting the match with 599 points (one point behind the leading couple Beyerle-Mihajlovic), Pfeilschifter shot a consistent final, eventually securing the Bronze medal with a total score of 685.9 points.

Pfeilschifter, 39-year old, had finished in second at the last ISSF World Championship held here in Munich, and won two other World Cup Finals in this event in her career, in 1999 and 2008.

The 2010 World Champion, the home shooter Barbara Lechner, 28, started the match with a lower qualification score, 585 points, and finished the round in fifth place with 683.0 points, overtaken by Croatia’s Snjezana Pejcic, fourth with 683.8 points.

At the same time, it was a 7.3 fired on her sixth competition shot that put the third German finalist, Eva Friedel, out of the games for the podium. The 26-year old athlete, who had qualified in seventh with 582 points, ended up in sixth place with a total of 679.8 points, just two tenths far from her teammate Lechner.

The Kazakh athlete won the brightest medal, followed by the first time finalist of China Dong. Three German shooters made it to the final, finishing in fourth, fifth and sixth place, just three tenths far from the podium.

Kazakhstan’s 39-year old Rifle shooter Olga Dovgun secured Gold at the 50m Rifle Three Positions Women event, during the last day of competitions at the ISSF World Cup in Rifle and Pistol events in Belgrade, Serbia.

The Kazakh Olympian secured the brightest medal with a total score of 683.8 points. Entered into the final match in first place with a qualification score of 589 points, she exploited her consistent head start of 4 points over her followers to finish in first in spite of firing today’s lowest final score, 94.8 points.

Ranked 23^rd in the world in this event, Dovgun had won her last ISSF World Cup Stage back in 2007, when she had claimed a gold medal at the world cup stage held in Sydney.

The Kazakh winner was followed by the first time finalist Dong Lijie of the People’s Republic of China. The 19-year old shooter, who had never participated in an international competition before, surprised everybody today, first by making it to the final round with a qualification score of 583 points, and then by climbing up the scoreboard from the fifth place with ease. Firing today’s highest final score (100.6 points scored in spite of the wind) the young Chinese athlete ended up on the second step of the podium with a total of 683.6 points, finishing just two tenths of a point far from the Dovgun and the Gold medal. Quite an achievement for an athlete who had never competed outside China, before.

While Dovgun and Dong where fighting on the thin line of tenths, the crowd of spectators following the final was cheering for the Croatian shooter Snjezana Pejcic, a 27-year old Olympic medallist of Beijing ranked ninth in the world in this event. Starting in third place, Pejcic duelled neck and neck against the German record-setter Sonja Pfeilschifter to secure Bronze, eventually winning the duel by three tenths of a point thanks to a great 10.9 shot.
With a total score of 683.2 Pejcic grabbed Bronze, leaving the German left handed shooter Pfeilschifter in fourth place with a total score of 682.9 points.

And even if it walked out of this match without medals, the German team finished in the spotlight, today, as three German athletes made it into the final. Next to Pfeilschifter’s fourth place, Barbara Lechner closed in fifth with 682.8 points, followed by their teammate Eva Friedel, sixth with 678.1 points.

The Chinese shooter left no chances t her opponents, ending up on the highest step of the podium with more than one point of margin on the followers. Australia’s Van Nus made it into her first ISSF World Cup final round in front of the home supporters.

The 2005 ISSF World Cup Final winner, China’s Wu Liuxi, secured Gold at today’s 50m Rifle Three Positions Women event, securing Gold with a total score of 681.3 points.

After entering the final round in the lead with 584 points, the 25-year old Chinese athlete (an Olympic Finalist of Beijing 2008) shoot solidly scoring 97.3 points in the final, claiming her first Gold of the season.

While Wu was getting closer and closer to the Gold medal, the crowd following the match at the Sydney Olympic Shooting Range cheered up for the home shooter Robyn Van Nus, 27, who had never made into an ISSF World Cup final round, before. The Australian athlete had made into the final in second spot with a qualification score of 583 points. Understandably nervous for her first final, she dropped a couple of shots in the eighth ring, ending up in fourth place, just a few tenths far from the podium, with a total score of 678.0 points.

“I’d never made a World Cup final and to do so in front of my home crowd on my training range was a fantastic experience for me,” Van Nus said. The 27-year old athlete has just moved to Sydney, and started training year four weeks ago.

“I was disappointed with my performance in the final but I can take a lot of encouragement out of today’s match. I will take part in the next ISSF World Cup in Fort Benning (USA) next May.” Concluded the home shooter.

The Silver medal went to the 25-year old Olympic Finalist of Beijing Jamie Beyerle of USA, who claimed her second medal in this World Cup stage following the Bronze she had won at the 10m Air Rifle Women event two days ago.

Bayerle entered the final round in fourth with 579 qualification points, moving then in the lead by shooting outstandingly in the final, 101.2 points, today’s highest final score, securing the medal with a total of 680.2 points.

“Today it was quite a difficult day for me, actually! I have been working a lot on my Prone, and I was quite satisfied by the prone round, today. But the conditions for the Standing are quite tricky here in Sydney…But of course I am happy about today’s final!” Said the American shooter right after the final.

“Now I will take part in some selection match for the ISSF World Championship, back home” Bayerle added, speaking at the ISSF TV microphones.

Today’s Bronze was won by Croatia’s Olympic Bronze medalist Snjezana Pejcic, 27-year old, who ended up on the third step of the podium with a total score of 678.7 (579+99.7) points.

Following Australia’s Van Nus, the second Chinese finalist Liu Bo closed the round in fifth with 677.6 points, preceding Malaysia’s Nur Suryani Modh Taibi, sixth with 679.1 points.

The seventh and eighth spots in the final were taken by Switzerland’s Annik Marguet, 28, and by Japan’s first time finalist Aeiko Iwata, 29, with 672.7 and672.4 points respectively.