-2 to the Games. 50m Pistol Men preview: ready for a thunderstorm?

The weather forecast for Sunday the 5^th of August, the day of the 50m Pistol Men Final, predicts an Asian storm with a good chance of Russian lightings and Serbian thunder. It won’t be an easy match, indeed. Featured are two top-ranked Asian athletes placed at the top of ISSF NEWS Magazine’s “Super 25 Chart”: Japanese hero Matsuda Tomoyuki, and Korean sharpshooter Jin Jong Oh, so close in results, so strong in finals.

Probably one of the most strong-minded shooters out there, Matsuda finished under the highlights dedicating his medals to Japan after surviving the Tsunami. The policeman participated in 15 ISSF events in the last four years, making it into 10 final matches, and winning 4 Gold medals, including the pre-Olympic test event in London.

“It’s good that I came to shoot here in London and that I finished in first. Now I know how it feels and looks like, and I am prepared for the Olympics,”

Matsuda said at the London Prepares ISSF World Cup in London, last April.

“The lights are really strong, and I was kind of blinded while aiming during the final match – the Japanese champion added, explaining how he lost a few points during the medal match – we’re shooting under the spotlights, here in London. I will have to wear a cap with longer sun cover, and then I will be ready for the Olympics!”

But there he will meet the current Olympic Champion, Korea’s star shooter Jin Jong Oh, who did not miss the chance to display his skills at the last ISSF World Cup event of the year, in Munich, where he won the match climbing up from his original eighth place during the final match. Jin is focused and the team is working on his preparation. “I cannot talk to the press – he said, as early as two months ago – we are preparing for the Games, and we’re building up our concentration.”

In the last four years, the consistent shooter has participated in 10 ISSF events, winning 5 medals, displaying a great talent for peaking at the right time. With a personal best in the cycle of 575 points, and of 101.3 points in finals, he stands over his competitors in terms of results, but he won’t be the only top-ranked competitor in London.

Russian experts Vladimir Isakov, the 2008 Olympic Bronze medalist of Beijing currently ranked 5^th in the world, and his younger team-mate Leonid Ekimov, 6^th in the world, are ready to do their part in the Games. They will have to fight for a spot on the podium against Serbian team-mates Damir Mickec and Andrija Zlatic, who finished on the podium more than once in the last Olympic cycle. It will be the perfect storm: champions lightning, .22lr pellets hailing, and medals flickering.

50m Pistol Men

Date of the Final in London: Sunday, 05.08.2012 at 12:30

Reigning Olympic Medallists

Current World Ranking Leaders

Current World Record Holder

Current Olympic Record Holder

ISSF NEWS Magazine “Super25 Chart”