22-year old teammates Julian Justus and Daniel Brodmeier of Germany secured Gold and Bronze, not hesitating in front of titled and experienced Olympic medallists. The People’s Republic of China collected another medal, thanks to 29-year old Zhang Fu, back on an ISSF podium after missing since 2005.
It was a great day for Germany today, placing two shooters on the podium of the 50m Rifle Three Positions Men event, at the ISSF World Cup in Rifle, Pistol and Shotgun events in Beijing.
Two young German teammates, Julian Justus and Daniel Brodmeier, both 22-year old, entered the final shoulder and shoulder with 1173 and 1171 qualification points, respectively.
Shooting solidly, they held the first and second positions throughout the first part of the match, while behind them the 29-year old home shooter Zhang Fu was coming closer, climbing up from the fourth place.
Julian Justus, who had made it into a final round also at the 2009 World Cup Stage in Munich, kept on firing great shots with no hesitation right to the end. Managing his two-point head start, he fired 99.5 points throughout the final round, landing in first with a total score of 1272.5 points and the first Gold medal of his international shooting career.
His teammate Brodmeier shoot in second right to the eighth competition shot. Then he was caught up by China’s Zang Fu, who shot one of today’s highest final scores. The last two competition shots determined the podium placements. Zang, scoring 10.7 and 10.0, secured the Silver medal with a total of 1268.7 points, while Brodmeier put himself in third place by shooting an unlucky 8.9 and a 9.4. The young German athlete secured Bronze with a total score of 1267.1 points.
Today’s final turned out to be an unlucky match for experienced and titled champions. Beijing’s Olympians Henri Hakkinen of Finland, 29, and Joseph Gonci of Slovakia, 36, ended up in fourth and sixth place, with a total score of 1267.0 and 1264.0 points, respectively.
Beijing’s Olympic Silver medallist, the Ukrainian shooter Jury Sukhorukov, 42, closed the final round in seventh place with 1262.6 points, after receiving a two-point penalty for he dry-fired between two competition shots, braking ISSF rule #6.16.4.5.3.7
Following them, the winner of the 50m Rifle Prone Men event, USA’s Joseph Hein, landed in eighth and last place with a final score of 1260.7 points.