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Finals Skeet Men

Denmark’s Golding secures Skeet Men Gold and Olympic Quota

ISSF World Cup Shotgun · Maribor, SLO

The 27-year old shooter had to move from Denmark to Norway to train and reach his Olympic dream. He secured the brightest medal by outscoring Cyprus’ champion Achilleos at the shoot-off, after an almost perfect match.

Today’s Skeet Men Final, the closing match of the 2011 ISSF Shotgun World Cup in Maribor, was won by Andres Golding, a 27-year old shooter from Pandrup, in the north of Denmark.

 

Golding, ranked eighth in the world, made it into today’s final round with a qualification score of 124 hits out of 125 targets, tied to Beijing’s Olympic Silver medallist Tore Brovold of Norway and to the 2007 World Champion Georgios Achielleos of Cyprus.

 

Shooting a perfect final of 25 hits out of 25 targets, he ended up with a total score of 149 targets. Meeting Cyprus’ Achilleos in a shoot-off for Gold, the Danish shooter pocketed the brightest medal by beating his opponents 2 to 1 hits.

 

Golding, who had never won an ISSF World Cup Stage before, also secured an Olympic Quota Place, a qualification spot for the 2012 Olympic Games in London.

 

Today’s victory thrilled the Danish team, who reached a total of 5 Olympic qualification spots, two in Shotgun and three in Rifle shooting. A great step forward in comparison with the 2008 Games, when only one Danish shooter got to Beijing.

 

“All the hard work we have been doing, paid off today.” Golding said after the final.

 

“I had to move to another country to train, as in the place were I used to live I was only allowed to train once per week, due to environmental regulations.”

 

“I moved from Denmark to Norway, to train and to win this Olympic Quota Place.”

 

“After five consecutive finals, when I walked into today’s match I strongly wanted to win the Gold medal.” Said Golding, who has been climbing up the world ranking, in the last two years.

 

“He is a great shooter, he can get far.” His coach, the 1998 World Champion Piero Genga of Italy said.

 

“Golding has a good technique, and is very consistent.”

 

Following in second place, Cyprus’ Georgios Achielleos was awarded the Silver medal with a total score of 149+1 targets. The 30-year old shooter had secured a Silver medal also at the second world cup stage of the year in Sydney.

 

The Bronze medal and the second Olympic Quota Place went to Greece’s Efthimios Mitas, 26, who closed the round in third place with 146 hits. After making it into the final with 123 hits, the Greek shooter marked 23 targets, winning the second ISSF medal of his shooting career.

 

The Olympic Silver medallist of Beijing 2008, Norway’s Tore Brovold, finished out of the podium, in sixth place. After qualifying with 124 hits, he missed four targets during the final, ending up with a total score of 145 hits, tied to France’s Eric Delaunay in fifth and to Germany’s Ralf Buchheim in fourth.

 

“I could not see properly. It was simply too dark: the final took place too late.” The Norwegian shooter commented after the match, which had started at 7 PM and finished around 7.30 PM, at dusk.

 

The Skeet Men Final closed the ISSF Shotgun World Cup held at the Gaj Shooting Range of Maribor, Slovenia, from the 7th of July.

 

This was the fourth and last ISSF Shotgun World Cup Stage of the year. The best shotgun shooters of the World will now meet in the 2011 ISSF Shotgun World Championship, kicking-off in Belgrade on the 3rd of September. The season will then be closed by the ISSF Shotgun World Cup Final, taking place in Al Ain (UAE) starting from the 30th of September.

 

 

 

 

Marco Dalla Dea

 

ISSF Partners