The American athlete was uncatchable. She started off the match with a 2-point lead, and finished with more than 4 points of advantage on her followers. Coming in second and third place, Serbia’s Ivana Maksimovic and Czech’s Adela Sykorova.
USA’s Jamie Lynn Gray (maiden name: Beyerle) won the 50m Rifle 3 Positions Women event, setting a new Final Olympic Record of 691.9 points. After qualifying in the lead with 592 points (new Olympic record) and two points of advantage on the followers, she increased her advantage in the final shooting 99.9 points, leaving Silver medallist Maksimovic of Serbia 4.4 points behind her.
Gray had finished in the spotlights more than once in the last Olympic Cycle, by clinching Gold at the 2011 ISSF World Cup in Fort Benning and Silver at the 2010 World Cup in Sydney, and had recorded a personal best of 593 points and a best final of 101.5 within the last four years.
"You work for something for so long. I've been shooting since I was 8-year old.” Jamie said “I started the international competitions when I was 15, and ever since I was 15 it's been a dream to have a medal round my neck."
“I worked out: trainings at the shooting range, and sessions with a psychologist, to the get everything right, to put things in the right prospective.” The American shooter added.
Serbia’s 22-year old first time medalist Ivana Maksimovic secured the Silver, turning the tables of the match. The young shooter, ranked 25th in the world in this event, played the “match of her life”, today. Qualifying in second with 590 points, she managed the medal match by shooting 97.5 points, including an outstanding 10.9 shot, welcomed by the spectators with 3 minutes of non-stop pure enthusiasm.
Maksimovic had never won an international medal in this event, before. Her best placement, so far, had been a sixth place at the 2010 ISSF World Championship in Munich.
"This feeling is amazing. I have never felt anything like this in my life. In the finals I was so nervous that my arms were shaking and my legs too." The young shooter commented.
"I've been training like nuts. This discipline is very hard. I knew I had to do as much as I could in the first part and I scored a personal best and a national record." Maksimovic said. And the medal was family business. Her father won a Gold at the 1988 Seoul Games, and participated in five Olympics.
"There was enormous pressure and I was very nervous. – she said about the expectations - Everything I am and everything I did I owe to him and my mother, who is also my coach, and my brother, and everyone who supported me.”
The fight for Bronze kept the spectators breathless. While US and Serbia athletes where cheering out as loud as possible for their athletes, Adela Sykorova of Czech Republic, Snejana Pejcic and Sylwia Bogacka dueled for the Bronze.
And it was Sykorova who finally made it. With a last shot of 10.2 points, the 25-year old Czech shooter pocketed the Bronze medal with an overall score of 683.0 points. Bogacka – who had finished on the 10m Air Rifle Women podium on the first competition day – ended up in fourth with 681.9 points, after closing her match with a 10.1-shot. At the same time, Pejcic fired a 9.3 and landed in fifth, with 681.9 points as well.
"I feel amazing. It hasn't sunk in yet but I'm very happy. It's definitely the biggest moment of my life." Sykorova said.
"I was nervous in the beginning and I was not at my best in the prone position. Standing, I was more quiet and said to myself I had to catch up. Kneeling, I was nervous at first but over the last ten shots I was the calmest I had been in the whole competition." She added, commenting on her competition.
Germany closed the match without medals – and the medal counter is still on zero. Barbara Englader, who had won the pre-Olympic world cup held here last April – landed in sixth with 680.8 points. At the same time, world’s #1 shooter in this event, world record holder Sonja Pfeilschifter, closed her 4th Olympic out of the final, in 19th place with 581 points.
"I am trying to be positive but I feel a lot of responsibility from other people's expectations. I don't want to show how disappointed I feel." Pfeilschifter said “I probably won’t be at Rio 2016.”