On a day when her Republic of Korea team-mates Oh Ye Jin and Kim Yeji won respective gold and silver in the 10m air pistol women event, 16-year-old Ban Hyojin brought further renown to her nation as she set an Olympic record in the 10m air rifle women qualification.
Ban, (pictured), who won silver at the last ISSF World Cup of the season before the Paris 2024 Games, scored 634.5 points, surpassing the mark set at the Tokyo 2020 Games by Norway’s Jeanette Hegg Duestad.
But Duestad served notice of her own tip-top form as she finished second today, also beating her own Olympic record mark as she totalled 633.2.
On a day when China’s world champion Han Jiayu and Germany’s world No.1 Anna Janssen were among a group of leading performers who failed to progress, the third and fourth spots in tomorrow’s final went to Audrey Gogniat of Switzerland and China’s 17-year-old Huang Yuting, who won the first gold of the Paris 2024 Games along with Sheng Lihao in yesterday’s 10m air rifle mixed team event.
Sheng, meanwhile, topped qualifying in the 10m air rifle men event where he is world record holder after scoring 631.7, with Argentina's Marcelo Julian Gutierrez achieving the same score in second place ahead of their final tomorrow.
The other qualifiers for the women’s final were Ramita Ramita of India, Alexandra Le, who won the first medal of the Games yesterday in the mixed team event, Sagen Maddalena of the United States and Oceanne Muller, who will be the first home finalist at Chateauroux.
Han was 16th on 628.1, three places above Janssen, who scored 627.5 ,and Poland’s 2023 World Cup Final winner Aneta Stankiewicz was 19th. Switzerland’s Tokyo 2020 bronze medallist Nina Christen was 23rd, and Britain’s Seonaid McIntosh, who will also compete in the event where she tops the world rankings, the 50m rifle 3 positions, was 39th.
The other men’s finalists were Italy’s Danilo Dennis Sollazzo, Croatia’s Miran Maricic, the Republic of Korea's Choe Dae-han, Sweden’s 21-year-old world champion Victor Lindgren, Arjun Babuta of India and Petar Gorsa from Croatia.
Norway’s Jon-Hermann Hegg missed the cut by one place, and France’s Lucas Kryzs, the 2023 World Cup Final champion, was two places below him.