Colorado Springs, CO -(AmmoLand.com)- Glenn Eller won the first U.S. medal of the International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) World Cup today in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil when he claimed bronze in the Men’s Double Trap event.
Eller (Houston, Texas/U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit) qualified for the Semifinal in third place with 137 targets. Once in the Semifinal, he’d be forced into a shootoff with Andreas Loew of Germany to determine who would enter the bronze-medal match. Once in the bronze-medal match, Eller would only drop two targets to easily win over Anotonino Barilla of Italy, 28-23. James Willett of Australia won the gold medal and Vasily Mosin of Russia won silver.
Eller (pictured right) will once again shoot on this range in August as a member of Team USA as he secured his 2016 U.S. Olympic Team nomination last fall via the USA Shooting Olympic Points System. For more information on how USA Shooting athletes earn U.S. Olympic Team nominations, please click here.
2012 Olympian and Eller’s USAMU teammate Josh Richmond (Hillsgrove, Pennsylvania) just missed out Semifinal berth after losing to Loew in a shootoff (10 – 11) for the final remaining spot. Richmond would finish in seventh place overall with 136 targets. Derek Haldeman (Sunbury, Ohio/USAMU) finished in 25th place with 126 targets.
Men’s Free Pistol was also contested at the World Cup today where recently-nominated U.S. Olympic Team member Jay Shi (Phoenix, Arizona) finished in seventh place in just his second World Cup competition. Shi qualified for the Finals in seventh place with a score of 560, and would be eliminated in the seventh position in his first Finals appearance at a World Cup. Will Brown (Twin Falls, Idaho) finished in 12th place overall with a score of 557 and 2012 Olympian Nick Mowrer (Butte, Montana) finished in 44th place with a score of 544.
Competition continues tomorrow with the start of Men’s Prone Rifle and the Women’s Sport Pistol Finals. All of the U.S. athletes competing in these events have secured their Olympic Team nominations through either the Points System or wins at the U.S. Olympic Team Trials for Smallbore and will get their first crack at the Olympic ranges in their given events. Competing in Men’s Prone Rifle are 2012 Olympian Michael McPhail (Darlington, Wisconsin/USAMU), two-time Olympic medalist for Prone Matt Emmons (Browns Mills, New Jersey) and Smallbore Trials winner David Higgins (San Clemente, California). The lone competitor for the U.S. in Women’s Sport Pistol is Enkelejda Shehaj (Naples, Florida) who secured her trip to Rio later this summer with her Sport Pistol win at Smallbore Trials.
More than 660 athletes from 88 countries have made their way to this third World Cup of the season, which serves as the test event for the Olympic Shooting Centre located inside Deodoro Park, one of three venue clusters for the 2016 Olympic Games. The range, opened in 2007, has already hosted the shooting events of the 2007 Pan American Games, as well as an ISSF Rifle/Pistol World Cup in 2008.
The ISSF World Cup in Rio officially runs through April 25. For a complete schedule and live results, please visit: https://www.issf-sports.
About USA Shooting:
USA Shooting, a 501c3 non-profit corporation, was chartered by the United States Olympic Committee as the National Governing Body for the sport of shooting in April 1995. USA Shooting’s mission is to prepare American athletes to win Olympic medals, promote the shooting sports throughout the U.S. and govern the conduct of international shooting in the country.
Check us out on the web at usashooting.org and on Twitter at twitter.com/USAShooting.