Anti Dominates Three-Position Finals, Wins Olympic Silver

[USA Shooting]

Anti Dominates Three-Position Finals, Wins Olympic Silver Medal

ATHENS – Major Mike Anti, of the Army Marksmanship Unit (AMU), accomplished both of his shooting goals Sunday, at the Markopoulo Shooting Range outside Athens, Greece. Anti (Winterville, N.C.) not only shook his string of bad finals, finishing with the highest finals score of the group, but also won the Olympic silver medal in men’s three-position rifle, an event he has been dedicated to for over 25 years.

“The feeling is indescribable,” the three-time Olympian said. “The coaches and myself have been working on my finals for the past five years and finally the work has paid off.”

Anti went into the finals in seventh, six points off of first. In the finals, Anti shot a 98.1, the best score on the line to overcome Christain Planer, of Austria, by three-tenths of a point for the silver medal. This is Anti’s first Olympic medal. And during the qualifiers, Anti made a detrimental mistake, shooting 41 shots, instead of 40, docking him two points off his qualifying score.

“Usually my finals end up costing me the medal,” Anti said. “But after I was penalized those two points, I was so mad at myself, it may have actually been a blessing. I thought I had lost it and all I could concentrate on was making up that margin.”

Anti, along with his U.S. teammate, 23-year-old Matt Emmons, both had a shot at the gold. Emmons fought through a two-point deficit in the finals to lead the competition by three-points going into the final shot of the day. Emmons (Browns Mills, N.J.) had just one shot to go until he would be walking off the line with his second gold medal of the 2004 Games, and instead ended up cross-firing at the next competitor’s target, receiving a zero for his last shot.

“It is weird what the prospect of a medal will do to a person.” Anti explained. “I mean it has happened to all of us. We have all cross-fired at some point. And you just have to leave it up to fate to when it happens—because it will. But for it to happen to Matt at these Games is devastating. We know Matt shot a gold medal performance. He is, by far, the best shooter I know. And to the shooting world, he proved himself the best shooter on the line.”

Emmons had initially thought that the target didn’t register his shot. The officials, agreeing that this must have been the problem, told him to shoot again. That was, however, about the time that the next competitor found an extra shot on his target. Sinking the hopes of Emmons and the U.S. that two Americans would make the medal stand.

Don’t get me wrong, I love this silver medal,” Anti said after it was all over. “But I probably would have been more excited to have heard the National Anthem and seen two American flags on the medal stand.”

Emmons, himself, couldn’t explain it better than “that stuff happens. I haven’t cross-fired for six or seven years. And I have only done it once or twice in my entire life. But, that was the only shot I didn’t first look at the number. All I was worried about was calming myself. I don’t know if I can make up for things in the past, but I am definitely looking forward to Bejing.”

In other U.S. Shooting Team action, men’s skeet wrapped up today with Sgt. First Class Shawn Dulohery (Lee’s Summit, Mo.), also of the AMU, shooting 25-straight in the finals to remain tied with three other men for the bronze. Dulohery, Nasser Al-Attiya (QAT) and Juan Rodriguez (CUB) were forced into a shoot-off for that enviable place on the medal stand. In his first time at the Olympics, Dulohery hung in there through four miss-and-you’re-out targets, but on his fifth he let his excitement catch up to him and jumped the gun, allowing that target to fly untouched.

“It’s empty to see that target flying whole through the air,” Dulohery said after the match. “You put so much into it and you want it so bad. I’m a high anxiety person in the first place, it was hard to stay smooth in the shoot-off.”

Teammate and fellow AMU shooter Sgt. First Class Todd Graves (Laurel, Miss.) finished his fourth Olympic Games early. He was ousted in the qualifying round, finishing tied for ninth with a 121. Graves was the bronze medalist in this event in Sydney.

The shooting events are over and the U.S. Team is headed back to the States. For full results of the day’s events or stories on your favorite shooter, please log on to www.usashooting.org.