TargetTalk

I just came back from the YOG Buenos Aires 2018, were I acted as an official. As such, I met an amazing group of very young Indian shooters who will make a lot of headlines in the future.

You can find them in the ISSF webpage, but as they don´t recognize this Games there is a result they don´t highlight which I witnessed and want to share with this community: the air pistol shooter, Chaudhary SAURABH, only 16 years old, shot 580 in the quali round and an incredible 244.2 in the finals, a result that beats the standing final world record of 243.6, and a gap of more than seven points to the second place.

I was there, and I still can´t believe the coolness with which the young shooter coped with the pressure. Overall, India won two golds and three silvers with four shooters, an outstanding achievement.

I had the opportunity to be close to them for a week, and can bet there is a lot of medals in their future!!!

I upload the screens of the match for you to judge.

Impressive!

Chip

It's too bad that the ISSF has mucked up finals so badly that this record is essentially meaningless out of context.

244.2 out of what? What did the other shooters tally? Why do the winners get to shoot more shots? Why does your screenshot show four strings of 20.something and that somehow adds up to 244.2?

Sorry, I don't mean to denigrate the accomplishments of these young shooters, but I have zero idea what 244.2 means, and I've been shooting air pistol for more than a quarter of a century.

john bickar wrote:244.2 out of what? What did the other shooters tally? Why do the winners get to shoot more shots? Why does your screenshot show four strings of 20.something and that somehow adds up to 244.2?

The top 2 fire more shots because the final is essentially a knockout competition.

The screen shown, which is to keep the spectators informed of the current position rather than showing all shots, is only showing the last 4 pairs of shots: 17/18, 19/20, 21/22 & 23/24.

john bickar wrote:It's too bad that the ISSF has mucked up finals so badly that this record is essentially meaningless out of context.

You probably do the same as me when looking at ISSF results, that is scroll straight to the bottom and click on "qualifying scores" to see who shot what out of 60 shots.

john bickar wrote: 244.2 out of what? What did the other shooters tally? Why do the winners get to shoot more shots? Why does your screenshot show four strings of 20.something and that somehow adds up to 244.2?

It´s 24 shots, so 244.2 means an AVERAGE of almost 10.2 thru a whole Olympic final, at only 16.

I hope he doesn´t turn to be another Konstantin Lukashik, who won gold in FP at the OG Barcelona 1992 at the same age and never reached again those heights.

j-team wrote:

john bickar wrote:It's too bad that the ISSF has mucked up finals so badly that this record is essentially meaningless out of context.

You probably do the same as me when looking at ISSF results, that is scroll straight to the bottom and click on "qualifying scores" to see who shot what out of 60 shots.

Yup.

David Levene wrote:

john bickar wrote:244.2 out of what? What did the other shooters tally? Why do the winners get to shoot more shots? Why does your screenshot show four strings of 20.something and that somehow adds up to 244.2?

The top 2 fire more shots because the final is essentially a knockout competition.

The screen shown, which is to keep the spectators informed of the current position rather than showing all shots, is only showing the last 4 pairs of shots: 17/18, 19/20, 21/22 & 23/24.

So I must ask, how is that approachable or understandable to the casual spectator, when I can't even understand it, as someone who has competed in finals and won medals at the international level?

I believe that "bollocks" is the appropriate British English term.

john bickar wrote:

David Levene wrote:

john bickar wrote:244.2 out of what? What did the other shooters tally? Why do the winners get to shoot more shots? Why does your screenshot show four strings of 20.something and that somehow adds up to 244.2?

The top 2 fire more shots because the final is essentially a knockout competition.

The screen shown, which is to keep the spectators informed of the current position rather than showing all shots, is only showing the last 4 pairs of shots: 17/18, 19/20, 21/22 & 23/24.

So I must ask, how is that approachable or understandable to the casual spectator, when I can't even understand it, as someone who has competed in finals and won medals at the international level?

Most people, even those with no experience of shooting, seem to be able to understand it once the finals procedure has been explained by the announcer.

I still feel that the old "qualifying score + 10 shot final" is the fairest method to the shooters ... But that, like Olympic Free Pistol, is now lost to history. Harrumph.

prowling wrote:I still feel that the old "qualifying score + 10 shot final" is the fairest method to the shooters ... But that, like Olympic Free Pistol, is now lost to history. Harrumph.

Nearly 6 years now.

I must say that - while watching the finals among the public, spectators who knew nothing about our sport and were probably cheering their countryfolk asked me (it must have been obvious that I understood what was happening) their mechanics and - even explained very briefly - they quickly got the knack and enjoyed it a lot.

I also must say that I was an opponent to the current finals format (the knockabout standard and the round robin style for mixed teams) but, having been witness tho the enthusiasm of the general public and the thrill it provides, I must stand corrected.

David Levene wrote:

prowling wrote:I still feel that the old "qualifying score + 10 shot final" is the fairest method to the shooters ... But that, like Olympic Free Pistol, is now lost to history. Harrumph.

Nearly 6 years now.

The longevity of an injustice doesn't justify its existence; on the contrary, it magnifies the injustice.

renzo wrote:I must say that - while watching the finals among the public, spectators who knew nothing about our sport and were probably cheering their countryfolk asked me (it must have been obvious that I understood what was happening) their mechanics and - even explained very briefly - they quickly got the knack and enjoyed it a lot.

I also must say that I was an opponent to the current finals format (the knockabout standard and the round robin style for mixed teams) but, having been witness tho the enthusiasm of the general public and the thrill it provides, I must stand corrected.

Because the feelings of the "general public" should overrule the reasoned thought process of subject matter experts when it comes down to determining who is the best on a given day in a sporting event.

(Sarcasm here, obviously, and I don't mean to pick on you renzo, but the current ISSF finals procedure is very much a dumpster fire. Unless you truly subscribe to the "someone is going to win" philosophy, in which case we can agree to disagree.)

I love the finals format. It is thrilling. Even if you don't know anything about shooting, following the scores with the suspense of never knowing what's going to happen and seeing all the classification changes is exhilarating.

Ramon OP wrote:I love the finals format. It is thrilling. Even if you don't know anything about shooting, following the scores with the suspense of never knowing what's going to happen and seeing all the classification changes is exhilarating.

I couldn't agree more.

All of the larger matches we hold in the UK have finals. Under the old format they were poorly attended by spectators; they were only seeing 1/7th of the match.
Under the current rules the seats are normally full.

john bickar wrote:

renzo wrote:I must say that - while watching the finals among the public, spectators who knew nothing about our sport and were probably cheering their countryfolk asked me (it must have been obvious that I understood what was happening) their mechanics and - even explained very briefly - they quickly got the knack and enjoyed it a lot.

I also must say that I was an opponent to the current finals format (the knockabout standard and the round robin style for mixed teams) but, having been witness tho the enthusiasm of the general public and the thrill it provides, I must stand corrected.

Because the feelings of the "general public" should overrule the reasoned thought process of subject matter experts when it comes down to determining who is the best on a given day in a sporting event.

(Sarcasm here, obviously, and I don't mean to pick on you renzo, but the current ISSF finals procedure is very much a dumpster fire. Unless you truly subscribe to the "someone is going to win" philosophy, in which case we can agree to disagree.)

You do have a point, John, but I could tell you that the Olympic Broadcast Channel asked me to leave thir equipment at my office during the recent games. As such, I had a lot of talks with them. One day, one of my countrymen was fighting for the medal and I was in the stands cheering him, with joy gestures at good shots, and noticed that the camera was pointed several times at me.

The following day I asked the cameraman about it and he told me "It´s awfully hard to make good TV on Olympic shooting. The shooters were all inmobile, and so did most of the crowd, You were the only one shouting and jumping sometimes, and that was what I needed."

It´s a brutal declaration of facts, and not one that I concur with, but let´s give it to him that it´s true that you can enjoy most sports simply by the beauty of the show, but only shooters (and not always) can appreciate a shooting contest.

Cheers from Argentina

It has always bothered me that the shooter who qualified 8th in the match and was 20 points behind the 1st place shooter can win because the final format puts them all equal. Should be called the 2nd Chance Final!
jon

renzo and David Levene, I appreciate your perspectives, and I greatly appreciate your work as volunteers for our sport.

I also greatly appreciate your civil discourse on a topic where we fundamentally disagree.

Your opinions have greater weight than mine, because you both are actively contributing to ISSF-style shooting, whereas I am not, currently.

This sport only exists through the unsung efforts of the many volunteer match officials and staff like you that it takes to put on any match at the national and international level, and I thank you for continuing to do it.

That said: I no longer compete in international pistol above the local level. There are many reasons why (family, age, work obligations, time away from home, etc.), but the nail in the coffin for me was the switch to the inequitable finals nonsense. I can't justify traveling 2,000 miles from home, outshooting someone by 40 points, and then "losing" to the same person because he got lucky in a winner-takes-all final.

The "beauty of the show" and "the seats are...full" arguments don't move me, when they do not reward the best shooter on that day.

That's removed me from ISSF-style competition in the US, which I think is a shame, because I could (still, at my age) give the next generation some competition to hone their edge.

Instead, I'm on the sidelines in California.

What's "good" for the ISSF at the international and Olympic level is killing the sport at the feeder level, at least in the US.

That's a shame John, and obviously not the intention of the rules.

What we find with the younger/newer shooters is the delight when they make the cut for their first final. It becomes a stepping stone to success, just like when they shoot their first 90/95/100.

The game has changed. At major matches it's all about getting into the final. The final is where the best shooter on the day is judged.

That's not to say however that the qualifying stage is not important. Apart from giving the opportunity to shoot in the final, it's also where all minimum qualifying or consideration scores are set and the time when all shooters' performances can be compare to each other. It will always have a role to play; not all matches can afford the time and expense of running the finals. It's just not suitable for modern multi-sport events (e.g. Olympics) though. TV is the king, paying a very large part of the cost of such events. They are not interested in a sport where you essentially have 30 minutes of very little movement only to find that the medals were affected by something that happened before the cameras were turned on.

Long events are fine, providing that there is action e.g. marathon, cycling, equine etc.

Shorter, more static, events are also acceptable providing they have an understandable format. If they can show a series of successes/failures along the way, like the shooter eliminations, then that's even better. This only works of course if the spectators, both at the venue and remotely, understand what is going on. That's why the ISSF rules insist on an announcer and have a script of the minimum explanations they can give. Where ISSF TV provide the TV coverage they also have reasonable presenters.