TargetTalk

2004 FINAL OLYMPIC RIFLE, PISTOL and RUNNING TARGET TEAM TRIALS

FORT BENNING, Ga. – After women’s air and men’s prone rifle matches, Tuesday, there is only one conclusion that can be drawn—it is still too close to tell. In events that are easily won or lost by a tenth of a point, it may come down to just that, when nominating the next four shooters to the Olympic Rifle Team.

To reiterate this point, today’s prone match saw a four-way tie for first in which Chris Abalo (Glendora, Calif.), Sgt. 1st Class Thomas Tamas (Columbus, Ga.), Matt Emmons (Browns Mills, N.J.) and Michael McPhail (Osh Kosh, Wis.) all hit a 598 in their first qualifying round of competition. In the end, Tamas, a two-time Olympian in this event, came out on top with a 702.2. Matt Emmons, who just qualified for his first Olympic Team in men’s air, clinched second with a 702.0. Tarl Kempley (Reno, Nev.) gained some ground by shooting a huge final score of 104.0 to move into third with a 699.0. And McPhail and Maj. Michael Anti had a shoot off for fourth place. McPhail, who’s fairly unknown to most competitive shooters, shot a 10.0 for a tenth of a point win over Anti, a two-time Olympian looking for a place on his third Olympic Team.

“It just goes to show that on any given day, anything can happen,” National Rifle Coach, David Johnson said. “You will eventually start to see the experience come into play over the course of three days. I am just so excited to see such good performances. Four world-class scores off the bat—it’s unbelievable.”

On the women’s side, on the 10m range, Emily Caruso (Fairfield, Conn.) led the women the entire day through. After the qualification round, she was tied with 1988 Olympian, Deena Wigger. But with a final’s score of 103.6, Caruso picked up four-tenths of a point on Wigger and finished with a 499.6.

Jamie Beyerle (Lebanon, Pa.) is following closely behind the leading two, with a 497.1, while Sarah Blakeslee (Vancouver, Wash.) is looking to win yet another spot on the Olympic Rifle Team, finishing in fourth with a 494.1

For more information or full results, please log on to www.usashooting.org.







Newsline No. 4 ◄
Editor: Sara Greenlee


Yesterday
AT THE RANGES
Official Training Day

Today
AT THE RANGES
Men’s 50m Prone Rifle Matches and Finals
Women’s 10m Air Rifle Matches and Finals

Wednesday
AT THE RANGES
Men’s 50m Prone Rifle Matches and Finals
Women’s 10m Air Rifle Matches and Finals

Thursday
AT THE RANGES
Men’s 50m Prone Rifle Matches, Finals and Awards
Women’s 10m Air Rifle Matches, Finals and Awards




Men’s Prone
First-day Finalists
1. Thomas Tamas, 702.2; 2. Matt Emmons, 702.0; 3.Tarl Kempley, 699.0; 4. Michael McPhail, 698.7 (10.0); 5. Michael Anti, 698.7 (9.9); 6. Ken Johnson, 698.2; 7.Chris Abalo, 697.8; 8. Eric Uptagrafft, 695.8.


Women’s Air Rifle
First-day Finalists
1. Emily Caruso, 499.6; 2. Deena Wigger, 499.2; 3. Jamie Beyerle, 497.1; 4. Sarah Blakeslee, 494.1; 5. Shasta Little, 494.0 (10.5); 6. Morgan Hicks, 494.0 (10.2); 7. Melissa Mulloy-Mecozzi, 493.7; 8. Hattie Johnson, 493.6.

Is it my immagination, or does it always seem to be the same poeple at the top? Is there really a chance for the rest of us? Not that i'm denying that the people at the top don't deserve to be there, but is there actually hope that a "regular" person might make the games?

Jim B

The sport is too competitive and demands too much from the athlete for just anyone from Anytown, USA to just show up and make the team. It takes lots of experience to be able to shoot those kinds of scores. With good coaching it may take fewer months to reach that level of experience, but it still takes time and dedication.

So, no, a regular guy or gal from the local gun club who shoots "once in a while" does not have a chance.

Regular training is the key, along with good coaching.

Marcus wrote:Regular training is the key, along with good coaching.

Along with being willing to sacrifice just about everything else in pursuit of training - career, financial security, social life, love life, comfort; and being willing to put in an enormous amount of effort in both training and the logistics to permit training - all for a slim chance at making it.

And if you think it's bad in the US, you should try it in a smaller country sometime. Yes, there's less competition nationally (though you still go up against the Gonci's and Debevec's internationally so the lack of domestic competition is a handicap rather than an advantage) - but while the US sees actual money, smaller countries don't. USA shooting just announced there a day ago that $10,000 was given towards the US olympic shooting team by a corporate sponsor. In Ireland, that's the sum total of a year's budget for the entire national squad for every competition. And there is far more restrictive legislation in place making it even harder to train - we can't train at all in pistol events unless you're in the army or live in Northern Ireland, for example, and setting up clubs is a nightmare, legally. Junior shooting is a very grey area legally, and not encouraged by any offical body other than the target shooting bodies and the legislation regarding children in sport is another legal minefield that can easily lose you your house for something that you couldn't prevent, so few clubs wish to deal with juniors. Politicians avoid us like the plague, corporate sponsorship is incredibly difficult to get, and even the national airline charges us improbably high amounts for flying our firearms and equipment to competitions, while things like skis and golf bags get only nominal fees. And don't forget, the Irish Team won the World Championships team event in Olympic Trap in 2002!

Trust me, hard as it is in the states, you've still got it better than us!

I geuss you see this in other sports as well. When someone (or a team) is good; thet're just good. Remember all of thise Superbowls between the Pattsburg Stealers & the Dallas Cowboys? How about the 49ers? Then there's the LA Lakers, Boston Celtics, I could go on & on.

When you get some one who is a dominant force in a sport, then the rest of the competators are playing for Second Place (in the case of shooting sometimes it's Fourth Place). That's how the shooting sports seem to me anyhow. The people at the top will continue to win until they retire from active competition, then a new set of "super stars" will come along.

Jim B

Jim B.

I'll bet that at some point in each Olympic competitors life, regardless of discipline, they all said to themselves:


"Is it my immagination, or does it always seem to be the same poeple at the top? Is there really a chance for the rest of us? . . . is there actually hope that a "regular" person might make the games?"


At some point after that, they made the necessary sacrifices and then answered each of those questions with a simple - YES.