The 2016 Rio Olympic Games kick off today with the Opening Ceremony. Shooting sports will be a part of these Olympics with competitions for rifle, pistol, and shotgun. From August 6 though August 14, Olympic shooters will compete in Brazil’s ultra-modern Olympic Shooting Center, originally created for the 2007 Pan-American Games at a cost of $53.5 million.

CLICK HERE for USA Shooting Olympic Preview with Team Profiles

SFC Michael McPhail, shown above, is currently ranked #1 in the world in the smallbore 50m prone rifle discipline. He’s one of the favorites to win Gold in 2016.

2016 Olympic Media Coverage — TV and Internet
There will be some broadcast television coverage of shooting events. But the best way to follow the shooting matches is through streaming on the internet. NBCOlympics.com and the NBC Sports App will live stream 4,500 total hours of Olympics coverage — covering every event. Each day you can click the NBC Live Stream Schedule for Shooting Sports Events to see what’s running. CLICK HERE for complete shooting sports schedule.

With Rio just one hour ahead of the Eastern Time zone, Americans will enjoy great “real-time” coverage of the 2016 Summer Games. NBCUniversal will present 2,084 hours of Olympic programming across 11 affiliated TV and Cable networks.

Olympic Shooting Event Schedule

You’ll find more information on Team USA and Olympic Shooting Competition on these websites:

The 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil are coming up soon. The Rio Olympic Games will include rifle, pistol, and shotgun competitions. Shooting events will be held in Brazil’s ultra-modern Olympic Shooting Center, originally created for the 2007 Pan-American Games at a cost of $53.5 million. Perhaps the most challenging Olympic rifle discipline is the 50m three-position (3P) smallbore match. In this article, American Olympian Matt Emmons provides expert tips on three-position shooting.

Here Matt Shows the Kneeling Position. The other two positions are Standing and Prone.

Matt Emmons will compete in the Three-Position Event at the Rio Olympics, seeking his fourth Olympic medal. Rio marks Matt’s fourth Olympic appearance — he has competed on the U.S. National Team since 1997, medaling in three Olympic games: Gold in 2004 in Men’s 50m Prone; Silver in 2008 in Men’s 50m Prone; and Bronze in 2012 in Men’s 50m 3X40. Although his specialty is Men’s 3-Position rifle, Emmons’ World Championship and Olympic Gold are in Men’s 50m Prone. He usually shoots an Anschütz or Bleiker .22LR rifle, with Eley Tenex ammo.

Here are shooting tips from Matt, courtesy Anschütz. Click image below to launch a large PDF file. Right-click the image and “save as” to download the poster-sized PDF.

CLICK Photo to Load Large PDF File

Three Sets of Hardware for Three Positions
You may be surprised to find that Matt often totes three complete sets of rifle parts to important matches — three buttplates, three cheekpieces, and three Centra sights with adjustable irises. Matt told Shooting Sports USA that he travels with “three sets for three positions. Our final is so fast that I need three sets of everything to allow a fast change-over between positions.” Matt carries his gear in an an Anschütz sport bag: “It’s similar to the big Ogio duffels with wheels, but lighter. I’ve worked with AHG/Anschütz for many years and I like their bag because all of my junk fits in it.”

Emmons, who will be competing in Rio this upcoming August, also carries something for good luck: “My wife Katy gave me a little figurine of a Czech fairytale character a long time ago for good luck and I always have it with me when I shoot.”

Jamie shot great throughout the competition and headed into finals with a two-point lead over her competitors. Gray’s qualifying score was 592, also an Olympic record. This was Jamie’s second appearance in the Olympics, and she has made great progress in the past four years. In Beijing in 2008, Jamie finished fifth in three-position rifle, and fourth in air rifle. After winning Gold in Londson, Jamie said: “This is a dream come true. I made a plan and I stuck to it.”

Two Gold Medal-Winning Room-Mates
At the Olympic Athletes Village in London, Jamie shares a room with Kim Rhode, who won Gold in Women’s Skeet Shooting. Perhaps that pairing brought good luck to both ladies. Team USA now has three Gold medals in shooting, the team’s best performance since 1984.

Earlier this spring, in a USA Shooting interview, Jamie talked about Olympic shooting competition which divides male and female shooters into two divisions: “I am a born competitor and whether it is men or women I want to win. In a sport that is equal between men and women I would most definitely enjoy the competition. I started out only knowing that men and women compete against each other. It wasn’t until I learned shooting was an Olympic sport that I realized men and women didn’t compete against each other. It is exciting to me that there are still sports out there that men and women can be equal, however for other reasons it may be better that there are different categories for each.”

Jamie began shooting in a BB gun program at 8 years old. An all-round athlete, as a high school student, she played varsity soccer, basketball and softball. Jamie graduated from the University of Alaska Fairbanks and shot for its nationally-renowned rifle team. She is currently the technical coach for the Columbus State University Rifle Team. Jamie is married to another shooter, USAMU SSG Hank Gray. Jamie, who originally hails from Lebanon, PA, competed as Jamie Beyerle before her marriage.

SGT Vincent Hancock of the USAMU shot a 148/150 to win the Gold Medal today in men’s skeet at the London Olympics. Hancock has now won back-to-back Golds in skeet shooting at two successive Olympics. (Hancock also won Gold at Beijing in 2008). Finishing second with a 146 score, was Anders Golding of Denmark. Qatar’s Nasser Al-Attiya won a shoot-off over Russia’s Valery Shomin for the bronze at the Royal Artillery Barracks. Read Related Story on ESPN.com.

After setting a new Olympic Record by hitting 123 out of 125 clays in Tuesday qualifying, Hancock entered the medal round with a one-target lead. He then shot a perfect final round score of 25 for a total of 148 out of 150, which was also a new Olympic record. He is the first men’s skeet shooter in Olympic history to win two Gold Medals.

Hancock is a “young gun” in a field of more experienced competitors. At age 23, he is the youngest in the men’s skeet competition by five years. (The average age of medal-round-qualifying skeet shooters in London is 37 years.) Hancock almost missed the 2012 Olympics altogether. After his 2008 win in Beijing, he thought seriously about retiring from the sport. But after some months considering the options, he resumed his training with a vengence and now he is on top of the world. Hancock’s victory, combined with the Gold-medal performance of team-mate Kim Rhode in women’s skeet, gives Team USA a sweep of the Skeet events at the 2012 Olympics.

Olympics Finals photos by Tim Hipps, IMCOM Public Affairs.

]]> https://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2012/07/sgt-vincent-hancock-wins-gold-medal-in-skeet-shooting/feed/ 2 https://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2012/07/first-gold-at-2012-london-olympics-goes-to-air-rifle-shooter/ https://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2012/07/first-gold-at-2012-london-olympics-goes-to-air-rifle-shooter/#comments Sat, 28 Jul 2012 16:59:13 +0000 http://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/?p=40031 The 2012 Olympic Games kicked off last night in London. And the first gold meal awarded at the 2012 Game went to a shooter — Yi Siling of China. The top-ranked Chinese Air Rifle shooter edged Slywia Bogacka of Poland to win Gold in the Women’s 10m Air Rifle event. The South Korean shooting squad also captured its first Gold Medal of the games as Jin Jong-oh won the Men’s 10m Air Pistol event. Jin had won silver in the last Olympics at Beijing, China.

CLICK for Shooting Events Schedule | CLICK for Air Rifle Match Photos

Visit NBCOlympics.com for complete online coverage of the Olympics. On that website, in the upper left-hand corner (next to the London 2012 logo), you’ll find a “Select a Sport” button. That button opens a menu with links to all the different sports. There is a dedicated page for the Shooting Sports. CLICK HERE to visit the Shooting Sports Page at www.nbcolympics.com/shooting/.

]]> https://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2012/07/first-gold-at-2012-london-olympics-goes-to-air-rifle-shooter/feed/ 1 https://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2012/07/tv-and-online-coverage-of-shooting-sports-in-2012-olympics/ https://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2012/07/tv-and-online-coverage-of-shooting-sports-in-2012-olympics/#comments Fri, 06 Jul 2012 16:40:19 +0000 http://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/?p=39334 The 2012 Summer Olympics in London begin July 27 with shooting events starting the 28th and wrapping up August 5, 2012. NBC has already launched a full-featured website dedicated to the London Olympics at NBCOlympics.com.

LINK: NBC Olympic Shooting Events Web Page

We visited NBCOlympics.com this morning and were pleased to see that NBC has already launched a content-rich “homepage” dedicated to Olympic shooting. This includes Latest Shooting News, Tech Info, Event Schedules, Shooter Profiles, and Feature Stories with Video. There’s an excellent Video Interview with Sarah Scherer (10m Air Rifle), and you’ll even find a ‘Glamour’ Photo Shoot with Smallbore 3-P Shooter Amanda Furrer. In the NSSF video below, Amanda chats about the challenge of making the U.S. Olympic Team:

Fifteen (15) shooting events are featured at the 2012 London Olympic Games
Rifle	Pistol	Shotgun
Men's 10m Air Rifle  Men's 50m Rifle Prone  Men's 50m Rifle 3 Positions  Women's 10m Air Rifle  Women's 50m Rifle 3 Positions	Men's 10m Air Pistol  Men's 25m Rapid Fire Pistol  Men's 50m Pistol  Women's 10m Air Pistol  Women's 25m Pistol	Men's Trap  Men's Double Trap  Men's Skeet  Women's Trap  Women's Skeet

Olympic Television Broadcasts and Online Webcasts
NBC TV will broadcast many shooting events as part of its 2012 Olympics coverage. Supplementing that broadcast coverage will be Live Extra WebCasting. The Live Extra option provides real-time or delayed coverage of EVERY Olympic event. That’s right, you can watch every single Olympic event on the web. The Live Extra service does require viewers to register online for the service. In addition, you will need to verify that you subscribe to a cable, satellite, or telecom video tier that includes CNBC and MSNBC on the NBCOlympics.com website. CLICK HERE to learn more about Live Extra services.

History of Shooting in Modern Olympics
One of the original events featured at the first modern Olympic Games in Athens in 1896, the shooting sports have been present in all but the 1904 and 1928 games. The United States leads the field in shooting sports medals, having racked up 103 all-time, including 50 Gold. China is second with 42 total shooting medals and 19 Gold. The Chinese had the top showing at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, taking home eight shooting medals, five of which were Gold. (In Beijing Team USA garnered six shooting medals, including two Gold.)

]]> https://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2012/07/tv-and-online-coverage-of-shooting-sports-in-2012-olympics/feed/ 2 https://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2012/05/shooting-facilities-readied-for-2012-london-olympic-games/ https://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2012/05/shooting-facilities-readied-for-2012-london-olympic-games/#comments Sun, 20 May 2012 20:11:36 +0000 http://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/?p=37840 Story based on Report by Gary Anderson in the CMP’s First Shot Online Magazine
The Opening Ceremony of the XXXth Summer Olympic Games will take place in London on July 27, 2012. The next morning, the first gold medal of the Games will be awarded to the winner of the Women’s Air Rifle event. That will be the first of 15 Olympic rifle, pistol and shotgun events to be contested on London’s Royal Artillery Barracks Shooting Venue during the first ten days of the Games. 390 shooters from at least 103 countries. plan to participate in Shooting competition. That number of participants places the shooting sports third among all summer Olympic sports.

Finals Range Exterior: All of the rifle and pistol ranges at the London Olympic Venue feature this same distinctive architectural style. This large structure houses the 10m/25m/50m Rifle and Pistol Finals Range.

The Olympic Shooting Venue at the Royal Artillery Barracks
The British government’s Olympic Development Authority created the Olympic Shooting Venue at the Royal Artillery Barracks at a cost of £36 million. This temporary Shooting Venue includes a combined 50m and 10m Rifle and Pistol Range, a 25m Pistol Range, a Rifle and Pistol Finals Range and a Shotgun Range with three fields. Rifle and pistol targets are electronic. Originally, Olympic shooting events were to be held at the National Shooting Centre at Bisley in Surrey, but that plan was changed after the International Olympic Committee complained about the number of sports staged outside London. So, the decision was made to create a temporary facility at the Royal Artillery Barracks in Woolwich (East London). Sadly, that means that the temporary venue will be torn down after the 2013 London Games. Three of these ranges will be moved to Glasgow, Scotland for the 2014 Commonwealth Games. But otherwise the Olympic Shooting venue will disappear after the London Games. According to the BBC website: “The Woolwich venue has proved controversial within the sport as it is temporary and will be pulled down after the Games”, thereby denying UK shooters a post-Olympics legacy facility.

Finals Range Interior. This is where the top eight shooters in each rifle and pistol event compete in Finals. Top to bottom are: monitors for each shooter’s target, the 50m targets, eight finalists on the line, and the Range officer control station.

The Pre-Olympic Test Competition
In April, test competitions in London were staged as an ISSF World Cup with athletes from 100 countries participating, the most ever for an ISSF World Cup. The 800+ athletes that competed is more than double the number of shooters who will qualify for the Summer Olympics. The huge number of Test Comp shooters, plus unseasonably cold, wet, windy weather, made the World Cup a supreme test of LOCOG preparations for the Games.

Cold Weather: Headgear worn by these two finalists in the 50m 3×20 Rifle Women Final tells a lot about weather conditions during the test competition.

The Pre-Olympic Test Competition in London also served as a preview of the Olympic competitions this summer. Scores were surprisingly high considering how bad the weather was. The top medal-winning nations in the London World Cup were Russia and China with six each. Italy won five medals followed by the USA and Ukraine with four medals each. USA medal winners were Matt Emmons, 50m 3X40 Rifle Men; Kim Rhode, Skeet Women; Kayle Browning, Trap Women and Mike McPhail, 50m Prone Rifle Men. The USA Shooting Team hopes to contend for several medals in London.

]]> https://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2012/05/shooting-facilities-readied-for-2012-london-olympic-games/feed/ 1 https://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2011/03/2012-olympic-shooting-schedule-tickets-on-sale-march-15th/ https://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2011/03/2012-olympic-shooting-schedule-tickets-on-sale-march-15th/#comments Thu, 03 Mar 2011 16:12:53 +0000 http://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/?p=24177 The complete events schedule for the 2012 London Olympics has been released. Shooting events will take place at the Royal Artillery Barracks near Woolwich. Shooting competition starts with 10m Air Pistol on July 28 and finishes with the Mens 3-Position Finals and Trap Finals on August 6.

Olympic tickets (for all sports) go on sale starting March 15, 2011. Don’t delay if you want to grab tickets for the Shooting Finals. U.S. residents can purchase tickets through CoSport.com, while UK residents can get tickets from the London2012.com official website.

Download 2012 Olympic Shooting Schedule (with ticket prices) PDF

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