South Korea’s Lee Jongjun won the men’s Skeet final at the 2018 ISSF Shotgun World Cup in Tucson, Arizona, USA, today.
The 28-year old shooter secured his first international medal with a final score of 54 hits, after leading throughout the whole match.
Lee had finished the qualifications atop of the leaderboard with 123 hits. When the final started (and the scores were set back to zero), Lee missed a clay on his very first station. But, keeping up with the pressure, he zeroed-in and shot an excellent match, missing just five more targets right to the end.
The Korean athlete shot head and head with Italy’s Giancarlo Tazza, who finished in second place claiming silver with 53 hits after chasing his Korean opponents for the whole match.
Today’s turned out to be the first world cup medal won by the 29-year old Italian shooter, who was no stranger to the Tucson Trap and Skeet Club, having recorded his best world cup finish - a 5th place - here in 2012.
“I can’t believe that I won this competition, it’s my first time out here and I did not expect it.” Said Lee, who is currently ranked 22nd in the world, and whose best world cup placement had been a sixth place in Changwon, earlier this year.
“This range is amazing. Yet it’s challenging. The background is quite difficult to read, and it requires a lot of concentration to see the targets against it. I did a lot of visualization exercises, before and during the match, and that helped me on the way to the top.”
“It feels amazing, and I am definitely hungry for more medals,” the South Korean athlete continued.
“In less then two months, the ISSF World Championship will be held in my country, in Changwon. I am looking forward to that. I am aiming at the world title.”
Following Lee and Tazza, it was the two-time world cup winner Stefan Nilsson of Sweden, 27, of Sweden, who pocketed the Bronze with 42 hits. He and his teammate Marcus Svensson (6th with 13 hits) were penalized by a 1-hit-deduction due to reporting late for the final. That extra target wouldn’t have changed the final result anyway, as Nilsson ranked two targets behind Tazza at the moment of his elimination.
Norway’s Engen Jorgen and USA’s Frank Thompson followed in fourth and fifth place, with 32 and 24 hits, respectively.
The ISSF Shotgun Wolrd Cup in Tucson will continue tomorrow with the Trap pre-event training. The women’s Trap competition will then start on July 15. The next medal event, the women’s Trap Final, will take place on July 16.
The Final match will take place at 3.00 PM (GMT-7) and it will be broadcasted live on the ISSF website, Facebook page and LiveStream channel.