Great Britain and Finland were victorious today in the women's and men's skeet at the ISSF Junior World Cup in Suhl, Germany, thanks to wins for Phoebe Bodley-Scott and Lassi Kauppinen.
The women's skeet, Phoebe Bodley-Scott from Great Britain had enough to defeat India's Raiza Dhillon for the gold medal.
Early exits went for Madeleine Zarina Russell of Great Britain and Lidiya Basharova of Kazakhstan in fifth and sixth place by comfortable margins, but it was much tighter at the top following this, with the four athletes remaining separated by just three points.
The next elimination went to Arianna Nember of Italy on a tiebreaker with Annabella Hettmer, who drew level when Nember missed her last shot. She was now on 31 points to Dhillon's 32 and Bodley-Scott's 34, with the Briton extending their lead to two. Hettmer would finish with the bronze in the end.
For gold, Bodley-Scott remained consistent and kept her two-shot cushion to keep ahead of Dhillon, missing just three of her second 30 shots to finish on a total of 53. She won a team gold at the 2022 Junior World Cup here, but this time added an individual title to her name too.
Lassi Kauppinen won his first Junior World Cup gold todayLassi Kauppinen was near-perfect in the men's final, missing just three targets in total. Two of these came in his first 20 shots, as he sat level with Dutch athlete Ryan Kooijman and Matteo Bragalli of Italy. However, he was soon out there by himself as Bragalli missed two of his next four targets and Kooijman missed four of his next 10 to be eliminated in fifth, ahead of another Italian, Marco Coco.
Next to depart in fourth place by a fair distance was Kazakhstan's Artyom Sedelnikov, leaving Kauppinen, Bragalli and Turkey's Muhammet Seyhun Kaya. Kaya had recovered from three misses in the opening round of shots to move ahead of Bragalli once the field was whittled down to four. He was still ahead by one until the 50th target. He missed this to draw the Italian level and by virtue of a better seeding, into the final showdown with the Finn.
While the drama over silver and bronze took place, Lauppinen looked poised. He had cleared 30 targets in a row going into the final round and looked capable of making it another perfect run. A miss on his final target was a small disappointment to an incredibly successful day, finishing with 57 to Bragalli's 54 - and winning his first ISSF Junior World Cup title.
In the 10m air pistol mixed team final, China's Jin Bohan and Zhang Yingtao contested a fantastic comeback to claim the gold medal against Yuliia Isachenko and Maksym Himon of Ukraine. Jin and Zhang trailed 14-8, with the Ukrainians needing just one more victory to take the title, however China's consistency was enough to turn the result in their favour.
The bronze medal went to Alessandra Fait and Francesco Rutigliani of Italy, who won the last three series to pull away from a tie with Cheng Yen-Ching and Hsieh Hsiang-Chen of Chinese Taipei, with the score ending 16-10.