Continuing US dominance in the shooting sports, Jamie Gray took the gold medal in the 50 meter smallbore rifle competition today. Oh, and just like Kim Rhode and Vincent Hancock before her, she set an Olympic record in the process. In an interview with NBC sports, when asked if there was anything else she’d like to say, she made a point of stating that the shooting sports have gotten a bad rap by some and that competitive shooting has nothing whatsoever to do with the negative connotations some have tried to associate them with. Good on you, Jamie.
Congrats Jamie Gray!
She and Kim Rhodes are roommates at the Olympic village? Talk about a GOLDEN room!
I kinda like the looks of those custom competition guns.
you go girl….
Have yet to see a single archery/rifle competition shown or even talked about on NBC yet. Starting to tick me off.
Some archery was shown on one of the NBC channels (Bravo, NBCSports, MSNBC, etc.). I don’t remember which one. Didn’t see any of the shooting although I did watch a lot of it live on the web. Watched the women’s Trap Final this morning. No Americans. There have been references to the medal wins in the reporting and I saw Kim interviewed by one of the talking heads but overall, you’re right. Not much coverage on the TV.
Was watching coverage last night and Boob Costas was running thru a medal recap. He mentioned every athlete’s sport, EXCEPT Kim Rhode’s. The lame-stream drive-by crowd just can’t bring themselves to acknowledge that shooting events are part of Olympic competition. Of course, there are also the British draconian gun laws, but I will not go there……
Sorry Dan, while the 3 US first place medals in various shooting sports is a great thing, it doesn’t seem to be “. . . US dominance in the shooting sports.” Of the 12 shooting events that have been completed so far with 36 available medals, as wonderful as they are, those three medals are it. China has 6 (2 gold), Italy and the US have 3, and the rest are spread around the world. No other US shooters have received shooting medals of any sort and of all the shooting finals held thus far, they were the only Americans left to compete except for a 5th and 7th place in 10m air rifle. Three golds. Great. Three golds out of 12 events (so far). Not too shabby. Three medals out of 36. Not dominance of a sport, IMO. As of this evening, three additional shooting events remain. Go Team USA!
“Continuing US dominance in the shooting sports…”
I would hope (that word ‘hope’ has really been poisoned the last five years) that the US would continue its dominance considering how guns and shooting are so much of the Great American Cultural Tradition.
Way to go Jamie!
Rumor has it that the ATF and DHS are now keeping her on a watch list since she has a demonstrated interest and skills in shooting sports.
I’m sorry, but I guess I’m the only one here who doesn’t find the Olympic shooting matches to be worthwhile. It’s an airgun with essentially no recoil, that’s so high tech that it doesn’t barely resembles a gun, AND they shoot from a bench rest?
Give them a 9mm pistol and a .308 rifle or the equivalent (say, the same pistol / rifle that their countries troops would use) and no bench rests and then I’d watch it and consider it to actually resemble reality.
Not correct:
Only the Airgun competitions use airguns. There are pistol and rifle competitions that use 22 cal. rimfire, which is what Ms Gray was shooting.
They do not shoot from a bench rest. Look closer at the picture or Google some of the other photo galleries from the games. Go to the NBC Olympics website and watch some of the shooting competition replays. She’s standing there shooting offhand, at 50 meters. She uses that stand next to her to rest the rifle between shots. Yes, it’s highly technical with ultra-sophisticated firearms. So what? They don’t drive Chevys in Formula 1.
To say that a particular form of shooting sport isn’t “worthwhile” leads us down the slope of eliminating the shooting sports, one by one. They’ve already removed a number of them, including Women’s Trap Doubles, which Kim Rhode initially competed and won gold in. They’ve removed the 22 pistol from the modern pentathalon and replaced it with (basically) a laser-tag gun. I say any shooting sport that can be kept at the olympic level is worthwhile.
Let’s add to what Ken said. The range is 50 m. The ten ring on the target is just larger than 10mm (roughly 3/8 inches). Personally, I can shoot a dime sized target with a .22 at 25 yards using a 4x scope; I don’t think I could see something smaller than a dime at 50 yards with no optics. You? Now let’s look at how Ms. Gray shot. They do 20 shots at each of the three positions (standing, sitting and prone). So there are a possible 600 points for straight bullseyes. She shot a 585 in a qualifying round, an Olympic record. On top of that, conditions were suboptimal. That is amazing shooting by anybody’s standard.
So hey guys, how about an article about those incredible Anschutz rifles they are using?
What do people want to know about them?
I own and shoot an Annie 1807 on a regular basis and can talk about the action, the superb trigger and the stock(s) that Anschuetz shooters use, but I can’t talk about Olympic competition.
I guess from my perspective, there’s nothing terribly mysterious about the Anschuetz rifles (air or .22LR). They’re purpose-built rifles for serious ISSF competition.
I know next to nothing about them, other than seeing these bizarre looking rifles in pictures. What is the bore length? What kind of sights? what is the twist rate? What kind of ammo is prefered? (For example, my Savage loves 36 grain jacketed hollow points and hates soft lead bullets). You know, like a regular gun review.
The 10m air rifle target’s 10 ring is 0.5mm in diameter.
The air rifle must be shot in three positions, prone, kneeling and standing. There is no bench rest. They have the use of a rifle rest on which they can rest the rifle while reloading or pausing, but not while shooting. While shooting, they have the whole weight of the rifle on them.
The ISSF does have 300m centerfire rifle competitions. Their rifles are typically 6 to 6.5 mm – like 6XC, 6mmBR, 6.5×47 Lapua, and can achieve nearly perfect scores.
When I was a kid, my brother had a Crossman “Olympic 10m air rifle” (Co2 powered). And I have to admit that shooting at 10 m was boring because the gun was so accurate.
For what it’s worth, I agree. I don’t diminish the skill involved in these Olympic shooters, but it’s simply unexciting to watch, for one, and it’s so gamed up that it barely resembles its roots. It’s like archery…those bows they use are ludicrous.
we watched Ms. Gray win her gold medal early this morning on NBCSports network (around 9:00 AM) They have been televising the shooting and archery events, but on their cable networks in off hours. I assume it’s done that way to make more time in prime time to discuss Misty May’s love life and Michael Phelps’s mom.
Me thinks we need some 3 gun in the next Olympics. How do we make that happen?
That would be cool but, I imagine that too would become gamed up and artificial. They should have force-on-force simmunition matches. Singles, doubles, and teams of five. Now THAT would epic.
Too gamed up? Have you watched the kayak competitions?
Looks like totenglock boy has no idea what he is talking about. The mental discipline that goes into this sport is incredible. Not to mention the physical aspect. Go take your glock to the dirtpile behind your house and shoot some beer cans .
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