A review of the 2024 Shooting Competition Year and How It Impacted junior Shooting
December 23, 2024
By Gary Anderson, DCM Emeritus
The Shooting world has just completed another great year with several major Shooting activities that that impacted Junior Shooting. They start with the Shooting events of the 33rd Olympiad in France where one-third of the Olympic gold medals (5 of 15) were won by junior-age athletes. International competition this fall featured an ISSF Junior World Championship in Peru. Last summer, junior athletes had some truly impressive USA National Matches performances. Junior Shooting also has a new Three-Position Air Rifle Rulebook that includes rules for some exciting, but under-utilized junior competition programs. This On the Mark article looks back at the 2024 competition year and how its activities influenced Junior Shooting. Each of these shooting activity reports point to ways Junior program leaders can advance Junior Shooting (look for statements in this font).
2024 OLYMPIC SHOOTING WRAP-UP
The last two editions of On The Mark featured stories about Olympic Shooting. The Summer 2024 issue (“Shooting in the 2025 Olympic and Paralympic Games”) previewed Olympic and Paralympic Shooting, with explanations of their history and rules, and with introductions of the athletes who represented the USA in those Games. The Fall 2024 OTM article, “Shooting Celebrates Its Greatest Days during the 2024 Paris Olympic Games,” was a detailed report on the great stories from 2024 Olympic Shooting.
That article highlighted the successes athletes who were under the age of 21, which would qualify them as Juniors in USA competitions, had in the Olympics. Five of 15 Shooting gold medals were won by under 21 athletes; one gold medalist was barely 16. Junior-age athletes won 20 percent of the 45 Olympic Shooting medals. These achievements demonstrate how it is possible for junior age athletes to achieve the exceptionally high scores needed to compete internationally.
One of the important stories from the 2024 Olympics concerns the huge numbers of Shooting fans who watched Olympic Shooting on television or the internet. The worldwide TV viewership for Shooting in 2016 (the latest Games for which statistics are available) was 48 million, an additional 11 million viewed Shooting on mobile apps, as many as 50 million used various websites. Shooting’s worldwide Olympic Shooting audience for the Paris Games was likely well over 100 million. Shooting really is one of the world’s most popular sports.
All 15 of the Olympic Shooting finals were televised live by the Olympic Organizing Committee’s TV production team. All Shooting finals were telecast live in the USA on NBC’s Peacock network. The time difference (a 9:30 AM final in France started at 3:30 AM in the USA’s Eastern time zone) may have discouraged some viewers (replays were also available), but lots of other Shooting fans got up in the middle of the night to watch Vince Hancock make Olympic history and athletes like Sagen Maddalena become Olympic medalists. The 2024 telecasts were generally good but not great. The camera work, which made effective use of front cameras, was excellent. The TV productions, however, were difficult to follow because leaderboards were not effectively displayed. The TV production did not do a good job of showing how the rankings were changing during finals. But more importantly, all of us were able to watch all Olympic Shooting finals live on television.
2024 PARALYMPIC GAMES SHOOTING
An important story that did not get told in the Fall 2024 On the Mark article concerns the 2024 Paralympic Games, because they occurred when that issue went to press. The Paralympic Games are a worldwide multi-sport competition for persons with disabilities. Paralympic Games take place in the Olympic host city every four years, immediately following the Olympics. They are an integral part of the worldwide Olympic/Paralympic Movement; a Paralympic Games medal is just as prestigious as an Olympic medal. Shooting, officially “Shooting Para Sport,” with 13 different rifle and pistol events, was one of 23 sports on the 2024 Paralympic Games Program. Shooting Para Sport, like 2024 Olympic Shooting, was staged at the French National Shooting Center in Chateauroux, 170 miles south of Paris.
Shooting Para Sport athletes are classified by medical experts who evaluate their disabilities to place them in one of two broad categories, SH1 or SH2, and then within those categories, according to the adaptive equipment they are approved to use. Pistol medalist Yan Xiao Gong, for example, is authorized to sit on a stool while shooting.
There were six USA Shooting athletes who qualified to compete in this year’s Paralympic Games. They were SH1 rifle athletes Kevin Nguyen and John Wayne Joss III, SH2 rifle athletes Jazmin Almlie-Ryan and McKenna Geer, and SH1 pistol athletes Marco de la Rosa and Yan Xiao Gong. The six USA Paralympians competed in 12 different events at Chateauroux. All had worthy performances, but except for Yan Xiao Gong, none of them qualified for a final where medals are decided. Gong had a series of outstanding performances. He competed in three events, qualified for two finals and won a silver medal in the Mixed 25m Pistol SH1 event.
Yan Xiao Gong, a 26-year-old from Malibu, California shot a 573-qualification score in the Mixed 25m Pistol SH1 event to advance to the final. The 25m Pistol final consists of ten series of five shots, fired in the international duel-sequence (seven seconds with the pistol down, followed by three seconds to lift the pistol and fire each shot). Shots that score 10.2 or better count as hits; shots scoring below 10.2 are misses. After the fourth series, the 8th place finalist is eliminated. After each successive series, another finalist is eliminated until the tenth series when two finalists remain to decide the gold and silver medals. Gong stayed in contention for a medal all the way to the end when he and Chao Yang of China remained to decide the gold and silver medals. Gong needed to gain three points in the last series to tie Yang; he gained one to win a silver medal, with a 28×50 score behind Yang’s 30×50.
The Paralympic Shooting story is important to USA Junior Shooting because there are very few youths with disabilities in the USA who participate in Shooting. Yan Xiao Gong’s silver medal is especially significant because it is only the sixth Paralympic medal ever won by a USA athlete since Shooting was added to the Paralympic Games Program in 1984. Gong credits his start in pistol shooting to the Bridge Shooting Club in Los Angeles and their coach In Kim. In the USA, both the CMP and USA Shooting have rules and programs that can accommodate Shooting participation by athletes with disabilities as well as staff members who are prepared to link disabled athletes with clubs or instructors that can provide assistance. To produce athletes who are capable of winning medals in Shooting Para Sport Championships, Shooting clubs and teams need to encourage many more youths with disabilities to try Shooting.
2024 JUNIOR WORLD SHOOTING CHAMPIONSHIP
The world’s premier junior shooting competition in 2024 was the ISSF Junior World Shooting Championship. This Championship took place in Lima, Peru from 27 September through 7 October. Junior World Championships are relatively new in the history of Shooting World Championships. There were no junior events in the early World Championships between 1897 and 1958, when the first junior events were added to the program. More Junior events for athletes under the age of 21 were added in subsequent World Championships. Junior World Championship events proved to be very popular. Participation grew until in the 2018 World Championship in Changwon, Korea, 32 percent (1046 juniors out of 3314 total competitors) of all entries were juniors. 21 of the 50 individual events on the 2018 program were junior events. Shooting’s World Championships had grown too large; the ISSF needed to establish separate Junior World Championships. Three ISSF Junior World Championships for all events have now been held in Lima, Peru (2021), Changwon, Korea (2023) and again in Lima (2024).
USA Shooting sent a large 30-athlete delegation to Lima. Four of these USA Juniors won five individual medals, they were:
- Braden Peiser 50m Rifle 3-Position Rifle Men Junior Gold
- Ben Keller Skeet Men Junior Silver
- Grace Hensley Skeet Women Junior Silver
- Braden Peiser 10m Air Rifle Men Junior Bronze
- Katie Zaun 10m Air Rifle Women Junior Bronze
In addition, nine USA Juniors qualified for finals or were members of USA teams that won medals. They were Madeline Corbin, Skeet; Karsyn Ross, Skeet; Joshua Corbin, Skeet; Jordan Sapp, Skeet; Ben Keller, Skeet; Griffin Lake, Rifle; Tyler Wee, Rifle, Emme Walrath, Rifle; and Carey Garrison, Trap. Lake, Wee, Walrath, Zaun and Peiser are all names that have appeared at the top of recent CMP Camp Perry results lists.
The one USA athlete who became an individual gold medalist and Junior World Champion was 19-year-old Braden Peiser from San Angelo, Texas. Peiser is a left-handed shooter who competed for the Texas Hill Country Team while he was in high school. He now shoots for the University of Kentucky. Peiser qualified first in the 10m Air Rifle Men event with a 529.8 and finished 3rd in the final. In the 50m Three-Position event, he qualified 2nd with a 588 and fought a close battle with Sweden’s Victor Lindgren in the final. Lindgren had a 0.2 lead going into the last shot (#45) and he had a 10.4 on that shot. But Peiser shot a 10.7 to win the Junior World Championship by 0.1, 460.2 to 460.1.
All USA medals were won by Rifle or Skeet athletes; no pistol athletes qualified for finals or team medals. This suggests that more initiatives must be pursued in the USA to develop Junior Pistol athletes. Organizations like the CMP and USA Shooting need to make junior pistol development a higher priority.
and China. All the USA medals were won by rifle and skeet athletes.
Wisconsin Juniors’ Performance in USA National Matches
The most important Rifle and Pistol Championships in the USA are the National Matches that take place at Camp Perry, Ohio every July and August (https://thecmp.org/cmp-national-matches/). The National Matches include traditional National Trophy Service Rifle and Pistol Matches, national-level EIC (Excellence-in-Competition) Matches and National Championship competitions for Match Pistol (3-gun bullseye pistol), Smallbore Rifle Prone, Smallbore Rifle Position, Highpower Rifle, and Long-Range Rifle. There are also several Vintage Military Rifle championships, as well as a whole series of clinics and schools. The 2025 National Matches will offer a comprehensive, 34-day program with Junior Championship awards in each of these events. The National Matches are open competitions, conducted in a festival atmosphere, that makes them a special experience every junior rifle or pistol athlete should have. The CMP encourages every junior rifle or pistol athlete to make going to the National Matches one of their personal shooting goals.
There were many excellent 2024 National Matches Junior performances, but the Junior performance that absolutely deserves the highest accolades were the multiple, outstanding performances by the Wisconsin Junior Service Rifle Team. Their greatest achievement was their victory in the National Infantry Trophy Team Match. The Fall 2024 On The Mark has a detailed story about their accomplishments, “Exceptional Performances from the Wisconsin Junior Rifle Team.” The significance of their victory in the Infantry Trophy Team Match lies in the prestige of the National Trophy Team Matches and how for many decades they were dominated by elite well-equipped, well-trained military teams. The National Trophy Rifle Team Match was established in 1903 when the U. S. Congress appropriated funds for “a national trophy” that became known as the Dogs of War Trophy. WWI Supreme Allied Commander General John J. Pershing procured the Gold Cup Trophy that inaugurated the National Trophy Pistol Team Match in 1920. The third of the three National Trophy Team Matches, the National Infantry Trophy Team Match, was inaugurated in 1922; donations by military personnel purchased the Infantry Trophy that is awarded annually to the winning team in that competition.
The Infantry Trophy match is a team event. Six-person teams each have a bank of eight silhouette targets. Teams start at 600 yards with 384 rounds of ammunition. Targets are exposed for firing for 50 second periods at 600, 500, 300 and 200 yards (the “mad minute”). Teams are scored according to the number of hits on their silhouette targets and whether they have a minimum of six hits on each of their eight targets. Making correct wind adjustments is especially critical at 600 and 500 yards. In the 102-year history of this event, it was won by civilian teams in 1929 and 1930, but from then until 2009, a 79-year span, only military teams won this event. The first big upset came in 2009, when a Junior Team, the California Grizzlies, coached by a retired Marine named Jim O’Connell, won this match. The 2024 competition began as expected with the USAMU Team leading after the 600-yard stage, but disaster struck them during the 500-yard stage, where the Wisconsin Juniors took the lead that they did not relinquish.
The “Wisconsin CMP Juniors” call themselves “an umbrella organization for junior service rifle competition in the state of Wisconsin.” Their victory in this match was the result of their organization of an excellent junior service rifle program that brought a dozen junior rifle shooters and several adult volunteers to the National Matches with a goal of winning Junior Service Rifle competitions. Team training for them runs from May through the National Matches. Their National Match successes included the Infantry Trophy Team victory, a third-place overall finish in the National Trophy Rifle Team Match and securing four of the six places on the Deneke Trophy National Junior Team. The Deneke Trophy selections honor the overall best junior performances in the President’s and National Trophy Service Rifle Team Matches.
This year, state junior service rifle teams from Wisconsin, California, Ohio, Texas, Arizona, and Pennsylvania participated in the National Trophy Team Matches. In Pistol, Juniors compete in a two-person National Trophy Team Match where the Freedom’s Fire Trophy is awarded. Only two states, New Jersey and Ohio, entered state junior pistol teams, a couple of other club teams competed. For a junior rifle or pistol shooter, being a member of a state Service Rifle or Pistol Team can be a great summer shooting adventure that more juniors should have. More states should designate junior leaders who can organize State Junior Service Rifle and Junior Pistol Team programs.
New 3PAR Rulebook and Some Under-Utilized Opportunities
The National Three-Position Air Rifle Council and CMP recently released a new rulebook, the 15th Edition 2024-2026 National Standard Three-Position Air Rifle Rules, that will govern junior 3PAR competitions for the next two years. Copies are available for downloading at https://online.fliphtml5.com/ebacv/eogi/. The release of this new rulebook also gives us an opportunity to consider how there are some exciting programs that utilize these rules, and that could offer more junior shooters opportunities to grow as competitors. Here are three examples:
JUNIOR CHAMPIONSHIPS WITH OPEN NATIONAL QUALIFYING. Junior Shooting in the USA is blessed with several championships that offer qualifying or participation opportunities in multiple locations around the country. That means all junior shooters can participate in them. These championships start with postal, sectional or state championship qualifying to determine invitations to National Championships. The CMP Three-Position Air Rifle Championship (https://thecmp.org/youth/three-position-national-postal-competition/national-three-position-air-rifle-championships-2/) is a great example of this format. Other championships that offer open qualifying in multiple locations include the X-Count Rifle and Pistol Junior Air Nationals (https://www.thexcount.com/all-things-air-nats/), USA Shooting Junior Olympic Championship (https://usashooting.org/get-involved/events/), JROTC National Championship (https://thecmp.org/youth/jrotc/). Event: 3-Position Air Rifle, and the American Legion Annual 3-Position Junior Air Rifle National Championship (https://www.legion.org/get-involved/youth-programs/junior-shooting-sports). Every junior shooter, whether advanced or new and inexperienced, should be encouraged to participate in these qualifying competitions. It’s their chance to be part of a great national event.
Championship were honored in a post-match award ceremony. The Texas Hill Country Juniors Team 2 (center) won the National Championship.
LEAGUE SHOOTING OFFERS A NEW COMPETITION FORMAT. League competitions are team competitions where one team competes against another team in their league. Teams are ranked according to their won-loss records. The most popular shooting event in Germany is its Bundesliga (Federal Shooting League), which is a national shooting league with multiple competition divisions. They describe the Bundesliga as the “flagship of the German Shooting Federation.” Team against team matches are easy to stage in Germany because of short travel distances. In the USA, with much longer travel distances, one league model that has succeeded is the SCOPOS National Air Rifle League (https://rezults.scopos.tech/national-leagues/), because it uses a virtual competition format where teams shoot on their home ranges. Scopos leagues use Orion software and the Internet to manage “game” scheduling and results presentation. Teams are assigned to leagues with other teams of the same skill level, so every team has a chance to win each week. 153 teams from all over the country are competing in Scopos National Sporter and Precision Class Leagues this fall. Scopos offers a National Air Rifle New Shooter League and National Air Pistol League in the winter months. This league format gives all participating teams seven team vs. team competitions, with the leading teams advancing to a three-event post-season competition to determine league champions. The coaches of teams that compete in these leagues report that 1) League participation helps them recruit new members, 2) team members practice more during league seasons and 3) league participation helps to bring positive attention to the team. Scopos national leagues offer junior teams everywhere in the USA multiple challenging competition opportunities with no travel or big expenses; any junior team with Orion software can participate, whether they shoot on paper or electronic targets.
REESTABLISH THE NEW SHOOTER CATEGORY. 3-position rules define a “new shooter” as someone who began shooting during the current school year (after 1 August 2024 for the 2024-2025 season, Rule 3.4.5). New Shooter categories were first used more than two decades ago in the Wolf Creek 600 and Montgomery Bell Classics to facilitate the entry of new shooters into competition. Separate rankings and awards were given to athletes sho started shooting during the current school year. New shooter categories were popular and successful, as many as one-third of the match entries in these competitions were in the new shooter category. Unfortunately, the new shooter category has been overlooked by too many current match officials. Now the Scopos National Sporter Air Rifle New Shooter League is reviving interest in this category. 59 teams participated in the Scopos new shooter league earlier in 2024. Offering a new shooter category is an effective way for match sponsors to get participating teams to also enter their new shooters in competitions and give them valuable experience.
This group of new shooters experienced their first competition at a recent Camp Perry Monthly 3PAR Match. The text urges match sponsors to include a “new shooter category” in their match programs.