The men’s double trap event will one of the key events in shooting at the 2016 Rio Olympics. It will take place on the same day as the men’s 50 metre pistol will take place – on the 5th day of the Olympics on 10 August 2016 at the National Shooting Centre in Rio.
None of the Indian shooters have managed to qualify for the double trap event at the Olympic Games. However, there are many international shooters who will be eager to show their class and bag a medal for their respective countries. Australia’s James Willett goes to the Games sitting at the top of the double trap rankings. The 20-year old shooter has enjoyed a meteoric rise in terms of how he has risen to the top – he is considered as the favourite to land the gold medal at Rio 2016.
Along with Willett, Italy’s Alessandro Chianese, who is currently ranked two in the world, will also be seen as a favourite. Malta’s William Chetcuti is currently ranked at number 3 and will be looking to make history at the Games.
Here are some of the details about the event:
What is the double trap event?
The men’s double trap event is an International Shooting Sport Federation shooting event which will also be featured at the Rio Olympic Games. In this event, the athletes shoot on five different stations to hit doubles of orange clay targets thrown from under a trap located in front of them.
In this event, the athletes have to shoot one-by-one, moving to the next station as soon as the following athlete has fired his shot.
Rules
The event starts with the qualification round where every participant has to shoot a total of 150 targets, which are divided into five rounds of 30 targets (15 doubles) each. Here, every round will involve up to six athletes who will be shooting from stations number 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. These shooters will be rotating from left to right and shooting 5 times from each station.
Behind station number 1, the sixth athlete will be waiting so that he can move into station 1 when the athlete on station number 5 has fired his shot.
Semifinal round
The top 6 shooters from the qualification phase will advance to the semi-final round. These shooters will then shoot 30 targets (15 doubles) each in the same manner as they shot in the qualification stage from the five stations.
This round before the final follows the same set of rules and regulations as the qualification phase, and it will conclude when every semi-finalist has shot three times from each of the five stations.
Final
In this event, only the top-two shooters from the semi-final stage will advance to the final where they will have a gold medal match. The 3rd and 4th placed shooters in the semi-finals will play the bronze medal match. The two medal matches are also conducted with the same set of rules as the qualification and the semi-finals. But the only difference is that the two finalists will shoot 30 targets (15 doubles) only from the stations numbered 2, 3 and 4.
Incase of a tie, a shoot-off is contested between both the shooters.
London 2012 result:
Men
Gold: Peter Wilson (Great Britain)
Silver: Hakan Dahlby (Sweden)
Bronze: Vasily Mosin (Russia)
