Published on 24 May 2009

10m Air Pistol M- Swiss’s Grunder shot a record match

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Marco Dalla Dea

A world cup first time finalist, Lukas GRUNDER, 19, equalled the Junior World Record, leading the final match and winning his first gold medal in this event.

The first time finalist Lukas GRUNDER surprised everybody at today’s 10m Air Pistol men event, claiming Gold with a record qualification score. The 19-year old Swiss shooter, who had never won an ISSF medal before, walked into the final with an equalled Junior World Record of 588 points, with a safe advantage of 5 points on the other finalists.

In spite of his lack of experience, the young GRUNDER did not hesitate and shot a fantastic match firing 103.1 points for a total score of 691.1 points, winning his first ISSF world cup medal.

GRUNDER turned out to be unreachable: Ukraine’s Serhiy KUDRIYA closed the match about nine points behind him, securing Silver with 682.2 (583+99.2) points.

The 26-year old Ukraine shooter, forty-second in the world rank, had never won an ISSF medal before, and he had taken part in an ISSF World Cup only once, at the 2008 Rio de Janeiro’s stage, when he had placed seventh.

Another first-time world cup finalist, Russia’s Denis KOULAKOV, 29, secured Bronze by placing in third with 680.6 (582+98.6) points. He was followed by two young athletes, the 18-year old Chinese shooter ZHANG Bin and the 23-year old Sergey CHERVYAKOVSKIY, who placed in fourth and fifth place, respectively.

The expert 28-year old Polish shooter Wojciech KNAPIK followed in sixth place with 678.6 points, fourth tenths more then what scored by the Olympic finalist of Beijing Brian BEAMAN, seventh with 98.2 points.