43-year old Vitaly Fokeev of the Russian Federation claimed the men’s Double Trap world title on his home turf, today, at the 2017 ISSF Shotgun World Championship in Moscow Region.
The four-time Olympian came back atop of the ISSF Wolrd Championship podium 11 years after winning the 2006’s edition in Zagreb, Croatia.
Fokeev, supported by the crowd, won one of the most exciting finals of this world championship. He dueled against India’s Ankur Mittal through most of the match, in a cold, windy and rainy day here at the Fox Lodge shooting range.
After 76 shots, the last two pair of targets decided the match. Mittal missed three clays out of four, while Fokeev zeroed in shattering three of them to finish atop of the podium with a score of 68 hits out of 80.
25-year old Mittal, the winner of this year’s ISSF World Cup stage in Acapulco, claimed silver with 66 hits.
Fokeev said:
“As you can imagine I'm very happy to be the winner. It’s a special feeling to win in my home country. I felt the responsibility during the match, and now I feel very honored.”
“During the final I felt the support of the crowd, they were with me.”
“Everybody told me that it has been an amazing competition. It’s great. It's a very important moment in my life!”
Beijing’s 2008 Olympic Bronze medalist Hu Binyuan of China secured Bronze with 50 hits, leaving Great Britain’s Metthew French in fourth with 42 hits.
The two Italian finalists Antonino Barilla and Daniele Di Spigno closed the individual match in 5th and 6th places with 32 and 22 hits, respectively. Along with their teammate Alessandro Chianese they climbed atop of the teams podium with a total tally of 418 hits.
The People’s Republic of China (Hu Binyuan, Chen Xinyu, Yang Yiang) followed in second claiming the teams silver with 416 hits, while team Russia (Vitaly Fokeev, Artem Nekrasov, Vasily Mosin) secured bronze with a score of 415.
The 2017 ISSF Shotgun World Championship in Moscow Region, Russia, is due to continue in the next days with the Skeet events. The qualifications will start on the 7th of September. The women’s and junior women’s Skeet medals will be assigned on the 8th of September. The men’s and junior men’s Skeet finals will be held one day later, on the 9th of September, while the championship will be closed by the Skeet Mixed Team event on the 10th of September.