Final Skeet Men

ISSF World Championship Shotgun · Moscow, RUS

The Italian athlete prevailed at the end of a neck and neck duel against Germany’s Vincent Haaga and Cyprus’ Georgios Achilleos

The reigning Olympic Champion and world ranking’s #1 Gabriele Rossetti of Italy is the new men’s Skeet world champion.

The Italian shooter scored 54 hits out of 60 targets to win today’s final, leaving Germany’s first-time finalist Vincent Haaga in second with 52 hits.

The 2007 world champion, Cyprus’ four-time Olympian Georgios Achilleos, followed them in third place with 42 hits.

Sweden’s Stefan Nilson took the 4th place with a score of 33 hits, as he missed two targets on his last station. The two Russian teammates Alexander Zemlin (the 2014 World Champion) and Nikolay Teplyy (the 2016 World Cup Champion) finished in 5th and 6th place with 25 and 11 hits, respectively.

22-year old Rossetti arrived here at the 2017 ISSF Shotgun World Championship in Moscow Region after a series of successes. In 2014 he became the ISSF junior world champion. One year later, in 2015, he won the ISSF World Cup Final in Nicosia, to then move on and climb atop of the Olympic Games podium in Rio de Janeiro in 2016.

“This world championship has been more difficult than winning the Games.” Rossetti said after the award ceremony.

“There are more athletes competing in the world championship. Hundreds of shooters. And everybody has a chance.”

“I had a very difficult first qualification day,” added the Italian winner. “I made a couple of stupid mistakes. But I tried to stay calm. I did not waste time in looking at the rankings. I just went on, one shot after the other.”

“I only felt the tension during the last ten targets of the final. I was more nervous than in Rio. Even if I am the Olympic Champion, even if I am the number one in the world, every match is a new start, is a new challenge. And being the favorite is adding a bit of extra stress to the game.”

“This is an important medal. Especially after finishing second at the European Championship,” he continued. Rossetti had indeed won silver at the 2017 European Championship in Baku, finishing behind Milos Slavicek of the Czech Republic. “This is an only a step forward: my aim is to build a long and successful career through the years, one victory after the other.”

“I owe this medal to my federation and to my sponsors, and to my father.” Bruno Rossetti, an Olympic bronze medalist at Barcelona 1992, has been Gabriele’s coach since the early days. “He got me into the sport. He lifted me atop of the Olympic podium. And he is a big part also of today’s result.”

Rossetti’s result lifted Italy (Rossetti, Tammaro Cassandro, Riccardo Filippelli) atop of the teams podium with a tally of 364 targets. The Russian Federation (Nikolay Teplyy Alexander Zemlin, Anton Astakhov) claimed silver with 363 hits, leaving the Czech Republic (Milos Slavicek, Jan Zemcnik, Tomas Nydrle) in third with 361.

The 2017 ISSF Shotgun World Championship in Moscow Region, Russia, is due to be closed by the Skeet Mixed Team event, tomorrow, September 10. The medal matches will be broadcasted live on www.issf-sports.org and on the ISSF Facebook page, as well as televised through the Eurovision network, starting from 16.30 (GMT+3).