Silver and bronze for Paralympic shooting hopeful
5 June 2007
by Sian Davies
The listing was posted by
WheelPower - British Wheelchair Sport - News
Herne Bay shooter Nathan Milgate led a string of impressive British performances at the Croatian Open Shooting Championships at the weekend - winning silver and bronze.
The 20-year-old, who recently won bronze in the R3 Prone at the Jikji Cup Korean Open Championships, followed his recent good form to pick up silver in the R1 air rifle and bronze in the mixed R3 air rifle prone event.
Nathan shot 578 out of 600 in the air rifle to finish second behind Athens 2004 Paralympic Games silver medalist Franc Pinter of Slovenia before matching his personal best of 599 out of 600 in the qualification round of the prone.
There were also top performances from new-comers Matthew Skelhon and James Bevis, who both shot the minimum qualification scores (MQS) set by the IPC for the Paralympic Games.
Skelhon - from Peterborough – placed 10th in the R3 air rifle prone mixed while Bevis, from Hereford, placed 12th in the R5 air rifle prone mixed. Both men were representing GB for the first time.
There was also a MQS for Chris Summerscales, who return to the GB squad after a break of over a year.
Rikki Singh, chairman of Disability Target Shooting Great Britain (DTSGB) said these performances were a positive sign for the squad.
He added: “It’s pleasing to see that we are once again amongst the medalists.
“Nathan Milgate continued to impress and it’s very encouraging to see some fantastic performances from the newer members of the squad in their first outing for GB, which bodes well for the future of disability shooting in Great Britain.”
The Croatian Open Shooting Championships took part in Zagreb, Croatia from June 1 to 3, 2007. A total of 125 shooters from 22 nations took part in the competition, which was an opportunity for GB athletes to gain ranking scores to qualify places at the Beijing 2008 Paralympic Games.