The Unofficial 2008 Beijing Olympics Blog

The first gold of the Beijing Games was put under Chinese shooter Du Li’s name even before the Games started. However, Du finished fifth in the Women’s 10m Air Rifle last Saturday, August 9. The honor of winning the Games’ first gold medal eventually went to Katerina Emmons of the Czech Republic.

Chastened by her performance in the Women’s 10m Air Rifle, Du did not pass up her second chance of a winning a gold medal. Du won the gold medal with a new Olympic record for the final score of 690.3, while her qualification score of 589 equaled the Olympic record. Du broke both the Olympic qualification record set by Renata Mauer of Poland at Atlanta 1996 and the Olympic record for a final score set by Russian Lioubov Galkina at Athens 2004.

Following Du in second and third place were Emmons with a final score of 687.7 and Cuba’s Eglis Yaima Cruz with 687.6.

The final started badly for Du when she shot 8.7, the worst single shot of any shooter in the final. Cuba’s Cruz caught up and took the lead with her first shot scoring 10.3. Du soon regained first place when she scored 10.4 on her third shot, while Cruz could only manage 9.3. Cruz’s last taste of the lead was on her fifth shot when Du scored 9.9 and Cruz made 10.5.

Du’s timely 10.8 on her sixth shot set up her victory and 10.8 on her ninth shot secured the gold medal. Emmons fought back to beat Cruz for the silver medal.

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to our free updates via RSS or e-mail. Find out more about subscribing here. Thanks for visiting!

Despite being five points behind Mongolia’s Gundegmaa Otryad after qualification, China’s Chen Ying today won the gold medal in the Women’s 25m Pistol, with her final score of 590 points equaling the Olympic record.

Chen’s first round of five rapid shots in the final scored 52.5 points, which cut the deficit down to 3.6 after Otryad shot 51.1. Otryad’s lead was further decreased to 1.6 after the second round of five shots when Chen scored 53.1 and Otryad scored two full points less.

Drama ensued when Otryad’s pistol locked up after she scored a disappointing 9.0 on the 11th shot. Oblivious to Otryad’s problems, Chen marched past the Mongolian shooter on the leader board with 52.5 points from the third round of five shots (including 10.8 and 10.7 on the last two shots), and never looked back. After fixing her pistol, Otryad scored only 49 in the third round of five shots, trailing behind Chen by 1.9 points.

Chen scored 50.3 on her last five shots, with her final score of 793.4 breaking the Olympic record. Otryad scored 51.0 and held onto second place with 792.2. Dorjsuren Munkhbayar of Germany, who won a bronze medal in the same event shooting for Mongolia at Barcelona 1992, finished third with 789.2.

Bulgarian Maria Grozdeva, two-time Olympic gold medalist in the event at Sydney 2000 and Athens 2004, came fifth with 786.6 following China’s Fei Fengji who finished fourth with 787.9.

India’s Abhinav Bindra  won gold in Men’s 10m Air Rifle with 700.5 that edged China’s Zhu Qinan of 699.7 points. Henri Hakkinen of Finland come at a honorable third place with 699.4.