Day two of competition at the US Shooting Olympic Trails saw Virginia Thrasher post a qualification score of 589, five points better than anyone else in the field, and add to it a win in the final to shoot to first place in the women’s three position rifle competition with a cumulative score of 1189. Sarah Beard, who led after day one, shot only a 578 in qualification and missed out on the final round and a chance at bonus points. She finds herself 17 off the pace going into the final day and even with a great final day probably needs Thrasher to struggle to get back in front. Sarah Scherer remained in second though she is now a full seven points back of Thrasher. Thrasher, who shoots for West Virginia University, where she is a freshman and won the national title last month,will be facing the pressure tomorrow.
In the men’s prone rifle event Matt Emmons widened his lead from 4.6 points to 11.3 as Dempster Christenson, much like Beard, failed to qualify for the final and scored just 617 for the day. Emmons’ 625 in qualification was fourth best in the field and by winning the final he actually had the top score of the day with 633 points. David Higgins moved up from third to second but with such a talented veteran shooter in front of him he’ll be hard pressed to overtake him on the final day.
Finally in the men’s free pistol competition Jay Shi was five points better than anyone else in the field in qualification and despite coming in fifth in the final still leads by nine points with 1127 going into the final day. Will Brown struggled to just 545 in qualification so despite winning the final he dropped from one point back to 13 points back in third place. Jason Turner went from third to second by posting the second best qualification score and then finishing third in the final.
With the closest competition being the seven point gap in the women’s three pistol rifle it will be interesting to see if anyone can make a run at the leaders to steal an Olympic spot on the final day. Qualification shooting begins at 9 AM ET with the finals at 1 PM ET. There is no live scoring so the best place to get quick results may be the USA Shooting Facebook page or their twitter account, @USAShooting.
