Shooters on target at national trials

Gielie van Wyk was in a class of his own once again after he beat Etienne Jooste in the gold medal match.

Van Wyk, who had already dominated much of the first trials a month ago, scored an impressive score of 12/15 in the battle for gold. Jooste had to settle for 10/15.
Namibia’s Olympic Trap shooter Gaby Ahrens came in third at the second national trials of the year which took place at the Luiperdsvalley military base shooting range south of Windhoek last Saturday.
Ahrens, who was once again the only female competitor among the six participants, claimed the third place after she hit four more clay pigeons than Johan Slabbert in their bronze medal match.
All three medal winners shot their Minimum Qualifying Score (MQS) during the main round for the Namibian team selection again.
Van Wyk scored 113/125, Jooste achieved 110/125 and Ahrens hit 67 out of 75 possible targets.
All Namibians have to shoot a MQS at three of the events to be able to represent their country at international competitions.
“The scores that were shot by the participants were even better than those of the first event,” a delighted Ahrens said.
The Clay Target Shooting Association also took this opportunity to award the floating trophies and merit awards to the champions in the Olympic Trap discipline of 2014. All five Trials of last year were taken into consideration and the shooter with the most hits is the champion of the year.
For the first time, Etienne Jooste from the Omaheke Region won this title. Van Wyk was placed second and Ahrens third.
The merit awards went to Gaby, Hasso Ahrens, van Wyk and Jooste.