Mountain, Carroll Claim Trap Titles at National Junior Olympic Shooting Championships
OutdoorHub 07.11.14
One. Just one made all the difference.
One target, one point, that’s all it took to decide who was getting which medal or what team an athlete would be assigned to as the Men’s and Women’s Trap competition came to a close at the National Junior Olympic Shooting Championships today at the International Shooting Park on Fort Carson.
In hotly-contested matches on both sides, medals were being decided by the narrowest of margins with shootoffs being used to determine who would compete in which medal matches. Champions would be crowned at this match by adding the total targets hit over the two-days of competition (125), plus points earned by an athlete’s finish in today’s Final: Five for first, four for second, on down to the fifth- and sixth-place finishers in a Final each earning a point a piece.
On the Men’s side, Logan Mountain (Palmdale, California, pictured center) would emerge victorious, shooting a perfect 50 targets in today’s rounds, a perfect 15 in the Final, then eventually dropping just one target in the gold-medal match. Add together his hits from the two days of competition with his five points earned from winning the Final (122), and he snagged the gold from Tyler Lirio (Coolidge, Georgia) by one point.
Lirio, who would narrowly win the bronze-medal match in today’s Final – shot 15/15 targets, as did his competitor Roe Reynolds (Quitman, Arkansas, pictured right). The pair would eventually determine the match in a shootoff with Reynolds dropping his first target.
With those additional points, Lirio was tied (121) with Nathaniel Lundie (Wellesley, Massachusetts) and Sevin Layer (Palm Harbor, Florida). These athletes’ places earned would be determined utilizing the Count Back Rule, which goes back to who had the most hits in the previous round, and in this case, even the previous round before that one. Lirio would eventually win the silver medal and Lundie would win the bronze.
With their finishes today, Mountain and Lirio earned appointments to the National Junior Team, and Lundie and Layer would earn spots on the Junior Olympic squad.
The Women’s side saw tight competition as well. Though World Championship Team member Ashley Carroll (Solvang, California) wound up winning the bronze-medal match, the points she earned from that finish plus her hits from the two days of competition (121) would tie her for first place with the points earned by gold-medal match winner Grace Hambuchen (Maumelle, Arkansas). Carroll would eventually win the gold medal, once again utilizing the Count Back Rule as she had 24 hits in her fifth round versus Hambuchen’s 22. Amber Culwell (Rose Bud, Arkansas) would win the bronze medal.
Hambuchen and Cheyenne Waldrop (Foresthill, California) earned appointments to the Junior National Team as Carroll is already a member of the National Team and therefore ineligible. Emma Williams (Savannah, Tennessee) was named to the Junior Olympic Squad as Culwell is already a member of the National Junior Team.
Competition continues tomorrow at NJOSC with the start of Skeet and Double Trap Open Training. The Double Trap Final will take place on Saturday and Skeet Finals will take place on Sunday.
View complete results from the Men’s and Women’s Trap competition here: http://www.usashooting.org/library/Competitions/0_2014/Junior_Olympics/
Shotgun/2014_SG_JO_Trap_Day_Results.pdf
