After a not-so-suspensive final round, Russian shooter Vasily Mosin mounted the champion podium in the men's double trap with 191 hits at the Good Luck Beijing ISSF World Cup on Tuesday.
American Walton Eller seized silver with 188 hits and an equally absolute advantage from the third, Saif Alshamsy from the United Arab Emirates who collected 185 hits and stood out after a shoot-off.
Mosin, 36, twice World Cup title holder in the discipline in 2005 and 2006, strode into the final round with the highest 145 hits, a four-hit margin from the co-second-placers, his teammate Mikhail Leybo and British shooter Richard Faulds.
He started well but missed one in the fifth and sixth pairs. However, thanks to the rest finalists' lapses he nonetheless maintained his margin unchanged.
In the following competition, he let go of three birds in the 11th, 20th and 23rd pairs. Inspite of this, downing both targets in the 24th pair ensured him the gold medal in advance.
Eller, champion of the 2003 World Shooting Championship, was ranked fifth in the qualification. He mustered up his attention and appeared sharp in the final. Missing just two targets, he achieved the highest final round score of 48 hits.
Leybo, 22, the youngest athlete in the event, had several lapses at the beginning, while Sydney Olympic Games gold medalist Faulds had a big one at the seventh pair, when both targets flew away after he opened fire.
But the former sipped as the ending was drawing near, granting his 31-year-old British competitor the chance to have shoot-off with Asian Shooting Championship runner-up Alshamsy for the bronze.
Faulds, who shot first, missed one of the birds, while the Arabic grasped the chance.
Chinese marksmen Cai Chao, Wang Nan and Hu Binyuan all collected 137 hits in the qualification round and were ranked 11th, 15th and 17th according to their scores in the last series.
Famous Arabic shooter Ahmed Almaktoum, who was both world champion in 2003 and Olympic gold medalist in 2004, chalked up 134 hits and was shut out of the final.
(Xinhua News Agency April 15, 2008)