South African Olympic Trap shooter Tobie de Wet won the 8th Bank Windhoek African Grand Prix at the shooting range at Luipersvalley last weekend, while Angola’s Paulo Silva and Namibia’s Sven Ahrens had to settle for second and third places respectively.
It was the second time the reigning South African champion had won the prestigious event after his initial victory in 2011.
During the first five rounds, where every participant had to shoot a total of 125 clay pigeons to determine the best six shooters that would then advance to the final, 24-year-old De Wet already demonstrated his class by continuously shooting some of the highest scores ever recorded at the continental showpiece.
The final saw the South African come up against Namibia’s Sven Ahrens, Gielie van Wyk and Francois Marais as well as Angolan Paulo Silva and Zimbabwean Mike Nicholson.
This time, each finalist had to try and hit as many of the 15 targets that were sent out by the state-of-the-art Trap machine south of the capital. And again De Wet was in top form, missing only one of his shots that guaranteed him a place in the gold medal match against the Angolan champion Silva.
In the final, both shooters started off in style, hitting their clay targets at will. But as the match wore on, Silva briefly lost his composure, missing two targets in quick succession. De Wet, on the other hand, kept his cool and calmly played out his routine. Eventually Silva had missed a total of the three shots, while De Wet was off target only once and therefore won the gold medal and cashing in on the N$5 000 prize money.
“It was a great tournament with an extremely high standard of shooting. I did well during the first rounds but when it comes to the final, your previous scores don’t count anymore, it’s a different story. It’s all back to square one. Thanks to the help from God I used my routine perfectly to win. I am very happy”, De Wet said.
Meanwhile the race for third place was a much closer affair. Sven Ahrens, Gielie van Wyk and Mike Nicholson had all come out of the six-man shoot out with the same score. The trio then went head-to-head in a sudden-death match where the first contestant to miss his target would fall out, while the other two would go to the bronze medal match.
Van Wyk, who had won the tournament in 2010, was the unfortunate shottist to fall out, although he had some good scores to his name. It was now up to Ahrens to still win a medal for Namibia.
Both Ahrens and Nicholson came out with guns blazing, hitting 9 from 12 targets each. Being equal on points, the pair had to determine the winner by a sudden-death shoot out.
Fortunately for Ahrens, Nicholson already missed his first shot and the Namibian veteran then used all his experience to hit his target and win the bronze medal.
Namibia’s two-time Olympic shooter Gaby Ahrens, who was the only female to compete, missed out on the six-man final by only two shots, but gained some very valuable experience with her new weapon from Germany-based manufacturer Krieghoff.
“I only practised five days with my new gun so I’m still getting used to it. Nevertheless, I’m very happy with it and I shot some good scores over the weekend. I’m positive that, with time, I will get back to winning ways”, the 2010 Commonwealth Games bronze medalist said.
All in all, Ahrens believes that this was one of the best Africa Grand Prix’s in history. “When you look at the scores, you can see that this was of extremely high standard from all the shooters. Especially Tobie showed a very impressive performance. He really deserved it and I would like to congratulate him again on his win,” Ahrens said.
