While Thrasher is relishing her win, after Rio, life returns to normal for the rising West Virginia University sophomore.
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Thrasher isn’t legal yet. After her win, she spoke about how gun control is affecting her sport of choice.
Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.
Virginia Thrasher of the United States competes during the Women’s 10m Air Rifle Qualification at Olympic Shooting Center at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Saturday, Aug. 6, 2016.
“I thought, ‘Oh no. I’m very overwhelmed, but it’s the happiest feeling on earth”. Du, a four-time Olympian, took gold in the 10-meter event in 2004 when Thrasher was all of 7 years old.
Speedy starts: On the first day of prelims, swimmers set a world record in the men’s 100-meter breaststroke (Adam Peaty/UK) and the second-fastest performance in the women’s 400 individual medley (Katinka Hosszu/Hungary).
“Some of the (controversy surrounding) gun laws in America is just distracting from our sport, which is very different”, she said. Badass shooter 19-year-old Ginny Thrasher beat out two veteran shooters to take home the top spot Saturday.
Apurvi was placed in the 34th position with a combined score of 411.6 while Ayonika was 43rd with 407.0 among 53 shooters at the Olympic Shooting Centre.
It wasn’t long before Thrasher was shooting precociously, overtaking the far more experienced. “Once you get into the finals, anything can happen”. “I couldn’t do that”.
On a meteoric learning curve, she won five medals at the 2015 US Shooting National Championship.
“It’s kind of the critical piece”, Scherer said. “We are all incredibly proud of her, though as her coach, I know it’s now time for her to get ready for her second competition later this week”. It wasn’t her first choice’ she actually started out wanting to be an Olympic figure skater until she started joining her grandfather, father, and brothers on a hunting trip.
Sarah Scherer has had two operations since 2014 to fix three herniated discs in her back.
It was an intense match for Ms. Thrasher, Du and Yi for the Medal contention.
China’s Yi Siling took the bronze with a score of 185.4.
“This is beyond my wildest dreams”, said Thrasher, who’s just a couple of months removed from her freshman year at West Virginia. “Rest of the world likely looks at that and thinks ‘Yeah, that makes sense.'” tweeted Wayne Drehs, a feature writer for ESPN.
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Kim Rhode, a veteran Olympic shooter from California, has previously spoken about the extensive background checks she must go through to purchase ammunition for training.
