Although Thrasher dominated the USA Shooting 50-meter rifle three-position trials in April, her age and inexperience made her a long shot to do what she did in her first Olympic event.
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Rio De Janeiro-American teenager Virginia Thrasher won the first gold medal of the Rio 2016 Olympic Games on Saturday, holding her nerve against two Chinese Olympic champions to clinch the women’s 10m air rifle event. Du Li was the clear favorite to bag the gold this Rio after her gold medal-winning performances in the 2008 Beijing and 2012 London Olympics.
Thrasher, an Air Force baby who called herself a “girl from everywhere” due to nine family moves, had aspired to figure skating before taking up shooting four years ago. Not even when it was just down to her and two former Olympic gold medallists beside her – Yi and Du, the 2004 victor who shot an Olympic record in the qualification round earlier. She began hitting the range the same month as the London Olympics. Although it was a blowout, bettors in Las Vegas, where wagering on the Olympics is legal for the first time since 1998, were undoubtedly on edge until the final minutes. “For me to start out Rio 2016 with the first gold medal makes me very proud”.
Her coach, Jon Hammond, credits Thrasher not only with being a strong shooter but on her marked improvement over the a year ago.
Virginia Thrasher arrived in Rio de Janeiro this month, ready to take part in just her second global competition and glad that an event as momentous as the Olympics would be where she celebrated her fifth anniversary in shooting.
– The U.S. women’s soccer team puts its 12-match Olympics winning streak on the line in a tough match-up against France. Coming into the Olympics, her best finish at a World Cup was fourth in Munich this year. “I knew it was a realistic expectation for me to get into the finals and once you get into the finals, anything can happen”. Rugby sevens, the fast-pace, condensed form of the game, is the format for the sport’s return to the Olympic program for the first time since 1924, when the US men won gold in the 15-a-side tournament. Thrasher beat Du by a full point, a wide margin in perhaps the Games’ most precise sport. She soon became obsessed with shooting, but becoming one of the best shooters in the world wasn’t her vision.
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Soon after, Thrasher joined the air rifle team at her high school in Springfield, a suburb of Washington. Thrasher also set an Olympic final record by posting a score of 208. Three minutes later, USA’s Katie Reinprecht slipped one under the goalkeeper to give the Americans a 1-0 lead.
