Turkey’s golden start at ISSF World Cup in Baku

Turkey’s pairing of Simal Yilmaz and Ismail Keles secured the first gold medal of the ISSF World Cup Rifle, Pistol and Shotgun in Baku as they won the opening 10m air pistol mixed team final.

The Turkish duo registered an overwhelming 16-2 victory in their gold medal match at the Baku Olympic Shooting Range over Kazakhstan’s Valeriya Popelova and Eldar Imankulov.

This will be one of three mixed events that will take place at this summer’s shooting sport competition in the Paris Olympic Games.

The current competition in the Azerbaijan capital will feature all three, as well as the 12 individual events that will take place in Paris across the shooting sport range of events.

The first bronze in Baku was won by the Chinese pairing of Li Xue and Xie Yu, who beat Ukraine’s Olena Kostevych and Oleh Omelchuk 16-12.

Yilmaz and Keles had topped the previous day’s qualifying, while Li Xue and Xie Yu had qualified in fourth place.

Competition continues in Baku tomorrow with the men’s and women’s 10m air pistol finals, followed by the 10m air rifle mixed final.

The World Cup runs until May 11 when there will be concluding finals in the 25m rapid fire pistol men and the women’s and men’s 50m rifle 3 positions finals.