DOHA (Qatar): Qatar’s Rashid Saleh Hamad emerged as the joint leader at the end of day one of the skeet event at the ISSF Egypt World Cup for shotgun in Cairo on Wednesday.
The two-time Olympian from Qatar had an impressive three rounds shooting down 73 clay pigeons, missing two targets in the first two rounds while achieving a perfect score in the third and final round.
Rashid shared the top spot with three others, Achilleos Georgios of Cyprus, Mehelba Azmy of Egypt and Russia’s Cherkasov Vladimir.
In what has been an impressive day for the Qatari shooters, 2012 London Olympic Games bronze medal winner Nasser Saleh Al Attiyah is in second place along with seven others.
Nasser, who has represented Qatar a record six times, missed three targets from the 75 which came in his direction. The 49-year-old is eyeing his seventh Olympics and in Egypt he is aiming to make a good case for getting an Olympic quota for the Games.
The Cairo event along with next month’s event in New Delhi in India are the two events where in shooters can get Olympic quotas for the postponed Tokyo Games which will be held this year.
Slavicek Milos, Nydrle Tomas and Tomecek Jakub all of Czech Republic, Hansen Jesper of Denmark, Mielgo Moneo Jose Maria of Spain, Pilshchikov Nikolay of Russia and Werys Jakub of Poland are all in the second spot having missed three targets in the three rounds held on Wednesday.
The next two rounds will be held today followed by the medal round.