Junior Olympic Hopefuls Compete at Hillsdale College
Hillsdale College hosts the Junior Olympic National Air Rifle Championship
Hillsdale, Mich. — Hillsdale College, home of USA Shooting, housed around 400 Junior Olympic hopefuls from across the country for the Junior Olympic National Air Rifle Championship from May 12-16. Shooters ages 12-20 competed in two shooting events in Hillsdale College’s 76,000-square-foot Margot V. Biermann Athletic Center, hoping to earn a spot on a junior or national air rifle team.
“Matches like this are how junior and national teams are chosen,” said two-time Olympian Lucas Kozeniesky, whose interview with Hillsdale College can be found here. Kozeniesky noted that the event is the biggest junior event in the country, and to have it at a place like Hillsdale College, where on-campus lodging and dining facilities allow shooters to interact more with one another, is good for the sport and the competitors.
The competition included two events: 50-foot smallbore, in which competitors shoot in three positions with a low-velocity .22 rifle; and 10-meter air rifle, which is a direct reflection of the Olympic air rifle event and is scored with decimals of a millimeter.
William Shaner (Colorado Springs, Colorado) and Mary Tucker (Sarasota, Florida) won this year’s men’s and women’s smallbore rifle finals. Both are student-athletes at University of Kentucky and will compete in the Tokyo Olympics.
The air rifle championship is one of many scheduled competitions that will take place at Hillsdale College in 2021, including the Shotgun National Junior Olympic Championships and Shotgun National Championships. Both events will take place at the John Anthony Halter Shooting Sports Education Center, just a few miles from campus and home of the USA Shooting National Team.
The decision to host the Junior Rifle Championship in the Biermann Athletic Center was made in the summer of 2020 by Matt Suggs, USA Shooting CEO, and Rich Péwé, Hillsdale College chief administrative officer, as part of the College’s partnership with USA Shooting.
View photos from the event here. Find all shooting results here.