Women’s Trap World number one, Penny Smith, has won the bronze medal at the Larnaca, Cyprus ISSF Shotgun World Cup overnight.
Smith finished as second top qualifier in the Women’s Trap event after shooting a score of 115 out of 125 targets in some tough conditions that seemed to worsen as she progressed through to the finals. Of the Larnaca shooting range Smith said “It was a challenge the last couple of days and the weather has been quite cold… …the suns in, the suns out, windy and it looked like we were going to get a bit of rain…a challenging range to say the least.”
Of her semi finals performance that advanced her to the medal match as the top contender, Smith said “The semi final was really good and I was really happy with it…the conditions were getting quite challenging but I shot a 22 [out of 25] which was quite solid”. Smith shot a further 20 out of 25 targets in the medal match securing the bronze medal with Lucy Hall from Great Britain winning her first World Cup gold medal and Cuicui Wu from China securing the silver medal.
Smith (centre) with fellow Australian team members (Left to Right) Kiara Dean, Milad Nasr, James Willett, Deserie Baynes (support coach), Catherine Skinner and Richard Sammon (National Coach)
Just three weeks after her gold medal win at the Doha, Qatar World Cup, securing her number one ranking, Smith reflected “I am really chuffed to come away with two World Cups and two medals and [world number one] is something I have always dreamed to be at some stage in my shooting career and obviously world number one after Doha is really special thing and I will treasure it for a long time.”
Watching on from home in Camperdown in Victoria and speaking to both Smith’s World Cup performance and world number one accolade, mum Kim Smith said “It is a great reward for many years of hard work.”
Shooting Australia’s High Performance Manager, Kathryn Periac, reflected on Smith’s bronze medal performance by saying “Penny has been consistently strong and has had a great start to international competition in 2023. She and has an ability to maintain composure in challenging conditions while focussing on the next target.”
Smith will now return to Victoria for some down time and preparation before she departs for the next World Cup in Cairo, Egypt later this month.
