COLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado (July 8, 2019)
Austen Smith and Alexander Ahlin were crowned Junior World Champions in the Skeet Mixed Team event Sunday adding to a truly patriotic weekend for America’s Shooting Team at the International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) World Championships taking place in Lonato, Italy.
Joining Sunday’s podium success was six-time Olympian Kim Rhode and the U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit’s (USAMU) Christian Elliott, as they finished runner-up to a tough Italian duo on their home soil in the Open class.
In an extended celebration of America’s birthday, USA Shooting Team athletes thus far at the World Championships have earned one individual world title, two women’s World Team titles in Trap, a Junior Mixed Team Skeet title, an Open Skeet Mixed Team silver, Women’s Junior Skeet individual silver medal, and team bronze in Women’s Junior Skeet and Junior Men’s Trap. Still to come this week is action in Men’s Junior Skeet and Women’s Skeet.
Ashley Carroll (Solvang, California) earned the world title on Wednesday in Women’s Trap, which was followed by a runner-up finish from Katie Jacob (Rochester, Michigan) in Junior Women’s Skeet.
It’s been a particularly good championship thus far for U.S. Team members whose first name starts with the letter A, with Ashley getting things started last week and Austen and Alexander adding to it Sunday. The duo qualified first and would match up against the Russian duo of Mark Eshchanov and Elena Bukhonova. Smith and Ahlin each missed four of 40 targets once in the Final, which would be five better than the Russian pair.
Smith (Keller, Texas) is racking up World Championship medals at a pretty good pace. She already has two previous individual medals to go along with three
