USA’s Kim Rhode Wins Gold at ISSF World Cup in Beijing

Beijing, China – America’s four-time-Olympic medalist Kim Rhode has taken one more powerful step toward realizing her Olympic dream of making history in the 2012 London Olympic Games. Rhode won the Gold Medal and equaled the existing world record at the 2010 ISSF World Cup in Beijing, China. Chinese shooters Shi Hong Yan and Wei Ning were the silver and bronze medalists.

Rhode returned to the scene of her historic silver-medal-winning performance and was nearly perfect throughout the competition. By shooting a 74 of 75 targets in the first three rounds and a final round of 24, Rhode won this competition by two targets and Rhode has earned more valuable points in her quest to again represent the United States in the 2012 London Games.

If Rhode does participate in these upcoming Games and if she does earn one more medal, she will become the first American Olympian in history from an individual sport to have earned medals in five consecutive Olympic Games, a feat that has taken her 20 years to complete.

USA teammates Amber English and Jaiden Grinnell finished in ninth and eleventh place with scores of 69 and 68, respectively.

Rhode was very pleased with her performance and the fact that she flirted with setting a new world record. “This is an exciting time for me. I was hoping to get a 99 but is just was not meant to be,” observed Rhode. On competing again in Beijing, Rhode said “This city is so incredible. I love coming back here. Things are a lot different now than they were during the Olympic Games but it still is such an amazing place to compete.”

Next month, Rhode will compete in London at another ISSF World Cup and she also plans to compete in Germany and Turkey for championship competitions.