For the third edition, the World University Shooting Sport Championship drew top participation, confirming its full potential.
stopped counting the WUCs organized in Wroclaw (handball, table tennis, karate, …). It was sport shooting’s turn this time, in its third edition. Sharp shooting was popular from the very first time it was introduced in FISU (Pilsen in 2002) with 24 participating countries. After a five year break, it was included in the optional sports at the Bangkok Universiade in 2007, and finally in Beijing, China in 2008, and every time, the sport drew large numbers of athletes. This is a very complete Olympic discipline open to both men and women, that appeals to many students. The level of our student-athletes, moreover, is excellent.
They found ideal conditions in Wroclaw to practice their sport. Wroclaw is the scientific and cultural centre of Lower Silesia, and, as we mentioned, it has a long experience in organizing our events. The town has a population of some 650,000 of whom 100,000 are students.
The “Wojskowy Klub Sportowy Slask”, a magnificent and perfectly adapted facility, hosted our competition.
With 26 countries present, the record in Beijing was not equalled, but almost. A total of 239 sharp shooters came to Poland in a good balance of 135 men and 104 women. The only regrettable factor was the absence of any African countries because some of the delegations did not meet the registration deadlines.
The competition lasted 5 days, which is not too much for the 16 events on the programme (9 for men and 7 for women). There was not a single accident or protest.
The marksmen competed at a very high level, in every discipline – easily on a par with the ISSF (International Shooting Sport Federation) World or European Championships. The finals included many athletes who took part in these events, as well as the 2008 Olympic Games. In fact, more than 80% of the delegations consisted of members of the ISSF national teams.
Poland grouped 13 medal winners from World or European Championships in its delegation. For Hungary the number was six, and three for Germany, the Czech Republic and China.
France took the WUC to be a training ground for the next Olympic Games, and Iran, a novice to our competition, got excellent results in Wroclaw. Finally, congratulations to Korean Lee Daye Myung, silver medal winner at the ISSF World Championships in 2010 whose performance at Wroclaw, with 2 individual gold medals and one for the team competition, qualified him for the London Olympic Games in 2012.
Total satisfaction was expressed with the outcome of these 3rd World University Sport Shooting Championships that reached a truly exceptional level.
The future of sport shooting as a FISU sport is ensured, since the discipline has been taken up as an optional sport in the Shenzhen Universiade programme in China in 2011, and the next WUC is scheduled for 2012 in Kazan, Russia. The games will serve as a test run for the 2013 Universiade, also to take place in Kazan, where sport shooting is again on the programme.
