2024 Olympics. Beretta surpasses the Rio medal record: 11 titles

Paris 2024 | The Skeet shooters faced each other in a battle to the last target, which led the Chilean Francisca Crovetto Chadid to emerge from the British Amber Jo Rutter. As happened in the men's skeet, en-plain of Beretta rifles on the podium: on the third step we find the American Austen Jewell Smith. Thus the medals won in this edition of the games become 11, surpassing the previous record set in Rio with 10 medals

Châteauroux, France, 4 August 2024 – After yesterday's emotions, another intense final for women's skeet: record number of medals for Beretta, who adds today's 3 to the 8 already won, reaching 11 (exceeding the entire Olympic event in Rio de Janeiro in 2016, where the titles won were 10). The competition was very exciting: wind and sudden changes in light made life complicated for all the athletes. The Slovakian Hockova started very strong, putting in a long sequence of full shots, but both Smith, Rutter and Crovetto were always in her wake, until the overtaking occurred at the end of the thirtieth target when Crovetto grabbed the lead of the classification after an astonishing long series of centers.

All finished? No! This time it was nature that had a hand in it. The dense clouds alternating with sun in the sky of Chateauroux have made selection. This led to a two-way clash between the Englishman and the Chilean, the only representative of this South American state. Here too there was no lack of tension, as well as errors: Francisca missed two match points, but not the third. Rutter's mistake and her center give her Olympus and infinite joy.

“I believed it, I worked for more than twenty years dreaming of this moment. I shot well despite the light changes being complicated and the targets being low and slow, alternating with others pushed by the wind which picked up more speed. A person has to adapt to everything that comes out – Francisca comments. – Olympic champion? Lots of stuff! I still don't believe it."

Francisca Crovetto Chadid (1990, Santiago, Chile) won a silver medal in women's skeet at the 2011 Pan American Games in Guadalajara, Mexico and a bronze medal in the same event at the 2015 Pan American Games in Toronto. Crovetto represented Chile at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, where she competed as the nation's only shooter in women's skeet, placing eighth in qualifying for her event. At the 2016 Summer Olympics, she was again the only Chilean representative in sport shooting, placing 19th. She represented Chile at the 2020 Summer Olympics and won her first Olympic medal in the Paris 2024 edition.

“Winning a medal at the Olympics is something fantastic, I never thought something like this could happen, but it finally happened!” comments Amber Jo Rutter (bachelor surname Hill, born in 1997).

She is an English sports shooter specializing in skeet. She has won a total of three gold medals in major international competitions, including the ISSF World Cup series (2013 and 2015) and the inaugural European Games held in Baku, Azerbaijan. A member of the Great Britain team, Hill trains with her personal trainer Joe Neville at the EJ Churchill Shooting Ground in Wycombe. In February 2023, Hill married motocross racer James Rutter. Since her withdrawal from the 2020 Olympics, she has been active in promoting mental health in sport.

Austen Smith's words also arrive: “I feel like I'm on the moon and I'm extremely excited. Even if it's not gold, it's a dream come true for me.”

Austen Jewell Smith (Texan, born in 2001) is an American sports shooter. She won the gold medal in the 2021 ISSF Shotgun World Cup in Lonato, Italy. She was the youngest participant on the United States Olympic shooting team at the Tokyo Olympics, where she won the bronze medal in the skeet event. Today, she Austen Smith won bronze in women's skeet at the Paris Olympic Games.

President Franco Gussalli Beretta was able to witness all the finals and consequently also the obtaining of all 11 medals: “An extraordinary moment of sport, I am very happy for Francisca and for the other athletes who challenged themselves in this battle. These are sports pages that are good for our movement. Clean faces that I hope will be a driving force for new practitioners all over the world.”

A congratulatory message also comes from Daniele Piva, Vice President Commercial Market Business of Fabbrica d'Armi Pietro Beretta: “We are thrilled with the success of our athletes at the Olympics. This victory is also a testimony to our commitment to developing increasingly high-performance weapons and ecosystems and to supporting the activities of our athletes both at a national and international level. Seeing DT11, the "goat" of rifles, triumph is a source of immense pride. This weapon has written and will continue to write the history of world competitions and another page is opening before us: that of the SL2. With the support of this new platform, the developments that will arrive on DT11, and the continuous search for the perfect rods thanks to the Steelium ProX technology, I feel that they will be able to guarantee us an increasingly successful future.”

Today the Italian Shooting Federation turned 98 years old. This anniversary falls exactly on the date of Jessica Rossi's historic Olympic medal at the Rio games.

Tomorrow afternoon the last six medals in Mixed Team skeet will be awarded.