XVII Commonwealth Games

17th Commonwealth Games – Manchester/Bisley
England July 25 – Aug. 4, 2002
Willaim (Bill) Hare
Canadian National Pistol Team Coach

A significant number of participants in the Commonwealth Games were participants first in the World Championships in Lahti, Finland. Arrangements were made for some of the Commonwealth Games Team Members to stay in Lahti an extra day so that we would not exceed the accommodation restrictions of 18 days in England. A group of us, some of whom did not go to bed, rose at 3:00 A.M. in order to get the bus and pick up our firearms, then catch the early flight to London from Helsinki.

After some confusion clearing immigration, we still had to wait for our luggage to come off the plane. Equipment that looked like firearms were picked up and were waiting for us at the customs line. Others had to collect their luggage and at customs put the firearms and ammunition in separate containers for transportation to the Bisley Armory by a security company.

Separate transportation took us to the University of Surrey campus in Guilford where we collected our luggage, received our temporary passes and keys to our rooms. The rooms were mostly singles and doubles, with some triples. Each of us received a suitcase with our Games clothing. This became a severe disappointment when none of the clothing provided was a suitable fit. But with the urging of the team manager and coaches, a wish list was presented to the Manchester Village, home of the main Canadian Team, and eventually three suitcases of spares were sent so most athletes got at least some clothing that could be worn.

As training proceeded, we discovered that pistol shooters were required to shoot in a cage as we were using prohibited firearms. Some of the safety features like baffles and windbreaks were omitted to facilitate television coverage of the shooting sports.

Prior to the games starting, a warm up competition, called a Badge Match was shot to test procedures and give range officials some experience prior to the actual competitions.

• The first badge match to be shot in pistol was the men’s 10metre Air Pistol event. The top score was by Daniel Ban Tonder of South Africa with 578. J.P. Huot was 10th with 568 and Wayne Salhany was 17th with 557.
• In the 50metre Free Pistol Badge Match, Michael Gault of England was first with 565, J.P. Huot tied for 9th with 538 as did Wayne Salhany.
• In the 10metre Women’s Air Pistol event, Dorothy Hare was 1st with 374 and Kim Eagles was 5th with 370.
• In 25metre Rapid Fire, Allan McDonald of South Africa was first with 583, Metodi Igorov was third with 575.
• The Standard Pistol Badge Match was won by Jaspal Rana of India with a score of 571. There were no Canadians in this event.
• The 25metre Pistol event for women was won by Linda Ryan with a score of 576, Kim Eagles was third with 572 and Violaine Marin was ninth with 547.
• The Centre Fire Pistol Badge match was won by Jaspal Rana of India with a score of 587. Metodi Igorov was tied for 18th with 543. He had a problem with his revolver.

Some of our team members who had finished shooting went on the train to Manchester to attend the Canadian reception and get their clothing exchanged, and altered. The remaining members of the Canadian Team went by train on Saturday after the competitions were finished for the day. Our bus was 15 minutes late leaving and traffic was very slow; as a result we missed our train by “5” minutes. Then we had to find another way. The next train that was supposed to come, was delayed.

When we finally caught our train, we no longer had to change in Birmingham, but went right through to Manchester, finally arriving at 12:15 A.M. Then we had to make phone calls to notify Team Canada that we had arrived. Eventually two taxis came for us and we were transported to the Games village where security was more stringent than at Bisley. The Opening Ceremonies were quite good. The next morning we packed our bags and were transported to the train station for our return trip to Bisley and Guildford.

On July 27 the pairs competition started.

• The first event of the Games for us was 10metre Air Pistol which was won by England with a score of 1140. Canada was 7th. J.P. Huot shot a score of 568 and Wayne shot 559.
• Women’s 10metre Air Pistol was shot on Sunday, July 28. First was Canada with a score of 747, just one point off tying the Games Record of 748 set by Australia in 1998. Kim Eagles shot 369 and Dorothy Hare shot 378 which tied her personal best.
• Men’s 50metre Free Pistol pairs event was won by India with a score of 1088. Canada was 4th only two points out of third. J.P. Huotshot 539 and Wayne Salhany shot 533.
• Men’s 25metre Standard Pistol pairs was won by India with a score of 1141. The Men’s 25metre Centre Fire Pistol Pairs event was won by India with a score of 1150. Canada was 12th as only Metodi Igorov shot this event, shooting Wayne Salhany's Walther GSP. He shot a 566 which as an individual placed him 11th overall.
• The 25metre Pistol Women’s pairs event was won by Australia with a new Games Record of 1150. Canada came fourth, one point behind New Zealand. Kim Eagles shot 571 and Violaine Marin shot 554.

The individual events provided some heart thumping moments as position changed with each shot.

• In the Men’s 10metre Air Pistol, Michael Gault of England moved up from 4th to first with 574 + 101.0 = 675.0 only, 0.2 points ahead of 2nd place. J.P Huot was 6th with a score of 572 + 97.9 = 669.9, and Wayne Salhany was 14th with 561.
• In the Women’s 10metre Air Pistol, Australia’s women were 1st with 384 and second with 380. Dorothy Hare had a 95, 93, 96, 95 for 379 one point behind Australia and two points ahead of 4th place New Zealand. A Commonwealth Games record was shot in the qualification round by Lalita Yauhleoskaya of Australia with 384. Dorothy shot the best finals with a score of 98.9 for a total score of 477.9 to win the silver medal. Kim Eagles was 11th with a score of 368.
• Men’s 50metre Free Pistol qualification was won by Michael Gault with a 559. J.P. Huot was eighth with 541 and Wayne Salhany was 14th with a 527. Michael Gault of England set a new Games Record in the Qualification and finals with 559 + 98.5 = 657.5. J.P. Huot moved up to 7th place based on 93.4 finals for a combined score of 634.4.
• Men’s 25metre Rapid Fire Pistol event Qualification round saw Metodi Igorov in third place, 2 points behind Favell and Quick of Australia. The finals were shot in pairs, with the last pair shooting first, then pairs 3 and 4 and finally pairs 1 and 2. Metodi shot 95.3 in the finals to lead the pack before the top pair fired their final rounds. The two Australians did not shoot as well as Metodi. When the smoke cleared, Metodi had won Gold with 574 + 95.3 = 669.3. Metodi still holds the Commonwealth Games record set in 1998 of 674.8.
• Men’s 25metre Standard Pistol individual event was won by Jaspal Rana of India with a score of 583, a new Commonwealth Games Record.
• Women’s 25metre Pistol Individual event, in the qualification round saw Australia in positions 1 and 2. Kim Eagles was 7th and would proceed to the final round while Violaine Marin was 10th with a score of 557. First place went to Lalita Yauhleoshaya of Australia with a qualification round of 587 and a final record of 686.8 points. Kim maintained her 7th place position 0.1 point out of a tie for 6th place.

The Canadian Pistol Team had 2 Gold Medals – Women’s 10 metre Pairs and Rapid Fire Individual and one silver medal – Air pistol women’s Individual and two fourth place finishes in Free Pistol and Women’s 25metre Pistol.

Dorothy became sick while she was in England and managed to pass this on to Kim who was her roommate, who, due to jet lag and being tired, was hit hard by the bug and spent a whole day in bed.

After the competitions were finished, it was pack up, check equipment out at the range and hope our firearms made it to the airplane for the trip back to Canada. Then we gathered our remaining gear and returned to Manchester for the Closing Ceremonies. The Closing Ceremonies were wet and cold. We had a hot snack at the Games Village and then some athletes stayed up all night while others, after packing, got a few hours of shuteye. Because of our early flight times, we flew from Manchester to London to fly home.

In Retrospect:

It is unfortunate that we were unable to field a team in all the events at the Commonwealth Games. Given our expertise in Standard Pistol and Centre Fire we might have increased our medal count.

The Canadian Shooting Team as a whole only won 2 medals in the men’s events – Gold in Rapid Fire Pistol and Gold in Men’s Skeet. The remaining 11 medals came from the Women’s Teams and Individuals.

It was a privilege for me to attend these games as a coach.
William (Bill) Hare
Canadian National Pistol Team Coach