SINGAPORE - Not since the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics have Singapore’s shooters missed out on sport’s biggest and most prestigious event.
It is a scenario that Singapore Shooting Association (SSA) president Michael Vaz wants to avoid for the Paris 2024 Games – though with the event just five months away, none of the Republic’s athletes has sealed an Olympic shooting berth.
But he is not sweating yet, as he is confident that Singapore’s flag will be flying at the Chateauroux Shooting Centre in July.
Vaz, who has been president since 2013, said: “We are confident of having at least one (quota) spot at the Olympics. There is one more qualifier and we have focused on our shooters obtaining world ranking points through the various World Cups and competitions that they have entered during this qualifying campaign.
“So let’s see, I am hopeful that we will be represented in Paris.”
A total of 170 men and 170 women will compete across 15 shooting events in the Olympics. Qualification began in August 2023 and ends on June 9, with 312 quota spots available through designated International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) championships. There are also 16 wildcard slots and the remaining berths will be determined by qualification rankings.
At the Asian Rifle/Pistol Championships on Jan 11, Teh Xiu Hong narrowly missed out on an Olympic quota spot after finishing sixth in the women’s 25m pistol final, while teammate Teo Shun Xie was seventh. Chinese Taipei’s Wu Chia-ying, who finished fifth, qualified as some of the medallists had already secured their places in Paris at previous events.
The Singaporeans will get one last competition to earn their tickets to Paris at the Rifle and Pistol ISSF Olympic Qualification Championship in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, from April 11 to 19.
If they miss out in Rio, they could still qualify via the Olympics qualification rankings. Teo is currently world No. 10 in the 25m pistol, while Teh is 13th and 24th in the 25m and 10m air pistol events respectively.
In the women’s 10m air rifle, Fernel Tan is ranked 20th.
Teh, 29, said: “I have been working hard to get to the Olympics and getting a quota will be a reward for my journey so far. Every athlete wants to be among the best and the top shooters will be at the Olympics and I want to be one of them.”
While Tan wants to follow in the footsteps of her elder sister Adele Tan – who competed in Tokyo – she is mindful not to let the pressure affect her love for the sport.
Over the past two years, the 21-year-old, who won an Asian Championships air rifle team silver last October, has been on a gruelling competition schedule in a bid to qualify for the Olympics.
She said: “The pressure has been intense for a while now so it is important for me to reflect and enjoy the process even as we are in the Olympics qualification window. The selections for the various competitions and the competitions we have been to have been back-to-back with almost no break in between.
“So I have to keep going and keep giving my best (to achieve qualification) but also enjoy the sport more while I am at it.”
Olympic qualification will also be a welcome relief for the Singapore shooters after a sub-par performance at the Hangzhou Asian Games, where they returned home empty-handed for a second consecutive Games.
Vaz told The Straits Times that he revamped the national sports association’s secretariat in 2022, hiring a new general manager Lim Tian Lye – a former senior police officer – and two high performance managers Edmund Goh and Karen Teo, who are both ISSF-certified judges.
Since February 2022, the team have won 24 ISSF World Cup and Grand Prix medals, he noted.
The shooting chief stressed that he had to “get SSA back into shape” after learning of issues such as the use of outdated weapons, as well as shooters and coaches not keeping shooting logs, which are used to track rounds and scores during training sessions.
He added: “We were simply not winning. I called a meeting and realised that some of what we were doing needed to be revamped, so I went about getting new staff and putting in place a proper programme and structure.”
One of his bugbears is the lack of a finals range here and he is seeking support from the authorities to build one. The National Shooting Centre at Old Choa Chu Kang Road currently has a qualifying range of 33 lanes, while a smaller finals range has eight.
Vaz said that a finals facility will allow the shooters to train for high-pressure scenarios during competitions.
He added: “The finals range is intimidating and if you do not replicate that in regular training, you cannot get used to it. Our range was built in the early 2000s and the sport has developed so much since. That is the reality but I am hopeful and discussions are ongoing to improve the facilities.”
