Cyprus is bringing out the big guns this year to secure a spot on the Olympic medal table.
For big guns, read: shotguns. Not the sawn-off variety, but the smooth-bore firearm used by skeet shooters to blow clay pigeons into clouds of dust.
George Achilleos (L) and Antonis Nikolaides enjoy the moment after winning gold at the Skeet Pairs clay target shooting at the Melbourne Gun Club during day five of the Melbourne 2006 Commonwealth Games on March 20, 2006. |
Better known these days for its tourist droves, garage music and club culture than its historic roots as the mythical birthplace of Aphrodite or its ties to the birthplace of the ancient Olympics, the island nation is placing its faith in its brigade of skeet shooters to capture its first Olympic medal since independence.
Now world No 1 Giorgos Achilleos, London-born Antonis Nikolaides and top Cypriot female Andri Eleftheriou have their crosshairs trained firmly on Beijing 2008.
Despite decades of political turmoil since the former British colony of 800,000 experienced a Greek-Cypriot coup d'etat followed by a Turkish invasion in 1974, its sporting woes are finally on the wane.
"Achilleos has proved himself a winner at the World Games and European Championships and is considered above the odds for obtaining a medal in Beijing," said Cyprus Olympic Committee spokesman Iacovos Kakouris. "Moreover, skeet results balance on a hair trigger and the gap between success and failure has shrunk over the years."
Achilleos finished eighth at the 2004 Athens Games but is capable of much more. World No.9 Nicolaides wants to stock up his trophy cabinet before he switches over to coaching.
"I want to retire when I am at the top," said the Cypriot, who did not pick up a gun until he turned 22 but has already amassed a number of Commonwealth medals. He traveled to Finland last year to develop his coaching skills.
Eleftheriou, 16th in the world rankings, started the male-dominated sport when she was ten. Like the rest of the team, she is coached by Sydney Olympic medallist Petr Malek of Czech Republic, and she doesn't plan on playing second fiddle in Beijing.
"Even when I was a child I liked extreme sports. I was like a boy," she said. "I spend all day on the shooting range, do some hard training in the gym as well as psychological preparation, which is important as you have to stay controlled, calm and focused."
Olympic shooting is divided into four categories: Rifle, pistol, shotgun and running target. Skeet, one of three shotgun disciplines along with trap and double trap, has been an Olympic event since 1968. Shooters must gun down clay targets that are sprung from differently positioned traps to score.
To keep their bodies supple, athletes swim, run and even play table tennis rather than hitting the weights bench.
Cyprus already has several Olympic qualifiers among its stable of 17 prospects heading to the August 8-24 Beijing Games. Of these, women's high jump, sailing (Laser class) and tennis are also strong.
Since they began competing independently of Greece at the 1980 Moscow Games, Greek-Cypriot athletes have managed to scrape top-ten finishes, but none have eclipsed the achievements of 400m hurdler Stavros Giorgis, who raced to sixth place at the 1972 Munich Games in 49.66 seconds. His time still stands as a Cypriot record to this day.
But shooting is something of a tradition in the troubled Mediterranean paradise, and the war-torn Cypriots have had lots of practice.
The first Cyprus-born athlete to stand on the Olympic podium did so courtesy of not one firearm, but two. At the inaugural 1896 Athens Games, flag bearer Ioannis Fragoudis captured the gold medal at the 25m pistol and took silver at the now-defunct Army Gun 300m.
Menelaos Michaelides placed ninth in the skeet at the 1968 Mexico City Games and compatriot Lakis Georgiou (Psimolofitis) went one better at the following Games in Munich to place eighth.
The tradition continued in Sydney in 2000 when Antonis Andreou also ranked eighth. Andreou was part of the 2004 European Championship-winning junior skeet team.
