Shooting Sport Big 5

Shooting: a history of the sport

Shooting developed as a hunting sport. The earliest shooting clubs were recorded in central Europe in the 15th century. The rules and competition structure of modern shooting were developed in Europe and the USA, spreading worldwide in the late 19th century.

Today, top marksmen and women come from a wide range of countries – every continent is represented at the Olympic Games.

Shooting at the Games

Shooting was one of the sports on the programme of the first modern Olympic Games in Athens 1896.

The worldwide development of the sport has seen it grow from three events at those Games to 15 today.

Women first took part in Shooting at Mexico City 1968. They used to compete alongside men, but separate men’s and women’s events have been held since 1996.
How to play

Shooting is made up of Pistol, Rifle and Shotgun competitions.

In Pistol and Rifle events, competitors fire bullets at a target from a set distance.

They score points according to the accuracy of their shots. The targets consist of 10 rings, with a ‘bullseye’ at the centre that counts for 10.9 points in Olympic finals.

Pistol targets are either fixed at 50m and 10m, or turn to set time sequences at 25m.

In the Shotgun event, competitors fire lead pellets (‘shot’) at moving clay targets. These are launched from different directions, and in sequences originally designed to look like birds in flight.

Weightlifting Sport

The basics

Competitors in Weightlifting are divided into 15 weight categories, eight for men and seven for women. The strongest competitors may lift more than three times their body weight.


Each event features two types of lift. In the snatch, the bar is lifted from the floor to above the head in one movement. By contrast, the clean and jerk is a two-stage action – the bar is first brought up to the shoulders before being jerked over the head.

Each lifter is allowed three attempts at the snatch and three attempts at the clean and jerk, and their best lift in each discipline counts towards their total. When a tie occurs, the athlete with the lower bodyweight is declared the winner. If two athletes lift the same total weight and have the same bodyweight, the winner is the athlete who lifted the total weight first.

Wrestling Sport

Wrestling: a history of the sport

Wrestling can be traced as far back as human records go. There is evidence of its early existence in ancient Egyptian wall paintings.

In ancient Greece, 2,000 years later, it was among the most popular events at the original Olympic Games.

The sport has taken many forms over its long history. Different versions have flourished in different areas of the world.

Wrestling at the Games

Greco-Roman Wrestling was an event at the first modern Games in Athens 1896. The organisers hoped it would give a flavour of the ancient Greek Olympic Games, where the sport had been very popular.

Freestyle was introduced by public demand at the St Louis 1904 Games. Women had to wait another 100 years to compete in Wrestling in the Olympic Games, at Athens 2004.
How to play – and win

Wrestling is a body-to-body combat sport. The aim is to force the back of the opponent’s shoulders on to the ground. Bouts take place on a mat, and can last for a maximum of three periods of two minutes, with a 30-second break in between. A contest can finish early if a wrestler wins the first two periods or pins his opponent.

There are two styles of Wrestling at the Games: Greco-Roman and Freestyle. Women compete only in the Freestyle event. In Freestyle, competitors can use all parts of their body to attempt moves and holds. In Greco-Roman, use of the legs to make contact and use of the arms below the waist of the opponent are forbidden.

Big Ben Comes Up Small in Super Bowl

ARLINGTON, Texas -- Ben Roethlisberger was supposed to be the unflappable quarterback. The born winner who always made the big play in the big spot. A win Sunday would have meant a third Super Bowl title, and only four members of his profession have ever done that. Plans were being made to carve him right into that Mount Rushmore alongside Bradshaw, Montana, Aikman and Brady, and some were even putting forth the preposterous notion that a victory in Sunday night's football game might somehow offer Roethlisberger some form of "redemption" for the reprehensible offseason behavior that almost got him drummed out of Pittsburgh and the NFL last year.

And then he went out and played a rotten game, throwing two interceptions and badly mismanaging the two-minute drill at the end when he still had a chance to march down the field, win the game and put a sweet coat of varnish on his Hall of Fame resume.

So what do we do with Ben Roethlisberger now?

"Personally, I feel like I let a lot of people down," Roethlisberger said when it was all over. "You can't turn the ball over, and I did."

And in somewhat spectacular fashion. His first interception, courtesy of Nick Collins, was run back 37 yards for a touchdown and gave the Packers a lead larger than any that has ever been overcome in a Super Bowl. His second interception led, four plays later, to the touchdown that put the Packers up 21-3 in the second quarter. Those accounted for 14 of the 21 points the Packers would score off turnovers in this game. And while it looked for much of the second half -- right up until his fourth-down pass to Mike Wallace fell incomplete in the final minute -- as if Roethlisberger was going to bring the Steelers back against a shredded Green Bay secondary, he didn't.

"I feel like I let a lot of people down today that stood up to fight. People like Doug Legursky, Antwaan Randle El, Trai Essex and Ramon Foster. Those guys gave everything they had, and I let them down."
--Ben Roethlisberger "I don't put blame on anybody but myself," he said. "I feel like I let the city of Pittsburgh down -- my teammates, my coaches, the fans, everybody. And it's not a good feeling."

If we're going to canonize the quarterback who wins the big games, we also have to hammer the guy when he comes up small in the winnable ones. It's often pointed out that Roethlisberger played poorly in his first Super Bowl-winning effort, but part of his legend is that he's the guy who gets it done when it counts, even if it's not pretty along the way.

This one was just the opposite. Roethlisberger was set up to add Sunday to his winner's resume. Charles Woodson was out. Sam Shields was banged up. For the final few minutes of the first half, there was a parade of Packers defensive backs to the locker room with injuries, and not all of them came back. If ever a team were to come back from 18 points down to win a Super Bowl, it was this one, and the reason was to have been Roethlisberger.

But in the end, he simply had a lousy game at the worst possible time. He seemed as if he couldn't (or wouldn't) make the right decision when he rolled out to throw, as he so often does. He showed no urgency when he got the ball back down six with 1:59 left on the clock, as if the idiotic personal foul penalty by Keyaron Fox that forced him to start on his own 13 had somehow rattled him. He got excellent performances from a host of injury-replacement guys he didn't hesitate to name as he offered his postgame mea culpa.

"I feel like I let a lot of people down today that stood up to fight," he said. "People like Doug Legursky, Antwaan Randle El, Trai Essex and Ramon Foster. Those guys gave everything they had, and I let them down."

He wasn't alone in deserving blame. Rashard Mendenhall's second-half fumble was as crushing and inexplicable a turnover as either of Roethlisberger's. There were penalties and miscommunications that cost them chances to score. It was a jarringly poor performance by a team that should have been the composed one.

"I really thought we were mentally prepared to be on top of our game," Steelers receiver Hines Ward said. "And then to come out and execute the way we did, it's totally uncharacteristic."

But in case you haven't heard yet, it's Big Ben who feels like he let some people down. And he should. Such is the life of the quarterback. This crummy Super Bowl game he just played goes into his ledger along with the two wins. And yes, it scuffs it up a little bit. After all, the whole point of Roethlisberger has been that he gets it done, that he's a winner, that he makes the play when he has to make it. The Steelers like to keep it simple when they talk about what makes their quarterback great, and so it was fitting that they kept it simple Sunday when explaining why he wasn't. Asked how he would describe Roethlisberger's performance, Steelers coach Mike Tomlin couldn't have put it any more simply.

"Just like mine," Tomlin said. "A losing one."

Jordy Nelson: From Unsung College Walk-On to Super Bowl Hero

ARLINGTON, Texas -- Jordy Nelson walked an unlikely path from Kansas farm boy to Super Bowl hero.

Nelson walked on as a safety at Kansas State in 2003. He became a starting receiver as a redshirt sophomore but when he reached the NFL with Green Bay in 2008, Nelson returned to semi-afterthought status with just six touchdown catches during his first three seasons. Speedy Greg Jennings, veteran Donald Driver and streaky James Jones are all ahead of Nelson on the Packers' depth chart.

But on Sunday night, the baby-faced kid with the crew cut on a team chock full of long-haired stars was the game's No. 1 receiver. Nelson opened the scoring with a 29-yard touchdown grab from quarterback Aaron Rodgers and went on to catch nine passes for 140 yards as the Packers held off the AFC champion Pittsburgh Steelers 31-25 to win Super Bowl XLV at Cowboys Stadium.

"This is unbelievable," Nelson said. "You always dream big. I guarantee you there's kids all over the country playing in their backyard emulating somebody making the game-winning catch in the Super Bowl. It's such a long shot, I can't believe it.

"I just take it year by year, doing what the coaches ask. I owe a lot of things to a lot of people. Hopefully, I'll see a bunch of (these) highlights someday down the road and realize it's me."

Nelson's huge game against the Steelers' top-rated defense gave him 21 catches, 286 yards and two touchdowns in the four-game run through the playoffs after he had caught a respectable but hardly awe-inspiring 45 passes for 582 yards and two scores during the season.

"I can't say enough about young Jordy Nelson," said Jennings, who had two touchdown catches of his own from MVP Rodgers against the Steelers. "He's been making plays for us all year. We tell him he's going to be that guy because he's going to be underrated, (defenders) are going to look at him and think that they can take advantage of him.

"He was able to take advantage of the matchups that we saw that he would be able to expose for us. (Steelers cornerback Bryant) McFadden is kinda slow out of his breaks. With Ike (Taylor) following myself, whoever was the No. 3 receiver was gonna have McFadden. We were pretty much gonna exploit that matchup and it just happened to be Jordy."

The Packers -- who lost Driver late in the first half with a high ankle sprain -- owe a big piece of their first Lombardi Trophy in 14 years to the 25-year-old Nelson, who held his postgame interview session with year-old son Royal on his lap, feeling pretty regal.

"Jordy stepped up when probably no one expected him to do it to fill my shoes," Driver said. "He's a playmaker and when you're a playmaker and you get your opportunity, you've got to make the best of it."

On his touchdown, Nelson evaded a bump from linebacker James Farrior at the line and then beat nickel cornerback William Gay on the right side of the end zone.

"I should have been on the guy; I should have been on him the whole way," Farrior lamented.

"Pittsburgh's a great defense," said Nelson, whose parents' sports bar in Manhattan, Kan., was surely rocking during and after the game. "Their front seven's hard to do anything on.

"We felt our best matchups were on the outside. It's all about opportunities. When we get four or five of us out there, we feel confident. ... We feel there's hardly any DBs can match up with us one-on-one, let alone four-on-four or five-on-five. That's just how defenses are made. That's a mismatch all the way around the board."

Family atmosphere the key to Steelers’ success

FORT WORTH, Texas — Here's one of the cool things about playing for the Steelers. Team owner Dan Rooney is just a phone call away.

“We call the owner ‘Papa Rooney,’ ” safety Troy Polamalu said. “People have his cell phone (number). He’s got a really unique view on how a successful franchise should be run, and how the team should be run, and how the atmosphere in the locker room and within the building should be. I think other owners could learn from that.”

The Steelers success isn't hard to figure out, Clifton Brown says. Look no further than owner Dan Rooney, who promotes a family atmosphere in Pittsburgh.

The Steelers have won six Super Bowls, the most of any franchise, and go for their seventh Sunday. People often discuss the keys to the Steelers’ sustained success. Here is one—the way the Rooney family has run the franchise for decades. It started with team founder Art Rooney. It has continued with his son, Dan, the chairman emeritus and current United States ambassador to Ireland, and Dan’s son, Art Rooney II, the team’s current president.

This is not to suggest that the Steelers are the only classy organization in the NFL. But the Rooney family has created an atmosphere where coaches and players feel like extended family. That has to be an advantage, particularly in a sport where teamwork is so vital.

Players and coaches have talked all week about “The Steeler Way.” Listen to offensive coordinator Bruce Arians.

“I’ve been a lot of places, about 14 different cities and colleges, and there’s nothing like the Rooneys,” Arians said. “But Mr. (Dan) Rooney is special. Our players love him. He’s walking through the locker room at all times. Our offices are all on one level. It is special. I don’t know if anybody else can replicate it because he got it from his father, and they’re passing it down through the family.”

Steelers wide receiver Hines Ward found another reason to admire Dan Rooney recently, after he spoke out in opposition to a potential 18-game regular season.

“He’s just speaking what we really feel,” Ward said. “He doesn’t care about that extra half-million or whatever money they make for those two extra games. He worries more about his players and their safety.”

Players who leave the Steelers often find out how different other organizations can be. Wide receiver Antwaan Randle El, linebacker Larry Foote and backup quarterback Byron Leftwich all left the Steelers at one point in their careers but have returned. None has regretted coming back. Guess the cliché, "You can’t go home again,” does not apply to the Steelers.

“This is the best organization in sports,” Leftwich said. “People see those six championships and wonder how they do it. The environment they put you in allows you to be successful.”

That environment was seriously tested this season. Ben Roethlisberger had his well-documented off-field issues, which led to a four-game suspension to start the season. Not only did the situation jeopardize Roethlisberger’s career, but it could have jeopardized the Steelers’ season. It was an uncomfortable and embarrassing offseason for the Steelers, with the future of their franchise quarterback in doubt.

Yet, another February finds the Steelers back in the Super Bowl, with a chance to win their third championship in six seasons. Mike Tomlin, who has made the Rooneys look wise for hiring him as their head coach four years ago, said working for the Steelers helps him set the proper tone.

“It’s passed down from generation of Steelers to generation of Steelers, through stories and actions,” Tomlin said. “The young guys who are brought in are taught how we do business. It’s something great to be a part of. It comes from the Rooney family.”

Maybe the Packers will prevent the Steelers from winning their seventh Super Bowl. Maybe the Packers, who have been rolling since Week 16, will culminate their late-season run with a championship.

However, history suggests that the Steelers will be tough to beat. The Steelers like to think of themselves as family.

And their favorite family heirloom is the Lombardi Trophy.

Old warriors endure painful irony of NFL’s greed game

DALLAS — Somewhere, someone has to see the irony in all of this. Maybe it just takes a fresh set of eyes.

Or a swift slap in the face.

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell addressed the media Friday, and most of the talk centered on the labor strife. (AP Photo)

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell gave his state of the league address Friday, and this is what we learned: The owners and players each think the other is too greedy, and it could cost us the 2011 season.

Meanwhile, the Super Bowl—the largest, most extravagant, decadent sports day/marketing bonanza of the year—will be played in a palace of a stadium that cost $1.3 billion to build.

“I know people at home think this is billionaires against millionaires,” Steelers safety Ryan Clark said, “but it’s more than that.”

At least it should be.

The world wants to hear about Maurkice Pouncey, and whether the Steelers’ rookie center will be ready to play Sunday in Super Bowl XLV. I want to hear more about Mike Webster, a Steelers Hall of Fame center who died from complications of numerous concussions he sustained while playing.

The world wants to talk about Troy Polamalu, the Steelers’ star safety and the league’s best defensive player. I want to talk more about Dick “Night Train” Lane, the greatest defensive back to ever play the game—and whose family barely had enough money to bury him.

While current owners and players haggle over millions, while they publicly complain that one of the most successful and healthy businesses on the planet is in danger of economic crisis, the sweat and steel of players who built the foundation of the game is long forgotten.

“Jerry Jones may have paid for that new stadium in Dallas,” NFL Hall of Famer Joe DeLamielleure said, “but he didn’t build it.”

It’s almost fitting that we’re here in Dallas, and the collective bargaining agreement has become the biggest story of the week. This is where America’s Team was born, where the game was nurtured and developed and blossomed long before petty and petulant owners like Jones and Danny Snyder came along.

That billion-dollar stadium may as well be an architectural graveyard; the blood and bones and ligaments and tendons of players gone by buried deep in its soul. Players that have long been ignored by the NFL once their careers were complete.

DeLamielleure played 13 seasons in the NFL and is one of the best linemen in the history of the game. Yet his NFL pension is a measly $1,200 a month.

“And my pension,” DeLamielleure says, “is a lot better than most.”

The NFL recently signed a $2 billion television contract with ESPN, a mere percentage of the league’s annual income from television (FOX, CBS and NBC also pay billions), apparel ($1 billion deal with Nike) and stadium revenues.

Player salaries and benefits have never been better. There are mega-signing bonuses for college players who have never played a down and marketing deals and image rights fees.

Meanwhile those who built the game can’t get out of bed without help from their wives or prescription medication or both. The pain still rips through DeLamielleure’s right elbow when he leans on it the wrong way. His knees hurt, he has headaches—and he’s one of the lucky ones.

Some can’t walk, some are homeless. Some have dementia and memory loss from head injuries. All of them need help.

It’s shameful, really, that it has come to this. Pensions for the men who built the league were bartered decades ago, and the current CBA is all about current players and owners getting theirs — and protecting theirs.

“When you’re wealthy,” DeLamielleure says, “you have no clue unless you walk in another man’s shoes.”

Billionaires vs. millionaires. There are no winners in this greedy game of chicken.

Only the bones of the game’s greats underneath the rubble.

GMs consider dealing while players ignore rumors

With the NHL’s trade deadline closing in, it’s the time of year when rumors heat up and general managers work the phones even harder to fulfill their wish list. Atlanta’s Rick Dudley wants to add scoring. Boston’s Peter Chiarelli would like to add a defenseman.

The Flyers seem to be in on everything. Columbus has been trying to make a deal as long as anybody, except maybe the Kings and GM Dean Lombardi.

Anze Kopitar's Kings are one of many teams looking to make moves that improve their rosters. But too much trade talk can be dangerous, Craig Custance says.

All the talk, the rumors and speculation can become a dangerous thing for teams in the middle of it.

Lombardi, for instance, could dramatically increase the chances of the Kings making a long playoff run by adding a scoring winger, and nobody would benefit more than center Anze Kopitar.

But Kopitar said he and his teammates won’t get caught waiting for outside help to walk through the dressing room door.

“We said in the locker room, it’s the guys who are in here who are going to do it,” Kopitar told Sporting News. “Even if a guy comes, one guy is not going to turn the thing around. We’re going to wait and see, if something happens, it happens. If it doesn’t, it’s not a secret. We’re definitely not sitting here waiting for that.”

Howson has been looking for a move to spark his team, as the Jackets fall dangerously close to falling out of the playoff hunt. Coach Scott Arniel recently said he hasn’t seen signs of the trade rumors seeping into the room.

“I think guys have always heard rumors,” Arniel said. “Those things, as we all know, are out of control as a player. You just have to do your job.”

Soon, if they haven’t already, general managers will have the talk with their players who have no-trade clauses to see if they’re willing to waive them. Last year, Mike Modano went through it when Stars GM Joe Nieuwendyk let him know he was getting calls from the Capitals, Flyers and Bruins about Modano’s availability.

He asked Modano if a trade was an idea he needed to entertain.

“It’s an uncomfortable situation. You know when you go in the game and you start playing, you say ‘Hey, this is one of those things that can happen in your career,’ ” Modano told Sporting News. “There’s a real kind of feeling out process. It’s tough.”

The negotiating window between the NHL and Versus regarding a new television deal closed at the end of January, and NHL commissioner Gary Bettman said the window to negotiate a deal with NBC would begin “slightly afterwards.”

It’s an interesting time considering the merger between Comcast and NBC. As much talk as there is about getting hockey back on ESPN, NHL COO John Collins sounded interested in the potential of the media giant created by NBC and Comcast.

“It’s probably the most wired, potentially the most important media company in the United States,” Collins told Sporting News.

He said the league got a taste of the kind of cross promotion NBC can do with Versus during All-Star weekend. It was the most-watched NHL All-Star game in the history of the sports network, peaking at nearly two million viewers. The Skills competition was the most watched on cable since 2003, signs that cross promotion on Comcast and NBC entities paid off.

“There’s a lot of great assets there they can bring to bear and they brought them to bear for the first time ever in the newly merged company for the All-Star game,” Collins said. “They can cross promote across all the different channels and websites. I think it’ll be really interesting to see how combining those assets can really drive sports in general and the NHL in particular.”

Ilya Kovalchuk takes no satisfaction in the recent losing in Atlanta. He told Sporting News that he keeps in touch with former teammates Nik Antropov, Eric Boulton and Chris Thorburn and would love to see his former team make the playoffs without him. “I’d be happy for sure,” he said. “That franchise did a lot of good things for me. I only can say good things about it. I wish them the best all the way.”… The Lightning have continued to improve under Guy Boucher and it’s no fluke. One NHL player who recently lost to the Lightning said Tampa’s system isn’t easy to crack. “It’s driving people crazy,” he told us. “If you (mess) around in the neutral zone, they’re picking it off and going the other way… You need speed and skill guys who can carry it through. There’s a way to get through it but you don’t have four lines that can do it.”

Key Super Bowl matchup: Packers RB James Starks vs. Steelers ILB James Farrior

The Steelers have the best run defense in the NFL. No running back rushed for 100 yards against them this season, and they shut down some of the league’s best backs, including Michael Turner (42 yards) and Chris Johnson (34 yards).

That leaves Packers rookie running back James Starks facing a formidable challenge Sunday in Super Bowl XLV. Starks has provided a spark during the playoffs averaging 87.7 yards per game. However, the pursuit of the Steelers’ linebackers makes it difficult for any back to find running room.

James Farrior and the ferocious Steelers run defense will look to stop James Starks and put the Packers into obvious passing situations.

"They have great linebackers," Starks said. "They are physical. They are strong. They flow to the game, and they like contact."

All four of the Steelers’ linebackers—James Farrior, James Harrison, Lawrence Timmons, and LaMarr Woodley—are excellent ball pursuers. But Farrior and Timmons, the two inside ’backers, set the tone for stopping the run.

Farrior will enter Super Bowl XLV with a chip on his shoulder, still remembering the shootout against the Packers last season, which the Steelers won, 37-36.

"We looked bad out there," Farrior said. "I thought we made a lot of mistakes that game, and those guys took advantage of it. I think we’re a better team. A better defense. I think we’ll be able to make some of the plays that we couldn’t make the last time we played those guys."

Even if Starks does not have a huge day, the Packers want to be able to run in key spots —in the red zone, in third-and-short and in a late-game situation if they have the lead. The Steelers, on the other hand, want to shut down the Packers’ running game and keep quarterback Aaron Rodgers in obvious passing situations.

Farrior and Co. can demoralize a running game. If Starks doesn’t have success early, it will be interesting to see if Green Bay abandons the run.

"We can’t give up on the run too early," Packers wide receiver James Jones said. "Their front seven is phenomenal, and they are great at stopping the run. You have to try. If it doesn’t work based on the flow of the game, we are a good offense so we will adapt to it."

Starks is looking forward to the challenge.

"It is going to be fun—two great teams in the Super Bowl," Starks said. "It is going to be a great match."