By Gary Anderson

October 24 - Veronika Vadovicova (centre) celebrates her second indivdual gold medal at the 2013 IPC Shooting European ChampionshipsProving herself arguably the athlete of the week so far, Slovakian Veronika Vadovicova claimed her second individual gold medal and set a European finals record on the penultimate day of action at the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) Shooting European Championships in Alicante.

The Beijing 2008 champion and London 2012 silver medallist registered a score of 442.4 points in the final of the women's SH1 R8 50 metre air rifle three positions to take top spot once again, finishing ahead of British pair Lesley Baldwin in second and Karen Butler in third.

The 30-year-old, who had earlier won a gold medal in the SH1 R2 10m air rifle standing, cited the increased Government support for Para-shooters in her home country as one of the reasons for her continued success.

"I expected to win this one because it is one of my best events and I have been training and competing a lot, and I have good support," said Vadovicova, who has also claimed an individual silver and team gold in the Spanish sunshine this week.

"I get really good support from the Ministry of Internal Affairs who have a centre where elite athletes are trained.

"All that is now paying off."

In the other rifle event of the day, Ukrainian Vasyl Kovalchuk missed out on making it two golds in two days after finishing second behind compatriot Pavlo Volynets in the mixed SH2 R9 50m air rifle prone, which saw Volynets setting a world and European finals record of 625.4 on his way to victory.

Serbian Dragan Ristic took home the bronze medal, while the R9 team gold went to the impressive and consistent Ukrainians with Croatia and Italy securing silver and bronze respectively.

Filip Rodzik (centre) and Bawomir Okoniewski (left) made it a Polish top two in the pistol event on day fourFilip Rodzik (centre) and Bawomir Okoniewski (left) made it a Polish top two in the pistol event on day four




























Poland secured its first gold medal of the Championships in the form of Filip Rodzik whose score of 193.3 in the men's SH1 P1 10m air pistol competition was enough to see off the challenge of second placed man and compatriot Bawomir Okoniewski, with Rastko Jokic picking up another medal for Serbia in third.

That bronze for Jokic was enough to see Serbia take third in the overall team competition also, behind Turkey in second and the gold medal winning Russian trio of Valery Ponomarenko, Sergey Malyshev and Andrey Lebedinsky.

The final day of action in Alicante is due to place tomorrow and for live results and coverage of the Championships visit the IPC Shooting Twitter feed or Facebook page.

Contact the writer of this story at [email protected]


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