Shooters on target as Scotland closes in on record medal haul
TEAM Scotland’ shooters added to an already impressive Commonwealth Games medal tally, with a bronze and a silver taking the count to 28, ever-closer to the target of 30 medals.
In the Queen’s Prize Fullbore Rifle pairs, Ian Shaw and Sandy Walker finished day one in fourth place. However, on day two in Gold Coast, they stepped up their performance to leapfrog into third position and grab the bronze medal.
Shaw and Walker’s medal-winning exploits were closely followed by 37-yearold stalwart Neil Stirton’s silver medal in the 50m Rifle Prone final – his fourth career Commonwealth medal and first in an individual event.
The athletics continued in the Carrara Stadium, with flag-bearer Eilidh Doyle, 31, putting in a solid run to make the final of the 400m hurdles.
There were mixed fortunes for the Scots in the 800m, with former Diamond League winner Jake Wightman finishing second in his heat to progress, but 2014 finalist Guy Learmonth failed to secure a spot.
Scotland’s swimmers continued to perform strongly overnight with both the men’s and women’s 4x100m medley relay teams progressing to the finals while the race to really watch out for will be the men’s 200m individual medley, in which three Scots feature.
Duncan Scott, who has already picked up five medals at these Games, will be looking for further success, while Dan Wallace is also a medal hope and Mark Szaranek, who earlier in the week won silver in the 400m individual medley, completes the Scots in the line-up.
Elsewhere, Scotland cyclist Katie Archibald, star of the track team, narrowly failed to add to her medal haul, finishing in fourth place in the women’s individual time trial on the road, while brother John finished 11th in the men’s race.