Kim Rhode Wins Women's Skeet Gold, 1st American With Individual Medal in 5 Straight Olympics

This morning Kim Rhode won the women’s skeet gold medal, making her the 1st American with an individual medal in 5 straight Olympics!

 Rhode broke the Olympic record when she missed only one of 75 targets during the qualifying round of women’s skeet shooting. She hit 25/25 in the medal round.  That strong performance of 99 hits out of 100, ties the Olympic record in Skeet Shooting.

Rhode is now the most successful female shooter in Olympic history and the first American athlete to medal in five successive games.

Rhode, the most decorated female clay shooter ever, started off with gold in Atlanta, then won bronze in Sydney, gold in Athens and silver in Beijing.

Rhode was runner-up in skeet four years ago in one of shooting’s most memorable finals.  Rhode, Chiara Cainero of Italy and Christine Brinker of Germany were tied after qualifying and the final, forcing a shootoff for the medals. Cainero prevailed, Brinker was third and all three were back shooting today.

Rhode has had a rough and lonely build-up to her Olympic bid after flight cancellations forced her to miss her team training camp… before her puppy ate her ticket.  Rhode, seeking to become the first American to win individual medals at five Summer Games in a row, went to the airport in Los Angeles on Friday intending to fly to Copenhagen in Denmark for the training camp.

But the first leg of her flight — to Newark — was twice cancelled and as timed ticked away she eventually flew direct to London, arriving on Tuesday.

When asked whether the dramas of the past few days had affected her, a relaxed Rhode said: “It’s like anything. You just roll with the punches and hope for the best.”