YOG: Martina shoots to silver in comeback win

SINGAPORE - Singapore's Martina Lindsay Veloso has won the country's first medal at the Nanjing Youth Olympic Games.

The 14-year-old Singapore Sports School student took the silver in the girls' 10m air rifle event at the Fangshan Shooting Hall on Tuesday morning. Her score of 207.2 was just behind Switzerland's Sarah Hornung's winning effort of 207.8. Germany's Julia Budde took the bronze with a score of 186.3.

Martina had, in June, won gold at the International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) World Cup in Munich after beating an Olympic champion and European champion en route to becoming the competition's youngest winner. But against her in peers in Nanjing, she said she felt more nervous going into the YOG final than when she competed against the sport's bigger guns.

"The final today felt different from others that I've competed in before, I don't know why," said Martina, who last month took on rivals more than twice her age in the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, finishing a creditable fifth in the 10m air rifle.

But she was able to calm her nerves and deliver when it mattered.

She added: "I was only 11 in 2010 (during the inaugural YOG in Singapore) and wasn't even shooting yet. I would never have thought that four years later I would be here."

Team Singapore won two silvers and four bronzes at the inaugural Games in 2010 which Singapore hosted.

This article was first published on August 22, 2014.
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