Shooting at the 2004 Summer Olympics – Men's 10 metre air rifle

The men's 10 metre air rifle competition at the 2004 Summer Olympics was held on 16 August at the Markópoulo Olympic Shooting Centre near Athens, Greece.[1]

Men's 10 metre air rifle at the Games of the XXVIII Olympiad
Venue	Markópoulo Olympic Shooting Centre
Date	16 August 2004
Competitors	47 from 33 nations
Winning score	702.7 WR
Medalists
Zhu Qinan  China Li Jie  China Jozef Gönci  Slovakia

Shooting at the 2004 Summer Olympics
Qualification
Rifle
50 m rifle three positions	men	women
50 m rifle prone	men
10 m air rifle	men	women
Pistol
50 m pistol	men
25 m pistol		women
25 m rapid fire pistol	men
10 m air pistol	men	women
Shotgun
Trap	men	women
Double trap	men	women
Skeet	men	women
Running target
10 m running target	men

The event consisted of two rounds: a qualifier and a final. In the qualifier, each shooter fired 60 shots with an air rifle at 10 metres distance from the standing position. Scores for each shot were in increments of 1, with a maximum score of 10.

The top 8 shooters in the qualifying round moved on to the final round. There, they fired an additional 10 shots. These shots scored in increments of .1, with a maximum score of 10.9. The total score from all 70 shots was used to determine final ranking.

China's Zhu Qinan stunned the entire worldwide audience as he came from nowhere to snatch the Olympic gold in air rifle shooting, smashing a new world record of 702.7 points. Zhu also enjoyed his teammate Li Jie taking home the silver medal with 702.7, as the Chinese marksmen led the medal haul in a blistering 1–2 finish.[2][3] Slovakia's world number one Jozef Gönci came up with a steady feat in the final to claim the bronze on 697.4 points. Earlier in the prelims, Zhu set a junior world standard to grab the top seed in the six-man final, just one point short of the perfect grade 600 that had been successfully recorded by Thailand's Tevarit Majchacheeap in 2000.[4]