Czech trap shooters Jiří Lipták and David Kostelecký win gold and silver medals in the Tokyo Olympics

Czech shotgun shooters Jiří Lipták and David Kostelecký both won medals at the Olympic trap competition. Lipták erased the first Olympic gold of his career, and Kostelecký finished second.

Both Czech shooters gradually eliminated all four opponents in the final and then dueled against each other in the shootout. In the end, Lipták prevailed when Kostelecký missed a shot.

“I'm glad that after the Czech shooters failed to win any medals in Rio [in 2016], David and I started a new series here,” Lipták said.

He intends to watch the match once he gets home. “It went by very quickly,” he said.

Kostelecký said he was surprised by his result. "I wanted to earn one more medal, but I didn't believe it would be so late. I was 42 in Rio, so it would have been be more appropriate there. It was a surprise for me," Kostelecký said. He previously won a gold medal at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.

The last time two Czech shooters were in the final of the Olympic men’s trap competition was in 1992 in Barcelona. That time, Petr Hrdlička won a gold medal and Pavel Kubec finished fifth. Hrdlička is now coach of the national team.

Lipták did not have a very successful entry into the final. and missed the first shot. "I didn't expect the referee to say start so soon, and I wasn't ready," he said. He subsequently made more mistakes and was in worst position of the final six shooters.

However, Lipták gradually recovered. “Everything changed. You can see how interesting the shooting is. An outsider can be a winner," said Lipták,

The battle for gold had to be resolved by a shootout. Lipták hit all seven shots in it, while his national team colleague missed in the last attempt. “It was a fair fight, we often train together at this pace,” Kostelecký said.

Lipták said he hoped they both would win medals. “It was our big wish to stand next to each other on the podium and it happened here. It is huge. [Kostelecký] is my longtime friend. We have been training for several years together. It is great for me to learn from him,” he added

The World and European champion in men’s trap, Britain’s Matthew Coward-Holley, took the bronze medal. Mexico’s Jorge Martin Orozco Diaz, who at 21 had been the youngest competitor, had led the field in the first few rounds but finished fourth. China’s Yu Haicheng came fifth and Kuwait’s Abdulrahman Al Faihan was sixth.

Lipták won his first Olympic medal during his second participation. He was eighteenth in London nine years ago.

In Olympic competitions so far from the Czech Republic and Czechoslovakia. athletes won gold and silver in the same discipline in one game only – weightlifters Jaroslav Skobla and Václav Pšenička in a super heavyweight in 1932 in Los Angeles.

In the Tokyo Olympics so far, the Czech Republic has four medals. Aside from the two in men’s trap, Lukáš Rohan won silver in canoeing in the men's slalom C-1 and Alexander Choupenitch own bronze in for wincing in men’s foil.