The participation of Russian athletes in the Olympic shooting competition is unclear.
Aleksi Leppä Aiming an air rifle towards the target at the Kokkokallio shooting range in Hamina.
Leppä squeezes the trigger so calmly that it is difficult for bystanders to see any movement in the trigger finger. There is no movement in the position during the performance.
The bullet leaves the barrel and a hit result of 10.6 appears on the screen next to the shooter.
That’s a good hit.
Shooting requires extreme concentration. Every shot should look exactly the same.
Rifle shooter from Kotka and silver medalist at the Sidney Olympics Juha Hirvi has stated that a shooter needs 100,000 practice shots for a sportsman to become you with his gun.
100Â 000 practice shots came to Lepä around the age of 19.
Now 29-year-old Leppä is counting half a million practice shots in his approaching career.
– Still, practice is like practice, so every day you learn something new. I don’t know how much I should shoot so that I can say that now I can no longer learn about the sport, Leppä states.
The biggest dream of Aleksi Lepä, who fell in love with shooting sports at the age of 7, came true last August, when the native of Hamina aimed for an Olympic place for Finland at the World Cup arena in Baku, Azerbaijan, and was sixth in the 50-meter miniature rifle.
– My own dream has been to make it to the Olympics. It was an incredible feeling.
Participation of Russian snipers uncertain
Shooting has been one of the medal sports for Russian athletes at the Olympic level. In Tokyo, Russia won eight Olympic medals in the sport, two of which were gold.
In December, the International Olympic Committee ruled that Russians and Belarusians may participate in the Olympics, but without national emblems, such as the national flag and national anthem.
Russian athletes are also not allowed to support the war in Ukraine, and they are not allowed to have any connection with the army or the state leadership.
A part of the international sports community wishes that the International Olympic Committee had left Russia completely out of the Paris Games.
Aleksi Leppä, who works as a sports non-commissioned officer in the defense forces, does not take a stand on who can compete in the Olympics and who cannot:
The International Shooting Sports Federation has not banned Russian shooters from competing at the Olympic level, but recently Russian shooters have not been seen in international competitions.
Russian shooters have not yet reached a single Olympic place in Paris.
At the Olympics, anything is possible
Aleksi Leppä will participate in the 10-meter air rifle competition as well as the 50-meter miniature rifle position competition at the Paris Olympics between July and August.
He aims for a place in the finals of the games, i.e. advancement from the preliminary competition to the top eight shooters.
– In the final, everything starts from scratch. If Mikä finds out for himself a place in the finals, then only the sky is the limit. There is no need to humiliate anyone in the final, says Leppä.
Coach father Marko Leppä reminds that surprising results have been seen in shooting at the Olympic Games. In a sport that requires extreme concentration, the intense pressure makes winning an Olympic medal really difficult.
– Every shooter who has made it to the Olympics has already achieved a lot. Every shooter included is good, but none stand out above the rest. Aleksi has the potential for anything, says Marko Leppä.