Like any top athlete, Pelly Crossing’s Danielle Marcotte, 16, has her sights fixed on the future, not the past.
“I finished that competition, I get a day break, and now I’m on to another competition,” said Marcotte. “So it’s kind of hard to think about this past weekend when I’m already focused on my next one. For me that completion is already gone and out of my head.”
Marcotte once again showed why she’s the Deadeye Dick of North of 60, winning the Junior Ranger Regional Air Rifle Championship held in Yellowknife, NWT over the weekend.
After taking the title in 2007, making her the top shootist in the three territories (and Northern BC), she failed to defend the title last year with a bad outing.
“I felt really good - I got a really good score,” said Marcotte. “It wasn’t about just going and winning it. I just wanted to prove to myself what score I could get.
“Last year was really bad because I had two guns that didn’t work, so I really wanted to make up for what happened last year. I was missing targets and I don’t miss targets.”
Seven Yukon Junior Rangers, plus one from Atlin, BC, attended the meet of 30 shooters, taking aim from standing, kneeling and prone positions.
After the final shot rang out, organizers announced the top three shooters for each region, with Marcotte in first with a score of 295 out of 310. Taking second for the region was Alisha Sembsmoen from Haines Junction, followed by Stuart Leary from Dawson City.
Following the announcement, Marcotte was named overall top shot.
Marcotte is currently in Colorado Springs, US, for the USA 3X Air Gun Championships, the final challenge in vying for a spot on Team Canada for next summer’s first ever World Junior Olympics in Singapore.
“This is a very important meet for her,” said Marcotte’s coach and father Darcy Marcotte. “She has three days of competition and she has to shoot a score of 355, or above (out of 400) to gain a position on the team. Danielle has been doing well - she’s been shooting 370 - so she should do OK with that.”
Marcotte also feels rather confident about her chances for achieving the necessary match-qualifying score.
“I only have to get over a 355, but that’s no problem,” she said. “If I didn’t get a 356, that would be pretty embarrassing. But it could happen, so I shouldn’t say that.”
So far this year, the Junior Rangers sergeant took second in a first-ever national Junior Rangers shoot in Labrador at the end of May and gold at the Grand Prix Air-gun Championships in Toronto in February.
In June, competing in her first .22-calibre competition, the 2009 Alberta Provincial Handgun Championship, she won gold in the junior women’s 25-metre sport pistol event.
At the Canadian National Pistol Championships in Calgary in August, Marcotte won two gold medals in the 25-metre sport pistol and the 10-metre air pistol, both in junior divisions.
No stranger to success at the event, Marcotte won gold in 2007 and silver in 2008 for the 10-metre air pistol at the championships.
Contact Tom Patrick at
tomp@yukon-news.com