A shooting sport is a competitive sport involving tests of proficiency (accuracy and speed) using various types of guns such as firearms and air guns. Hunting is also a shooting sport, and indeed shooting live pigeons was an Olympic event. The shooting sports are categorized by the type of firearm or target used.
Rifle: A Rifle is a firearm or air gun with a rifled barrel, but commonly refers to long weapons that usually require two hands to hold and fire steadily. They generally have a longer range and greater accuracy than pistols, and are popular for hunting.
Handguns: Pistols, are smaller than rifles, and are much more convenient to carry in general. They usually have a shorter range and lesser accuracy compared to rifles.
Shotgun: A Shotgun is similar to a rifle, but typically fires projectiles that either contains many smaller sub-projectiles, or one large projectile. They are more often than not pump-action or single-shot-and-reload actions.
Sub-machine Gun: A Sub-machine Gun (SMG) is a weapon that has a mix of rifle and handgun properties. They share the smaller cartridge of the pistol, but are fully automatic and generally have longer barrels compared to the latter. Sub-machine Gun competitions have been around for over 20 years and are growing in popularity every year.
The National Rifle Association (NRA) of the United Kingdom was founded in 1860 to raise the funds for an annual national rifle meeting "for the encouragement of Volunteer Rifle Corps, and the promotion of Rifle-shooting throughout Great Britain".
For similar reasons, concerned over poor marksmanship during the American Civil War, veteran Union officers Col. William C. Church and Gen. George Wingate formed the National Rifle Association of America in 1871 for the purpose of promoting and encouraging rifle shooting on a "scientific" basis. In 1872, with financial help from New York state, a site on Long Island, the Creed Farm, was purchased for the purpose of building a rifle range. Named Creedmoor, the range opened in 1872, and became the site of the first National Matches until New York politics forced the NRA to move the matches to Sea Girt, New Jersey. The popularity of the National Matches soon forced the event to be moved to its present, much larger location: Camp. In 1903, the U.S. Congress created the National Board for the Promotion of Rifle Practice (NBPRP), an advisory board to the Secretary of the Army, with a nearly identical charter to the NRA. The NBPRP (now known as the Civilian Marksmanship Program) also participates in the National Matches at Camp Perry.
French pistol champion and founder of the modern Olympics, Pierre de Coubertin, participated in many of these early competitions. This fact certainly contributed to the inclusion of five shooting events in the 1896 Olympics. Over the years, the events have been changed a number of times in order to keep up with technology and social standards. For example, targets that formerly resembled humans or animals in their shape and size have are now a circular shape in order to avoid associating the sport with any form of violence. At the same time, some events have been dropped and new ones have been added. The 2004 Olympics featured three shooting disciplines (rifle, pistol and shotgun) where athletes competed for 51 medals in 10 men's and 7 women's events slightly fewer than the previous Olympic schedule.
The Olympic Games continue to provide the shooting sports with its greatest public relations opportunity. The sport has always enjoyed the distinction of awarding the first medals of the Games. Internationally, the International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) has oversight of all Olympic shooting events worldwide, while National Governing Bodies (NGBs) administer the sport within each country.
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