MADRID, 15 Mar. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Spanish shooter Sonia Rivero was proclaimed European runner-up on Tuesday in the 10-meter rifle modality for people with visual disabilities at the European Championships that are being held in the Norwegian town of Hamar.
As reported by ONCE, this is the third continental metal that the Malaga native has achieved in her career after the two gold medals in 2002 and 2003 and after a very solid performance where she also flirted with a third title.
Rivero, who has low vision due to her albinism and who competes with the help of her guide, Antonio Cobo, started very well scoring 551 points in the qualifying round and got into a final without problems that she dominated until she was overtaken by the better success of the champion, the Polish Barbara Moskal, who took the gold with 211.9 points for the 201.2 of the Andalusian.
“This Championship has meant a lot to me because it rewards
the effort of several months of training, arriving home late, leaving family and friends behind to train, and returning to an international circuit has been super exciting,” said the Spanish woman after getting on the podium.
The malagueña had “an enormous and inexplicable emotion”. “I still don’t believe it and I have it in my hand, but I’m ‘freaking out’, I can’t explain the emotion I feel. It’s the reward for the effort, for so much work, to know that I can,” she confessed.
Rivero, 41, has been a member of ONCE since she was 10, and licensed by the Andalusian Federation of Sports for the Blind. She is a salesperson for ONCE in the Rosaleda Shopping Center, a mother of two children, and has practiced shooting with a rifle since 2001, coinciding with the beginning of the organization’s workshop in Malaga, and she does so together with her husband, who is also a member of ONCE. .
“I encourage blind people or people with low vision to try it because it is a very curious thing. They will find a quiet sport, within
that you have pressure because it is a matter of listening, feeling and shooting. It is a form of sport different from all that we are used to, it is outside of what we know, “he stressed.
On the other hand, in the SH2 category for people with physical disabilities, the Basque Fernando Michelena finished in twelfth position in the 10-meter rifle with a score of 624.9, reported his federation.