Amateur Trap Association
Women in the Trap Hall of Fame
Women & Olympic Trap
The participation of women in olympic trapshooting has an interesting and
rather complicated history. Trapshooting was added to the Olympic games
in 1900. Olympic trapshooting is not identical to American trap. The clays
are harder, thrown at a higher speed and the trap house has 15 individual
traps inside what is commonly called a bunker. There are a number of other
differences and a number of websites which can tell you about bunker trap.
When trapshooting was added to the olympic games
it was a gender neutral sport. It was up to individual countries to
determine their team and if they allowed women to compete.
My information indicates that the first woman to compete in the olympics
in trap was Susan Nattras. She was a member of the Canadian olympic
team. She is in the ATA hall of fame and has a doctorate from the
University of Alberta.
Then in 1992, the unthinkable happened. A woman, Zhang Shan, from China
won the gold in skeet. The first woman to win a gold in mixed competition
at the games. Of course, the only response was to eliminate women from the
competition and a "men only" rule was instituted for the olympic shotgun
shooting competitions.
For the 1996 games women were only allowed to compete in a separate double
trap event. The traditional trap and skeet events were men only.
Kim Rhode from the United States won this initial
women's double trap event.
Susan Nattras led the charge to get traditional olympic trap and skeet
added to the women's venue for the 2000 olympics and she was successful.
Of course to keep any possible score comparisons from complicating the
issue the women's events were set at 75 targets while the men shoot 125.
Sexism is alive and well in the IOC.
In 2000, the women competed in trap skeet and double trap.
In 2004, Kim Rhode won the double trap gold again.
2004 was the last year for women to compete in double trap. For 2008 there
will only be trap and skeet shotgun events for women. Kim holds the
distinction of winning both the first and the last gold medal in this
event. Collyn Loper, was fourth in trap.
A list of all the medal winners in shotgun shooting can be found
here
A history of the Cornhusker Nationals Trap Shoot
Marian Trap Home Page