Shooting at the 1920 Summer Olympics

The shooting programme in 1920 contained 21 events, the most in Olympic history. Most of them were contested at Beverlo Camp, which had stationed Belgian soldiers in World War I. Beverlo was 75 kilometres from Antwerpen, in the northeast corner of Belgium. A shooting range for training Belgian soldiers was there and was used for the Olympic competitions. The range was a rolling, barren ground with many hills and hollows in it. Pyramids were constructed for the shooters so they could see all the targets over the hills, and this was where the shooters stood for the contests. There was no tree cover near the range, and high winds kept scores quite low. During the matches, the Belgian Corps of Engineers was still busy detonating German grenades in parts of the heath that lay about four kilometres from the shooting stands.

The clay pigeon trapshooting and the running deer shooting events were held at Hoogboom Military Camp, in Brasschaat. Brasschaat is a small town about 10 kilometres (6 miles) slightly northeast of Antwerpen.

The Americans dominated this sport, winning 13 gold medals and 23 medals in all. In rifle and pistol events, individual and team medals were awarded. In most of them, the shooter could allow his team score to stand for the individual event as well, and most of the shooters did this.

Shooting is the only sport at the 1920 Olympics for which it has been impossible to find complete results. Myriad sources, including newspapers, magazines, sporting experts, national Olympic committees, and national shooting federations, have been researched with some success, but not complete. Still, the results seen below are the most complete ever published.