PARALYMPIAN Richard Davies has his focus fixed firmly on Rio 2016 and a place in the Great Britain team for the Paralympics.

The Stourbridge shooter this week took part in the biggest competition in the UK in Bisley, Surrey, with more than 350 top marksmen from all over the British Isles.

Davies, who competed in the London 2012 games, took the competition in his stride, going into the final in second spot. Feeling the pressure, he used his skills and meditation to refocus and take the finals with a breeze, beating the opponents by a full 2.6 and securing gold.

Davies has now earned this title three times – more than anyone before – and his scores get better each year. Training more than 40 hours a week, the proud father of three had a top five world IPC ranking in the SH2 mixed event, which is indoor target air rifle .177.

Back in October last year, he shot in the open European competition in Alicante even though he made the finals in the number one spot shooting the highest qualifying score of 630.6. But the final was not to go as planned and a medal slipped away. The Rio Olympics will be in September 2016 which for an athlete it only leaves a few precious big competitions to shine in to be selected for the Paralympics. Davies’ competition schedule this year includes a world cup competition in Poland and a Paralympic qualifier in Germany. That will be followed by another world cup at Fort Benning, (the Army sniper school) USA.

He has also been selected to be on the front cover of the new rules and classification book on Paralympic shooting.