- Malcolm Cooper
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Olympic medal record Men's shooting Gold 1984 Los Angeles 50 m Rifle Three Positions Gold 1988 Seoul 50 m Rifle Three Positions Malcolm Douglas Cooper, MBE, (20 December 1947 – 9 June 2001) was a British sport shooter and founder of Accuracy International. As of 2009[update], he is the only shooter to win defend the gold medal in the Olympic 50 metre rifle three positions event.
Cooper was born in 1947 in Camberley and learned to shoot small bore rifles whilst attending Westlake Boys High School in New Zealand, where his father was stationed with the Royal Navy: he subsequently attended the Royal Hospital School. He started shooting competitively in 1970. In 1978 he established his own rifle making company Accuracy International. He won gold medals at the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles and at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul (both in the three positions event). In 1986 he was also world champion in 300 m Standard Rifle, a non-Olympic rifle discipline in which he claimed several European and World titles, as well as holding the World record for a period.
Cooper died in June 2001 after an eight month battle with cancer. He died at his home in Eastergate, West Sussex.
External links
Olympic champions in men's 50 metre rifle three positions 1952: Erling Asbjørn Kongshaug • 1956: Anatoli Bogdanov • 1960: Viktor Shamburkin • 1964: Lones Wigger • 1968: Bernd Klingner • 1972: John Writer • 1976: Lanny Bassham • 1980: Viktor Vlassov • 1984: Malcolm Cooper • 1988: Malcolm Cooper • 1992: Hrachya Petikyan • 1996: Jean-Pierre Amat • 2000: Rajmond Debevec • 2004: Jia Zhanbo • 2008: Qiu JianThis biographical article relating to sport shooting is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. This article about a British businessperson born in the 1940s is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.