The event consisted of two rounds: a qualifier and a final. In the qualifier, each shooter fired 5 sets of 25 shots in the set order of skeet shooting.
In this last Olympic skeet competition before rules were changed, Marko Kemppainen attained a perfect 125 to break the world and Olympic records in the qualification round, but missed one target in the final, allowing Andrea Benelli to catch him up with a score of 149 to force the gold medal shoot-off.[1] Meanwhile, Cuba's Juan Miguel Rodríguez had shared a score of 147 targets with Qatar's Nasser Al-Attiyah and United States' Shawn Dulohery, until he fired a perfect ten in a three-way shoot-off to grab the bronze.[2]
Records
Prior to this competition, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.