The North Dakota State Junior Olympic rifle selection matches were held over the weekend of January 18 & 19, 2025 at the Minot Rifle and Pistol Club range. Each year North Dakota Junior competitive shooters are offered a single opportunity to earn an invitation to compete in the USA Shooting Junior Olympic National Championships. The National Championships are by invitation only, based on the scores fired in the single selection matches held in each state across the United States.

Young shooters from across North Dakota competed with air rifles and smallbore (.22 rimfire) rifles in their effort to earn invitations to compete in the Junior Olympic National Championships which will be held in April this year at Alabama Civilian Marksmanship ranges in Talladega Park. There are few things that mean more to youth across America who participate in the Olympic style shooting sports than the opportunity to compete in the National Junior Olympic Shooting Championships (NJOSC). So, these are very tough matches for these young people, as, again, they are the only route to earn an opportunity to compete in the Junior Olympic Nationals. They must shoot a qualifying score during these matches or they simply cannot compete at the Nationals.

Rachel Vaagen, Isaac Vaagen, Lauren Stiven, Josie Brekhus and Casia Steinhaus, members of the Lake Region Shooting Sports Association and Ramsey County 4H Shooting Sports, traveled to Minot to fire the matches. When the firing was complete, Casia Steinhaus had earned Gold medals in both the Women’s Air Rifle and Women’s Smallbore matches. These first place finishes automatically earned her an invitation to fire these events in the 2025 JO Nationals. Casia is a second year student at UND.

Isaac finished with a Gold Medal in Men’s Air Rifle to earn his first invitation to the National Championship Match. Rachel earned the Silver medal in Women’s Smallbore Rifle as well as the Silver Medal in the Women’s Air Rifle match. Isaac is a Senior at Devils Lake High School and Rachel is a Sophomore.

The competition is very tough among these top North Dakota shooters, and this is the third year that Casia has won Gold in both the air rifle and smallbore events.

These young people have been training for years in order to earn this invitation to compete at the Junior Olympic National Championships with the best junior rifle shooters in the nation. We wish them all the best. The complete match scores are available on the Orion Results at: http://www.orionresults.com/lrssand