SHOOTING: It’s a family affair for Australian shooter Laura Coles.

The 27-year-old took up clay target shooting at the age of 15 after her father joined the local shooting club.

“Dad took it up after he was given a shotgun by my Grandfather and it looked like fun,” she said.

The Western Australian admires fellow Australian shooter Michael Diamond’s career and credits his gold medal win at the Sydney 2000 Olympics as spurring her on to take up the sport permanently.

Coles is thankful she did, because she’s now a Commonwealth Games gold medallist and training hard to make the Australian Team for the Rio 2016 Olympics.

Her win in Glasgow showed mental strength, taking down Welsh world record holder Elena Allen in the gold medal shoot-off after hitting 14 of 16 targets in the final.

“I went there with the goal of making the semi-final and I would have been happy just to walk away with that and then I shot really well which put me straight into the gold medal match,” she said.

“At that point I was either going away with a gold or a silver medal at the Commonwealth Games, which was so unbelievable I actually had a little bit of a hard time to refocus, but I was able to do that successfully and came away with the gold.”

After missing selection for the London 2012 Olympics, Coles practices shooting targets three to four days a week in preparation for Rio.

She also sees a sports psychologist at the West Australian Institute of Sport and does yoga to mentally prepare for the high pressure moments in her sport.

 “If I make it to Rio it’ll be the culmination of so many years of hard work. It would feel amazing,” she said.

“It’s a huge honour I think, to be with all those people who are so good at what they do and have worked so hard to get there.”

Coles will compete in women's Skeet at the ISSF World Cup Shotgun in Al Ain, UAE on March 27. 

For more information and to see a live stream of the final head to the ISSF website.

olympics.com.au