The 36th UIT World Shooting Championships was the contemporary name of the

ISSF World Shooting Championships The ISSF World Shooting Championships are governed by the International Shooting Sport Federation. World Shooting Championships began in 1897, after the successful 1896 Summer Olympics, and although the ISSF was not founded until 1907, these early ...

in all ISSF shooting events that were held in

Caracas Caracas (, ), officially Santiago de León de Caracas, abbreviated as CCS, is the capital and largest city of Venezuela, and the center of the Metropolitan Region of Caracas (or Greater Caracas). Caracas is located along the Guaire River in the ...

Venezuela Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in th ...

, in 1954.All World Championship medalists
at the ISSF website It was the first time Venezuela hosted the competition (which it did again in 1982), and a new military shooting range had been constructed in the suburbs of Caracas for the event. After their successful debut in the

1952 Summer Olympics The 1952 Summer Olympics ( fi, Kesäolympialaiset 1952; sv, Olympiska sommarspelen 1952), officially known as the Games of the XV Olympiad ( fi, XV olympiadin kisat; sv, Den XV olympiadens spel) and commonly known as Helsinki 1952 ( sv, Helsin ...

, the Soviet Union now participated for the first time in the World Championships, and won 20 of the 30 gold medals. Rifle shooter Anatoli Bogdanov, the star of the 1952 shooting competitions in Helsinki, dominated once again with six individual and four team victories. He broke the world record in the

300 metre rifle three positions 300 m rifle three positions (formerly known as one of four free rifle disciplines) is an ISSF shooting event, involving shooting 40 shots each from the prone, the standing and the kneeling positions. Men and women both shoot the same number of sho ...

match with a margin of nine points. In the shotgun events, the United States and Italy were still on top, but the shooting greatness of especially Switzerland and the Scandinavian countries had now diminished, shifting the tide eastward. As in most other events, the Soviet team won the team championship in

25 metre center-fire pistol 25 meter center-fire pistol is one of the ISSF shooting events, and is normally a men-only event. Its origin lies in competitions with military-style service pistols, and as such its history dates back to the 19th century. 25 meter pistol (forme ...

. The American marksman Arthur Jackson commented that the western shooters watched with a mixed sense of pity and relief as the Soviet team shot their archaic

Nagant M1895 The Nagant M1895 Revolver is a seven-shot, gas-seal revolver designed and produced by Belgian industrialist Léon Nagant for the Russian Empire. The Nagant M1895 was chambered for a proprietary cartridge, 7.62×38mmR, and featured an unusual "ga ...

revolvers in the pre-event training. On the match day they revealed their practical joke and instead brought brand new American Smith & Wesson match revolvers, shooting the same kind of gun and ammunition as the individual champion, and winning three points ahead of the American team.Rocketto, p. 55

Medal count

Rifle events

Pistol events

Shotgun events

Running target events

References

{{ISSF World Shooting Championships ISSF World Shooting Championships ISSF S Sport in Caracas 1954 in Venezuelan sport 20th century in Caracas Shooting competitions in Venezuela