Danielle Marcotte has come a long way in the competitive sport of air gun shooting since she first began to shoot at targets as a member of the junior ranger program at the young age of 10.

It has been five years since then and Marcotte has never been shooting better in practice or at competitions, and she has the medals to prove it.

Last August, while competing at the nationals for the first time, Marcotte placed first in her junior age category.

As a result of that placing, she is now a member of the national team and is eligible to take part in four world cup competitions for the 2007-08 season.

The first event in the series is being held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on Saturday and Marcotte flew out today along with her parents and sister.

This isn't the first major competition that Marcotte has participated in this year.

In February, she, along with Yukon Shooting Federation teammates Kara Lepine and Nicholas Rittel, travelled to Toronto to take part in the the Canadian Airgun Grand Prix.

The Canadian airgun grand prix is an annual international competition, attracting shooters from all across Canada and the United States.

The event is one of the premier air gun

competitions in Canada and on the same level as the nationals.

Marcotte had an outstanding showing at this event, winning her sub-junior age class.

Her final score over the two days of shooting was 735 out of 800, which was high enough for her to qualify for the competition's finals.

The finals for the female category consisted of the top eight shooters in the air pistol event, which competed in one more round of 40 shots each to determine the winner.

When the finals were over she had a total score of 831.9 to put her in fourth place overall, just missing third by half a point.

Marcotte said her score in Toronto was the highest she has ever got at a competition.

"I was pretty happy because I did better that I thought and I beat some of my records when I was up there," she said. "It felt good and everything went the way I kind of wanted it to."

There were no qualifications for the event and it was open to anyone who paid the entry fee, but the Yukon Shooting Federation had their own selection criteria to determine who was eligible to go.

Since the Canadian grand prix features such a high level of competition, members of the Yukon Shooting Federation had to hit 75 to 80 per cent of the targets before being selected to the team.

Air gun competitions are all shot at a fixed distance of 10-m and athletes have choice of shooting with either an air rifle or air pistol. Participants have a set amount of time to fire all their rounds and have to change targets after every shot. At the end of a competition, a shooter's score is tallied up to determine the winners.

There are also separate competitions for men and women, which participants would be divided into a specific age category, including master, expert, junior and sub-junior.

The targets are round rings, numbered one to 10.

One is the largest, while 10, the smallest, is worth the most points.

The size of the 10 ring in an air pistol target would be smaller than a dime, while in an air rifle event it would be just a tiny dot.

Marcotte currently trains three times a week at the shooting range for an hour and a half each time and three times a week at the Better Bodies Cross Training Centre, which helps with her balance when she shoots.

Marcotte expects the world cup in Brazil to be her toughest competition to date, but said she is more confident heading into it after doing so well at the Canadian grand prix.

Her goals at the event don't centre around winning medals or placing, but rather on shooting to the best of her ability. Marcotte hopes to achieve a 94 per cent accuracy rating at the competition.

After the event in Brazil, Marcotte will take part in at least one more world cup competition when she travels to Beijing, China in April.

The world cup series will also take place in Italy and Germany and there is a strong chance that Marcotte will compete in both events. Her season in the sport will conclude once again at the nationals, in which Marcotte will attempt to maintain her status as a member of the national team.