Visit Qatar: Doha Closes the First Olympic-Qualifying World Shooting Championship in the Middle East

The scale of the event speaks for itself. Over eleven days, 36 quota places for Los Angeles were awarded across the Olympic program, making Doha the first stop on the road to the next Games for the world's finest marksmen and markswomen. In all, 123 medals were presented, 41 each of gold, silver and bronze. China headed the medal table with 27 medals, 13 of them gold, while India collected 13, among them two gold.

The closing day belonged to the mixed team trap, in which Italy's Jessica Rossi and Massimo Fabbrizi took gold with 35 targets. Britain's Lucy Charlotte Hall and Nathan Hales won silver with 32, and Türkiye's Rumeysa Pelin Kaya and Tolga Tuncer the bronze. For Qatar, the season continues: its shooters Rashid Saleh and Angelo Scelzo have qualified for the World Cup Final next month, which brings together the world's leading twelve competitors in each category.

Championships of this kind are part of a deliberate strategy, set out in Qatar National Vision 2030, to make sport, culture and hospitality pillars of a diversified economy. For visitors, the dividend is a country with world-class venues, an exceptional choice of hotels and a calendar that seldom pauses between autumn and spring, when the weather is at its most agreeable. A visitor can follow an international final in the morning, spend the afternoon among the treasures of the Museum of Islamic Art and dine that evening beside the water at the Pearl.

Our Qatar travel guide to Doha and Lusail explains how to plan a stay, and our selection of Doha's luxury hotels and things to do in Doha covers the museums, the corniche and the Pearl. Those who wish to stay close to the competition venues will find our guide to Lusail City and its luxury hotels useful, and our Middle East events calendar lists the season's other great occasions.