CALI, Colombia – Rylan Kissell of the Alaska Nanooks rifle team is coming home with two gold medals from the 2021 Junior Pan-American Games. He grabbed gold in both the men's air rifle event and mixed air rifle event.

Kissell's first event was the individual men's air rifle on Saturday, Nov. 27. In the qualifying round, he fired off a score of 623, giving him a second-place finish and qualifying him for the final. Marcelo Julian Gutierrez of Argentina took first, posting a 624.6 and Kissell beat out Carlos Fabian Quintero Perez of Mexico, who shot a 621.7. Heading into the final, Kissell went on to take the win, posting a score of 249.6. He beat out Gutierrez and John Blanton III from the United States, who took second and third, respectively.

He returned to the range on the final day, Sunday, Nov. 28 and won another gold, this time in the mixed-team air rifle. Kissell said he felt good about his performance and the future possibilities acted as a confidence booster, "It felt really good, knowing that I can perform wen something big like a spot in the 2023 PanAm Games is on the line, is always a real confidence booster."

Kissell has had imself an impressive start to his collegiate career and now international. In 2020-21, he earned a seventh-place individual finish in smallbore at the NCAA Championships and fourth-place finish individually in air rifle as the Nanooks took fifth as a team. Earlier this semester, Kissell represented team USA at the Junior World Championships, earning two bronze medals and a silver.

He has also helped the Nanooks to a 7-0, 2-0 PRC record this far on the season, including two national shooting records. A new aggregate-record of 4749, shot against Navy, and in the same match, a new smallbore record with a match total of 2371.

Head coach Will Anti spoke about what this will do for Kissell in the long-term and what it will bring to him as a shooter, "I think this was an important match for Rylan. We knew going in he had an opportunity to win his first major international match and he was able to capitalize on that opportunity. Needless to say, it's a big step towards his long-term goals. Rylan has been on a long trip here and it took a lot to maintain this level of intensity for essentially three weeks. He has a lot to be proud of and certainly we are very proud of him. I'm sure he is looking forward to getting back home to Fairbanks and getting a bit of rest. I know he took some things from this match that he felt he needed to work on, so we will begin game planning the next steps."

The Nanooks season will continue on Jan. 15, 2022 when they host Ole Miss at home in the Patty Center and at TVSA on Jan. 16, 2022.

For more information on the Alaska Nanooks rifle team, follow @NanooksRifle on Twitter or Instagram, or like the Alaska Nanooks Rifle team page on Facebook.