Susan Nattrass


Dr. Susan "Sue" Marie Nattrass, is a Canadian trap shooter and medical researcher in osteoporosis. She was born in Medicine Hat, Alberta. Competing at an elite international level from the 1970s through the 2010s, Nattrass has had multiple appearances, in one or both of trap or double trap, at Olympic Games, Commonwealth Games, World Championships, and Pan American Games. Nattrass is a repeat World Champion and repeat medalist at the Commonwealth Games, World Championships, and Pan American Games. She was the flag bearer for Canada at the 2007 Pan American Games and the 2014 Commonwealth Games.
As of the 2012 Olympics, Nattrass is one of only 122 athletes, all sports, to compete in at least six Olympic Games, appearing in 1976, '88, '92, 2000, '04 and '08. She won a gold medal at the World Championships in 1974, '75, '77, '78, '79, '81, and 2006.

Beginnings

She was introduced to trap shooting by her father Floyd Nattrass, who competed for Canada at the World Championships in 1958 and 1968 and at the Olympics in 1964. Nattrass said of her father:
"While other kids would go to the lake for the summer, we always went to trap shoots. My dad started when I was 5; we'd go to shoots, and I did everything I could do be a part of it. Then when I turned 12, he taught me how to shoot."

Olympics and Commonwealth Games

In the 1976 Summer Olympics she became the first ever woman to participate in a shooting event at the Olympics, as shooting was open to both sexes until 1992. She won a silver medal at the 2001 world championships in Cairo, Egypt in the trap event. She finished 9th in the 2000 Summer Olympics and 6th in the 2004 Summer Olympics in women's trap shooting.
At the 2006 Commonwealth Games Nattrass won three medals: two silver in women's double trap pairs and women's trap pairs and a bronze in women's trap.
She won the Trap Shooting event at the World Championships in 1981 and 2006, twenty-five years apart.
After the 1996 Summer Olympics, the International Shooting Union decided to discontinue the trap and skeet shooting events for women and instead allow women to compete in the double trap, where two clay saucers are thrown simultaneously. This is a difficult transition that Nattrass - who won two World Cups in the double trap in 1993 - equated to a downhill skier having to switch to cross-country. She led a campaign - writing letters, doing surveys, playing politics - against the decision to remove the two events. After five years, the campaign succeeded and women's skeet and trap shooting remained in the Olympics.
In 1981, she was awarded the Lou Marsh Trophy as Canadian Athlete of the Year and was made an Officer of the Order of Canada. She is also listed as a recipient of the Vanier Award for Outstanding Young Canadians.
She has travelled around the world at various competitions for over three decades, nearly always accompanied by her mother and coach Marie.
Nattrass serves on the Board of Directors, Sections Chairs of the Shooting Federation of Canada.

Education and research

Nattrass earned a bachelor's degree in Physical Education from the University of Alberta in 1972 and a Masters in 1974, and has since been an instructor, administrator, lecturer and consultant in physical education and sports psychology. In between her first and second Olympic appearances in 1976 and 1988, she earned her doctorate from the University of Alberta in 1987.
Since 1996, Nattrass has lived on Vashon Island near Seattle. She moved there when she joined the Pacific Medical Center as a medical researcher in September 1996. She owns and runs the Puget Sound Osteoporosis Center, where she studies the effects of aging in bones on active sportswomen in their forties and older, takes part in clinical trials, and provides pro-bono screenings in the community.

Awards and achievements

YearPlaceGoldSilverBronze-
1962 Cairo
1966 Wiesbaden-
1967 Bologna-
1969 San Sebastian-
1970 Phoenix-
1971 Bologna-
1974 Bern-
1975 Munich-
1977 Antibes-
1978 Seoul-
1979 Montecatini Terme-
1981 Tucuman-
1982 Caracas-
1983 Edmonton-
1985 Montecatini Terme-
1986 Suhl-
1987 Valencia-
1989 Montecatini Terme-
1990 Moscow-
1991 Perth-
1993 Barcelona-
1994 Fagnano-
1995 Nicosia-
1997 Lima-
1998 Barcelona-
1999 Tampere-
2001 Cairo-
2002 Lahti-
2003 Nicosia-
2005 Lonato-
2006 Zagreb-
2007 Nicosia-
2009 Maribor-
2010 Munich-
2011 Belgrade-
2013 Lima-
2014 Granada-
2015 LonatoFátima Gálvez