A man of honour: When the UAE won its first and only Olympic gold

The year was 2004, and the UAE's team had flown to Greece...

Ahmed bin Hasher Al Maktoum of the United Arab Emirates (C) won the gold medal in the men's double trap event at the Athens 2004 Olympic Games. Rajyavardhan Rathore of India won the silver medal, (L) Show more

Athens, Greece, 2004: the Summer Olympic Games were in full swing. That year saw a total of 301 events on the programme. American swimmer Michael Phelps won six gold medals and set a single-Games record with eight total wins. Leontien Zijlaard-van Moorsel, from the Netherlands, became the first female cyclist to earn four career gold medals, while Argentina won the men's football tournament without conceding a single goal.

Meanwhile, at the Markopoulo Olympic Shooting Centre, Sheikh Ahmed bin Hasher Al Maktoum became the first person from the UAE to win an Olympic gold medal in double-trap shooting. This picture, taken on August 17 that year, shows him, centre, on the podium with fellow winners Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore of India, left, who won the silver medal, and Zheng Wang of China, who scored bronze.

Sheikh Ahmed had only taken up the sport seven years earlier, at the age of 34, and competed in the 2000 and 2008 Summer Olympics as well. However, in 2012, he was forced to forgo his plans to take part in the London event and retire due to a heart condition.

To this day, he remains the UAE's only Olympic gold medallist.