Shooting from the lip, has Obama just hit himself in the foot?

Barack Obama has a well-documented history of shooting, but until now it has mainly involved "hoops" with his basketball buddies, the odd frame of pool and a round of golf.

So when Obama added clay-pigeon shooting to that list in an attempt to reassure America's gun lobby, there were those who wondered if the president might be trying too hard.

One Republican politician even challenged him to a shoot-out.

"Up at Camp David, we do skeet shooting all the time," Obama had told The New Republic magazine, adding that he had "a profound respect for the traditions of hunting". Coming from a president who once mocked small town Americans for their attachment to "God and guns", the remarks were met with a mixture of surprise and disbelief as the debate continued over gun control in the wake of the Sandy Hook school shootings.

Marsha Blackburn, a Republican congresswoman from Tennessee, wondered why, if Obama was such a keen shot, it had not been made public before.

"We had this debate that is ongoing," she said. "You would have thought it would have been a point of reference."

She then challenged the president to a competition at the Camp David clay-pigeon range, which was installed by Dwight Eisenhower in the 1950s and where the Prince of Wales put on a "dazzling display" in July 1970, according to press reports of the time.

"If he is a skeet shooter, why have we not heard of this? Why have we not seen photos?" Blackburn said. "I'll go skeet shooting with him and I bet I'll beat him."

The US media soon fired the same questions at Jay Carney, the president's press secretary. Carney admitted there were no photographs, adding hurriedly: "Because when he goes to Camp David, he goes to spend time with his family and friends and relax, not to produce photographs."

Seasoned correspondents observed that the White House photographer, Pete Souza, has taken pictures of Obama engaged in many other leisure activities: golf, basketball, 10-pin bowling in the White House alley, even shooting a water-pistol with his girls at Camp David.

Obama would not be the first politician to overstate his shooting credentials. In the 2004 presidential election campaign, John Kerry, a supporter of gun control, tried to gain a few extra votes in the Iowa caucuses by being photographed shooting pheasants, and referred to "my trusty 12-gauge" in interviews.

Mitt Romney, derided as a "Massachusetts moderate" by rural, gun-loving Republicans, claimed last year to be a lifelong hunter of rabbits and other "small, small varmints".