Mexico's Vázquez Raña, 83, had served nine terms as President since 1980 but announced during the Rio Olympics that he intended his latest four-year period to be his last.

He told nearly 500 guests at the opening of the French National Shooting Centre in Châteauroux that European Shooting Confederation (ESC) President Lisin is his preferred candidate to take over.

An election is due on November 30 during ISSF meetings in Munich.

A ESC press release hailing Vázquez Raña's backing today also said that Lisin "confirmed his readiness to assume the responsibility and to do his best for the future development of the shooting sport, to continue the successful activities of the international federation".

No other candidates have yet emerged. 

Lisin, chairman and majority shareholder of Novolipetsk, was ranked by Forbes this year as the 57th richest man in the world.

This made him the highest-placed Russian on the list, with a fortune estimated to be $19.1 billion (£14.2 billion/€16.2 billion).

He has been head of the ESC since 2009 when he succeeded Norway's Unni Nicolaysen.

Lisin, who has also been an ISSF vice-president since 2014. was at one stage touted as a potential candidate to replace Alexander Zhukov as President of the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) 

The 62-year-old, an ROC vice-president and member of its anti-doping commission, emerged as a major ally of Vázquez Raña last year when he publicly criticised fellow vice-president Luciano Rossi of Italy for trying to block proposed changes to the Olympic shooting programme.

He is also head of the umbrella body representing Summer International Federations for Russian sport.

The only other serving Olympic IF President from Russia is International Fencing Federation President Alisher Usmanov. 

Lisin and Usmanov were among numerous high-profile Russians involved in sport to be included on the United States Treasury Department's "oligarchs list" in January.

Vázquez Raña is the longest-serving leading in any Summer or Winter Olympic International Federation.

The 2014 ISSF Presidential election, also held in Munich, was shrouded in controversy yesterday when Sheikh Salman Sabah Al-Salem Al-Homoud Al-Sabah, President of the Asian Shooting Confederation and Kuwait's Minister of Information and Minister of State for Youth Affairs, was accused of using his Government position to try to influence voters.

As insidethegames exclusively revealed, official representatives of Sheikh Salman had been contacting Sports Ministers around the world on his behalf urging them to support his campaign and get their National Federations to vote for him. 

The Kuwaiti was beaten by 165 votes to 128 by Vázquez Raña.

This incident was widely cited as the reason for a subsequent intensifying of tension between Sheikh Salman and the sports world which culminated in Kuwait being suspended from the ISSF and International Olympic Committee a year later.