The SSRA would like to take the opportunity to wish all of its members, and target shooters across the globe, a merry Christmas and all the best for 2012.
Don't forget to enter the SSRA postal competitions: CanDicap, Speedway and Medal. There is still time to enter online and entries will be accepted until 1 January 2012. Click here to enter or visit the Enter Domestic Competitions online page to find out more.
The SSRA is keen to promote target shooting for all, and to that end will set out to assist with the Scottish Air Rifle Blind Shooting Championships held at Denwood in 2012.
One of the successful exponents of the discipline is Hussein Patwa, and together with Carol Brown (pictured) are delivering superb scores. Their performances at the 2011 championships drew much attention, especially as Brown scored a 600 out of 600 which prompted a round of applause from observers.
"This (Denwood) is the only rifle range that does acoustic shooting in the whole of Scotland," said Patwa, 24, who started out after his father found an advert about the competition in the local magazine for the Society of the Blind in 1997.
"It's a very technical sport," he explained, "there is a lot of tweaking. There is a lot of room for movement and innovation and taking things further which rather appealed to me."
The two-day British Championships take place in Wolverhampton on the first weekend of March 2012.
For more information on the sport and how you can help promote it, contact Jim Hammond.
An ISSF judges course, designed to give applicants a national British Shooting C licence and put existing holders firmly on the road to a B licence, is set to be held in the autumn of 2012 in central Scotland, potentially Edinburgh, with easy access to the airport. While the course helps preparations for the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow by qualifying officials to ISSF standards, the course will be open to anyone in the UK. This two-day course will be run by experienced by ISSF officials and for more information or to register your interest, contact Jim McIntosh.
The SSRA has announced that it will stage its 10m Air Rifle Championships at the Scottish Police College in Tulliallan by Kincardine-on-Forth on Saturday and Sunday, March 17-18 of 2012. The competition will be run along ISSF guidelines and some accommodation is hoped to be available on site.
For more information and to arrange for an entry form by mail or for download, contact Ian Henderson at executive@ssra.co.uk. Online entering will also be made available.
After an exciting and tense final, Robin Law narrowly held off Sarah Bates in Callander to win the first SSRA Air GP of the 2011-12 season with Kathryn Williamson in third. Earlier, Sarah Bates won A class, B class went to Mark Joyce, Maria Bexley took the honours in C class and early bird Bill Vaughan won D class. Detailed scores can be found here for Rifle and Pistol here.
The decision by the Commonwealth Games Federation to vote for Gold Coast to host the 2018 Commonwealth Games overshadowed another important series of decisions made at the CGF meeting on St Kitts and Nevis in the Caribbean. After lobbying by the Commonwealth Games Federation (European Division) members the federation voted to resurrect a number of events to the CG programme, including Women's Prone Rifle. While this decision does not automatically mean that the event will be added to the 2014 Games in Glasgow, the CG2014 organisation will review the decisions and rule on this by March 2012.
Despite this caveat it would seem highly likely that Jen McIntosh will be given the chance to defend her title on her own soil in three years' time and indeed offer her compatriots the opportunity to add to Scotland's superb gold haul in target shooting. We await developments eagerly . . .
Click here to read more.
The date for SSRA Air Grand Prix 3 at Denwood has been moved to 22 January 2012. The change from the original date of 15 January was requested by Denwood for logistical reasons.
Balerno & Currie Rifle Club will hold their annual Open event on the weekend of 19 and 20 November. An entry form can be downloaded here. Email inquiries can be made here.
A range of new functions has now become available at http://forms.ssra.co.uk. for everyone to use. Now, entering competitions and paying for fees; joining and/or renewing SSRA membership; and downloading entry forms for a range of SSRA events throughout the year can be done by a simple process. By now existing SSRA members should have received an email giving them a "get you started" link into the new membership pages. If you are a member and have not received such an email click here and provide your name, SSRA membership number and your current email address.
Robin Law, James Paterson and Janis Thomson were among those to the fore at the Welsh Airgun Championships held in Cardiff.
Law, (pictured left) shooting in A Class, won Comp 1 with 577 ex 600 Comp 4 with 577. He was also third in Comp 2 with 577. Paterson, (shown right) in X Class, made it to the final where he finished fourth with 579+101.1. Air Pistol shooter Thomson won Comp 4 in B Class with 544 and was second in Comp 2 with 544 and Comp 1 with 538. Click here for the results.
The event was a great success overall with a range of competitors from as far afield as Norway and Holland and finals shot on Megalink electronic targets. There was also the bonus of a film crew recording them and the results streamed live on the internet.
Mel Mutch had to contend with bitingly cold conditions as the sole Scottish representative in the UK Police team at the European Championships at Vingsted in Denmark. He came 13th with a score of 585 and 30x in a field of 31 competitors.
"Three shooters were on 587 for a shoot-off for 7th and 8th place," explained Mutch. "Chris Brown of Leicester was in a shoot-off and went into final 7th and finished 6th.
"My finger kept on getting cold so lost all feeling in it. - stopped three times to get sensation back into hand," he went on. "Others had prepared for this by bringing heat packs that they kept near them in a bag so they could defrost their hands between shots. A duvet in evidence too - heaven knows how much that cost in excess baggage..."
Mel Mutch will fly out to Vingsted in Denmark as the sole Scottish representative in the UK Police team at the European Championships. The standard of the competition is high and the UK team is made up of two men in the prone, two in the men's 3P and air. The ladies have two for prone and are also competing in 3P and air. Mutch will look to improve on his 13th place from last year.
Bobby Spence made the final of the Men's Prone at the Commonwealth Shooting Federation (ED) event held at Bisley but could not stop James Huckle taking the title. Mel Mutch had delivered a superb 595 in the elimination round but came up short in qualifying.
Spence faced a whole new experience by making the final: Having a big audience!
"It's something I'm not used to from the (SSRA) grand prix." he said. "It certainly puts the pressure on knowing there are a lot of folk watching you as you shoot."
The ISSF-style final set-up meant that scores from the Sius Ascor electronic targets were read out for each of the finalists, shot by shot. There was no hiding place and no way to avoid hearing what Spence's rivals were doing. That meant it came down to mental toughness.
"Shooting the final itself, I just took it easy and tried not to pay attention to any of the other scores though I knew Wayne Piri (from Gibraltar and in the firing point next to him) was shooting well," he went on. "I had a good spell of 10.6s and 10.7s in the middle which boosted me up to fourth until the last shot which gladly I was blissfully unaware of!
"Sadly on the final shot I just couldn't get the condition I was looking for and my aim off wasn't enough, placing the shot as a 9.5. I finished equal sixth but got the equal highest scoring the final so left on a high."
Orcadian Spence took time to praise the contributions of the team coach and management. "Having Sinclair Bruce and Cyril de Jonckheere there was a great benefit and thanks must go to them that we got a training day the day before the event where we could get set up and get some final bits of advice. During the event they were both on hand to give out advice and tactics to keep on top of the tricky conditions."
Bruce, Scotland's first full-time small bore coach, was also to be seen offering vocal support throughout the final, delivering more than a few whoops from behind the chain link fence of the firing point (erected to keep the likes of him from causing trouble, a source close to the judges claimed).
As with many of the Scotland competitors, Spence had a long, costly and arduous round trip to Bisley, with a lengthy delay returning north of the Border on the Monday due to traffic snarl-ups. However, he has at least found some help in the shape of local sponsors.
"I was lucky enough Scotrenewables Tidal Power was able to sponsor me for the event. Travelling to so many events is always a strain on the finances and any help that can be had is always appreciated. Further sponsorship I have achieved recently is from Northlink ferries which will be a big boost over the winter to attend the squad training and Air grand prix."
And talking of sponsors, Spence - along with the majority of the team based in Scotland - was indebted to his uncle for the loan of a vehicle to make the journey south.
For detailed results from the CSF programme of events, visit the ESSU site.
The Scotland team won the annual ATSC match against the Army at the Ash Ranges. Scores of 1154 from Bill Brown, 1164 from Bill Baird, 1149 from Lenny Thomson and 1145 from Ian Henderson secured victory.
John Harris has been unveiled as the first independent chair of British Shooting. With considerable experience in the fields of engineering and commerce, he takes the post for an initial term of two years and will be present for a busy period in the sport, with the 2012 Olympics followed by the Paralympics and of course the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow in 2014. Harris will head a board consisting of the following members: David Wathen: British International Clay Target Shoot Federation (BICTSF); David Parish: National Small-bore Rifle Association (NSRA); Robin Pizer: National Rifle Association (NRA); Trevor Budgen: Disabled Target Shooting Great Britain (DTSGB); Nick Fellows: Clay Pigeon Shooting Association (CPSA); Peter Underhill: Accountable Officer.
Scotland's score of 5903 was agonisingly not enough to see off the New Zealanders of North Island in the annual postal match, with the Kiwi side scoring 5907. The Scots junior side scored 1944 to North Island's 1957. Click here for detailed Scottish scores and here for North Island's.
The NSRA has announced that the 2012 Scottish Meeting will be held at Dumfries. After a lengthy consultation period in which competitors at The Scottish in Caithness were asked for their opinions and during which Huntly and indeed a meeting held in the north of England were mooted, it was decided that the meeting will return to Dumfries for the first time since 2008, on 23-28 June 2012.
Entry forms will shortly be made available for the SSRA Winter postal competitions such as the Speedway, Medal and CanDicap. In addition, it will also be possible to download entry forms, enter the competitions, pay for competition fees and indeed SSRA membership using a secure online system via this site. Check back with www.ssra.co.uk regularly for updates on this development.
The Scotland team for this week's Commonwealth Shooting Federation (European Division) event at Bisley has been unveiled and the line-up is...
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The athletes identified with (D) will compete in the development matches.
(Yes, that's right, four Bs from the B-squad plus Bobby and a.... bobby.)
Thanks to Willie McAulay at Alloa RC, the Tullygarth 50m range was made available for Sarah Bates (pictured top) and Sarah Brown to get some final practice in before heading south...
Donald McIntosh proved there was "still some life in this old dog" when he took the honours in the final SSRA prone grand prix of the season with a win that eclipsed Tom Hodgson by just 0.1 in the final. Class A had been won by David Caughey, Class B by Jonty Barron, Perth's Stephen Gemmell picked up C Class, while Ian Henderson saw off Ron Nilsen on countback for Class D. Nilsen rallied for the C&D final, however, and took the title with 577, ahead of Gemmell's 571.
Into the ISSF style ten-shot final then, and McIntosh added to his qualification score of 593 with 101.7 for a total of 694.7. Tom Hodgson, starting the final with 594, scored 100.6 for a total of 694.6. Jonty Barron came third with the highest score, 103.7, for a final total of 693.7 after his qualifying 590.
Donald accepts a dose of cough syrup from Jim McIntosh, left, while Sheena Sharp was rewarded for her century of Scotland caps with the presentation of a trophy from SSRA chairman Ian Thomson.
The previous day at Denwood saw the fifth and final 3P grand prix of the season. Iain Malone won the men's 3x40 event and Sheena Sharp the women's 3x20.
The inaugural SSRA C&D Prone League reached its conclusion and congratulations go to Nick Brown for taking the title. Full results for all the above competitions are available on the Domestic Results page.
Scotland's success at last year's Commonwealth Games and our potential for more shooting sports achievements was recognised by the Scottish government when Minister for Commonwealth Games & Sport Shona Robison announced the launch of the sportscotland Athlete Personal Awards (SAPAs).
Managed by thesportscotland institute of sport, this new three-year initiative offers an annual financial award of £3,000, £5,000 or £10,000 to individual athletes who are considered to have the potential to deliver a medal winning performance at the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games (and / or London 2012 Olympics).
In the first of three, annual award announcements, forty-five athletes across 13 sports will receive awards totalling £204,000. And Scotland's shooters - Jen McIntosh, Jon Hammond, Neil Stirton, Matt Thomson, Shona Marshall and John MacDonald - have all been awarded between £5000 and £10,000 each.
Click here for more details of the awards.
Orkney's Bobby Spence survived target changers that blew open in the gusts of Denwood to win SSRA grand prix IV and the Grampian Open title. In the ISSF-style final his 101.4 added to his qualifying score of 591 for a total of 692.4 and kept Tom Hodgson at Sinclair Bruce at bay. Hodgson scored an excellent 103.2 in the final and, added to his qualifying 587, gave him a total of 690.2. Scotland coach Bruce, pictured right, who must have won the award for best-dressed tartan rug wearer in the chilly conditions, scored 588+ 101.6 for a total of 689.6 and third place.
The conditions tested the skills - and the patience - of the competitors after a series of power failures on the Saturday led to the cancellation of the finals for the 3P event. Mark Szymankiewicz won the men's 3X40 event with a score of 1132 and Sheena Sharp the women's 3X20 with 560. The inclement weather - well it was August in Scotland after all - meant that rain squalls and wind gusts led to a game of musical chairs over the whole weekend as a number of Gehmann target changers failed and shooters had to be shunted around for workable firing points. The event's apprentice range officers found themselves kept on their toes as they battled to beat the gremlins.
In the end, though, it was Spence who came out on top. And thanks to some generous contributions of kit from fellow competitors, he will make his first venture into 3P at the final 3P GP on 3 September, also in Aberdeen. Of his preparations he commented: "Bobby's 3P challenge....starting to tweak things! Some for better some for worse! One day left to prepare.... challenge is definitely the right word!" on Facebook.
For full class results from the weekend, go to the Domestic Results page.
One of the major steps forward for the Scottish rifle shooters in the four years between the 2006 and 2010 Commonwealth Games was the increasing availability of electronic targets to train on. An initial purchase of two Megalink 4K300 units in early 2006 was followed over the next three years with four more of these units – suitable for use with smallbore rifles at 50m and with air rifles and air pistols at 10m – along with two of the larger 4K560 units suitable for use with smallbore rifles and free pistols at 50m.
There are currently insufficient for our whole squad to train on them at once, which leads to continued reliance on the ageing set of paper target changers at Denwood, and makes it much harder for the coaches to have good visibility of how the athletes are progressing within a training session.
A longer term objective of having sufficient units to allow the SSRA Grand Prix and Championship events at Denwood to be run on them would reduce substantially the workload on the volunteers, provide results in real time and narrow the gap between the experience of competing in domestic competitions and the realities of international shooting. The competition for medals at the Commonwealth Games such as India and Australia have such facilities in abundance, providing top class facilities all year round. A significant advantage over our athletes.
The 4K300 units are the preferred option for these purposes, with the flexibility to use them for both Air Rifle and Smallbore events. With four additional units it would be possible to hold the finals at the 10m & 50m Championships and the Grand Prix matches with them, providing a much better experience for athletes and spectators alike. They are also relatively portable, providing the opportunity for athletes to use them for day to day training on their home ranges.
We are seeking sponsors to help with providing more of these targets in order to support the progress of the current generation of rifle shooters who have done Scotland proud in recent Commonwealth Games and other international competitions, along with the next generation of young athletes who are inspired by the prospect of a home Commonwealth Games in Glasgow in 2014.
One target costs somewhere about the £3,700 mark – depending on the vagaries of the Pound/Euro exchange rate and shipping costs – with some additional infrastructure costs likely if we can progress beyond ten targets. We are happy to discuss all kinds of options with individuals, clubs, associations, businesses and anyone else who would be interested in supporting our ongoing programme. Please feel free to contact Donald McIntosh (donald@maccoach.co.uk) or Sinclair Bruce (performance@ssra.co.uk) for more details or if you have any questions.
Visit http://www.megalink.no/defaultEN.htm for technical information about Megalink electronic targets.
Bobby Spence, 27, must surely be one of the furthest travelled members of the Scotland squad in the UK, for he lives and works in Orkney. Despite this logistical handicap he has travelled the length of Britain to compete, including the Island Games on the Isle of Wight, the NSRA Scottish meeting in Caithness - practically a home gig for this amiable man - and all without any official funding.
Speaking ahead of this weekend's SSRA Grand Prix at Denwood, only one question seemed relevant: "How do you manage it?"
"With a lot of hard work," laughed Spence, 27. "I save all my money to do it and just budget around it." He can claim to get some financial support - from the ferry company for "frequent flier mileage". He's lost count of the amount of trips he's made to the mainland in 2011 but thinks he has around 20 planned for next year.
"It's something I'm passionate about," he said of target shooting," and something I enjoy.It was last year, I decided ' right, I'm going to take it seriously now'."
As for training on Orkney itself... "there is an indoor club, with three firing points, open once a week, but I've managed to persuade the caretaker to let me in two or three times a week," he said. "There are no outdoor facilities at all but I've bought a few wind flags and my dad has built a mobile bullet catcher, it's an old trailer that we've cut the back end off of and put a big steel plate on, on my cousin's farm."
Not ideal, but the alternative is to travel to Wick or Denwood for outdoor shooting.
Spence did reasonably well at the Scottish with the odd trophy >cough<...so many
in fact that he almost missed the ferry home after picking up the Mowat Cup at
the Caithness Open after a tie-shoot with David Simpson, catching the boat with
just ten minutes to spare.
"I'm quite good at that," he smiled wryly. "The ferry people are used to me
arriving late but usually I phone ahead and they wait."
Spence started shooting small bore when he was 17, but stopped in 2003 for four years because he could not afford to carry on when he at Napier University studying mechanical engineering. Only when he graduated in 2007 did he take up the sport again and bought his new rifle. "I shot indoors for a few years," he said, "learning how to do it again and last year I started competing again and doing it properly."
Was he surprised by the level of success he had in Caithness? "Yeah, it was beyond my expectations...."
And for those of you who shoot air rifle, look out - Spence has recently acquired an air rifle and is currently reacquainting himself with the discipline....
Scotland won the Home Countries Junior International match at Bisley for the ESSU Bisley trophy. Expertly wind coached by Julie Ballantyne and captained by Mike Ozmond, the team of Andrew Ozmond, Seoc Malone and Emma Steeples left England in second with Wales third.
Sadly the main team and ladies came up short in their international matches but this could not dampen Sheena Sharp's moment of glory, as she notched up her 100th cap for Scotland.
Detailed scores for all three teams can be found here.
Meanwhile, Sarah Bates won promotion to X class after finishing second in A class and was selected for the Randle match. Amongst the Scots in X class, Mel Mutch was second, James Paterson was sixth and James Henderson made the top ten. Seoc Malone and Andrew Ozmond were selected for the GB Drew match (50m junior postal event against USA/Canada/South Africa/NZ), while James Henderson, Bill Baird and Bill Vaughan made the final of the Roberts.
For more detailed scores, visit the NSRA website.
Kay Copland made it to the qualifying round of the Women's Prone in the World University Games at Shenzhen in China but her score of 585 ex 600 was not enough to make the final. Earlier she had scored 591 in the Elimination round. Rory McAlpine (581) and Olly Barron (584) came up short in their Men's Prone bid.
The London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympics Games (LOCOG) has begun a search for adult volunteer performers to participate in the Opening and Closing Ceremonies of the London 2012 Olympic Games.
Artistic Directors Danny Boyle and Kim Gavin are searching for 10,000 volunteer performers to fill roles as dancers, actors, percussionists and general all-round performers in the Olympic Opening and Closing Ceremonies respectively. Successful applications will perform in front of a packed Olympic Stadium and a worldwide broadcast audience of more than one billion people.
Applicants must be able to participate in up to two auditions that will take
place evenings and weekends in November and early December of this year, up to
two or three rehearsal sessions each week of up to four hours per session from
March 2012, and a number of all-day rehearsals in the three weeks leading up to
each Ceremony. All of these rehearsals will take place in East London.
Bill Morris, LOCOG Director of Ceremonies, Education and Live Sites, said: ‘To
deliver Ceremonies of this scale a significant amount of time commitment is
required from the volunteer performers. Performers will be required to attend up
to two or three rehearsals each week in London from March 2012 so applicants
should consider this. Previous performance experience is not required for people
to apply, applicants simply need lots of enthusiasm, personality, and a positive
attitude."
People can find more information and register their interest for this opportunity by completing the online application form at www.london2012.com/ceremoniescasting. The deadline for receipt of applications is Wednesday 31 August and it is not a first come first served process. To be eligible applicants must be aged 18 years or older on 1 March 2012. Only one application per person will be accepted and if LOCOG receives over 15,000 applications a computerised draw will be used to randomly create the short list for auditions.
No, that's not a misprint....for Alloa's 50m Open shoot was ultimately conducted in monsoon conditions and more fishing permits were being awarded than competition stickers. The moral of this story is shoot your cards on the first day when conditions were fine, but nonetheless that didn't stop Dave Caughey from winning A Class with a score of 592 just ahead of R Simpson who matched his score but lost out on countback. Class B went to Billy Crawford with 584, Class C to J Allan on 570 and D Class to E McIntyre with a score of 543. Competition organiser Willie McAulay reported a satisfying entry for the event - 35 in total being broadly the same as last year - and looks forward to making it bigger and better next year.
Detailed scores from all the event's competitions are available here.
Zinging in the rain: All this 50m point needed was a diving board
Despite excellent performances from the Scottish contingent in the GB team at the European Championships in Serbia, there was frustration after the Women's 3P and the Men's Prone.
Jen McIntosh scored 575 in the Women's 3P, ahead of England's Michelle Smith with 572 and Wales' Jenny Corish with 562. McIntosh's score was so close to achieving a quota place for next year's Olympics, only to be denied by X-bull count. The event was won by Germany's Sonja Pfeilschifter whose qualification score of 588 was followed by 97.5 in the final for a total of 685.5.
Matthew Thomson with 596, Jon Hammond with 593 and Neil Stirton with 591 made it through the Elimination round to reach Friday's Qualification round in the Men's Prone. There Thomson repeated his feat by scoring 596 with Hammond matching that and Stirton scoring 592 - but on a day of high scores their efforts did not prove to be enough to reach the final where Slovenia's Rajmond Debevec's qualification score of 598 was added to with 104.8 for a total of 702.8.
On Wednesday, Jen McIntosh scored 584 in the Women's Prone, on a day when Michelle Smith was denied gold after losing out to Sweden's Marie Enqvist with a lower X bull count after both women scored 595. Jenny Corish also recorded 584 and the GB team finished sixth.
The previous day had seen competitors faced with a tricky set of wind conditions and Rory McAlpine scored 579 and Fraser Cheetham 575 for Great Britain in the Junior Men's Prone. The GB team finished 11th.
Coach Sinclair Bruce will be heading for China next month with the British Universities and Colleges Sport (BUCS) squad for the World University Games in Shenzen from 12-23 August. Amongst the Scots in the squad are Ollie Barron (University of Aberdeen), Kay Copland (University of Aberdeen) and Rory McAlpine (St Andrews).
In the afternoon's blue riband event, James Paterson emerged victorious in the Men's 50m Prone event. His score of 693.9 won the title, with Jon Hammond who won a tie shoot for second and 692.7 against Northern Ireland's Matthew Hall.
Jen McIntosh won the Women's 3P title with a storming score of 674.7. In second place was Jenny Corish with 665.8 and third was Helen Warnes with 664.1.
Detailed results from all the weekend's events are now available on the Domestic Results page.
From left: James Paterson accepts some of his prize haul, including a bottle of whisky, from chief range officer Ivor French; Jen McIntosh shows off her 3P trophy, and Jon Hammond shows us all how to deal with the chill on the firing point at Denwood thanks to his trusty sleeping bag...clearly he spends far too much time in West Virginia working!
The Scottish Air Rifle Blind Shooting Championships, incorporating a Home Countries International against England, will be staged at Denwood on 27-28 August, making it a bumper weekend with 3P and Prone GPs also taking place. Our partners RWS will award pellets as part of the prizes for this event.
Jim Hammond is the organiser of the Scottish Air Rifle Blind
Championships. "We've always had the best blind shooters in Britain," he said of
the competition. "The championships have been staged on more or less the same
weekend at Denwood for the last three or four years. There's usually been a 3P
Grand Prix on the Saturday but not usually a Prone GP on the Sunday."
For those unfamiliar about how blind shooters go about their sport, Hammond
explained: "There's what looks like a telescopic sight on the air rifle and it
translates light intensity into sound. The targets go from black at the edges to
white in the middle. And what the shooter hears on the headphones is a
dull-pitched hum on the black and a high pitch on the white. It's very variable
and you do need quite good hearing as well as being able to shoot!"
The course of fire is 60 shots, exactly the same as the standard air rifle
event.
There are also different disciplines. "What's called stand assisted: in which
they rest the rifle on a stand which has a coiled spring in it so it's not
steady, you have to hold it steady. The other is normal air rifle, free
standing," Hammond said.
This year the plan is to use four lanes operating with electronic targets all
linked up to a computer and the [projection] screen, a technique which worked
well at the Scottish 50m Championships.
Click on the link on the SSRA calendar page to send Jim Hammond an email for an entry form or further details about blind shooting.
James Huckle and Jenny Corish took gold on the first day of Denwood's Scottish 50m Championships. Huckle won the men's 3P competition with a score of 1243.8 beating Ken Parr's score of 1239.2. The host club's Neil Stirton came third with 1235.8. And Cambridge-based Jenny Corish took the Women's Prone title with 591 ahead of Sarah Bates on 582 and Jen McIntosh on 579. The Prone final was broadcast to spectators with Megalink projections of the actual shots in real time, an encouraging development for the SSRA's ISSF-compliant events. In the Confined titles (open to Scottish entrants) were 1: Sarah Bates 2. Jen McIntosh and 3. Sarah Brown for Women's Prone. The Men's 3P Confined was won by 1. Neil Stirton 2. Jon Hammond and 3. Andrew Ross. Detailed results, including the scores in the finals, are available on the Domestic Results page.
Competition organiser Jim McIntosh advises that entries are now full for the Men’s Prone elimination rounds for Sunday 24thJuly at Denwood. The event promises to be very well represented with an estimated 60 SSRA members taking part, and including Scots GB squad shooters such as Neil Stirton and Jen McIntosh who returned from Austria this week after a successful visit to the IWK Tyrol 2011 competition.
The results from the third Three-Position Grand Prix of the season are available on the Domestic Results page.
As part of their preprations for the forthcoming European Championships a small GBR squad of Jen McIntosh, Neil Stirton and England's James Huckle returned to Innsbruck to take part in the Tirol international competition.
With no 10m events help, there were two matches in all of the 50m events. Some excellent shooting produced a clutch of medals for the Scottish shooters:
Day 1 - Women's 3P Bronze and Women's Prone Silver for Jen McIntosh
Day 2 - Women's 3P Gold for Jen McIntosh and Men's Prone Bronze for Neil Stirton
Day 3 - Men's Prone Bronze for Neil Stirton and Women's Prone Bronze for Jen McIntosh
A reminder that Alloa & District Rifle Club stage their 50m Open Challenge event at the Tullygarth range on 6-7 August. Entry forms are available by clicking on the link from the SSRA event calendar page.
Sarah Bates, currently based in Edinburgh but due to move to Caithness shortly, emerged triumphant from the latest SSRA Grand Prix, held at Thurdistoft, the venue for the NSRA Scottish meeting, in the third GP of the season. Tucking into a well-earned cake from the excellent local WRI service, Sarah explained that she only travelled to the area on Friday and showed her strength in the 50m event, coming out on top in the ISSF-style final. Look out for the detailed results here.
Thanks to local organiser Marty Simpson's hard work, the results from the Caithness SBRA county meeting (which also include the SSRA GP results) are available here. And webmaster Colin Watson has come up with a tongue-in-cheek diary from his week in Caithness, including never before seen photos...click here.
Alloa and District's Sinclair Bruce has won the Earl Haig competition at the NSRA Scottish meeting in Caithness. Bruce, recently appointed a full-time coach through sportscotland, took his medal haul of 12 trophies last year a stage further with victory in the Haig. The one-time Commonwealth Games shooter, also a member with Balerno & Currie, may now be under some good-natured pressure to enter the Scottish 50m championships in Denwood after all at the end of the month after his great achievement. His traditional hurl in the Earl Haig chair from the other finalists was topped off with a medicinal dram - and a celebratory Tunnock's teacake from the SSRA hack. It's hoped to publish still pictures and video from the Earl Haig ceremony soon. Pictured left, Sinclair Bruce is carried high, after a chat with his canine pal, Willow, right.
Visit http://www.caithness-scottishrm.org.uk for more info from this year's NSRA meeting and photographs via the flickr site.
The annual Scotland-England match at The Scottish saw Scotland come away with a win from both the main and Ladies teams: Scotland's women's team scored 77 off ex 400 against England's 82. The main team scored 117 off to England's 136.
Details of the scores can be found here.
The future of the annual NSRA Scottish meeting has come under scrutiny and, following some recent success in reducing the costs of organising and running the national meetings, the NSRA Board of Management are looking closely at ways of maintaining this momentum without compromising the opportunity for members to participate in the national meeting. The SSRA urges everyone who is interested in securing the future of this historic meeting to reply to the NSRA questionaire by clicking here. All replies must be returned to Ali Aitken at the NSRA (aliaitken@aol.com) in the next two weeks.
The SSRA Freuchie competition, a traditional event held during lunchbreaks at the Scottish, reached a conclusion today when Bill Vaughan, Cliff Ogle and Jim Cole-Hamilton held their nerve in the blustery winds of Caithness to reach the final where Cliff Ogle emerged triumphant and was awarded the impressive Wilkinson sword trophy. The C&D final was contested between Steve Gemmell, Adam Dove and Michael Baker and Adam Dove came away with the title.
Cliff Ogle is presented with his prizes by Mark Swift from RWS.
After the first round of this year's Haig trophy, the following competitors made it through to Friday's final round at Thurdistoft Range:
JA Henderson STM Malone WT Vaughan CG De Jonckheere JR Sinclair FA Spence* SE Brown* SM Sharp JR Brown RB Campbell |
AS Bruce IR Malone WMJ Cole-Hamilton AJ Paterson RG Spence* TF Hodgson E Paton* JG Shedden M Bexley RW Emburey |
In addition, S Dixon, A Dove, and F Howden have qualified for the B, C and D final.
(Competitors with an asterisk have qualified for the B,C and D final).
The second year of Alloa & District Rifle Club's Triple Dewar saw an increased entry from the 2010 debut, 35 from 28. More and more target shooters it seems are taking the opportunity to use the event's proximity to the NSRA Scottish meeting as a worthwhile preparation competition and this year's entries brought competitors from as far away as London. Alloa shooters cleared the boards, explained organiser Willie McAulay, and interestingly five out of the six competitions were won by shooters using RWS ammunition.
James Brown won Class A, Billy Crawford B Class, Willie McAulay C Class and T Kenny, with only a few months experience in target shooting, took the honours in D Class. Away from the serious business of winning medals and cash prizes, there was time to introduce some new features at the range, such as a cunning device to stop novice shooters (you know who you are) from cross-shooting and a chance for Alloa to take its youth policy to a new level with an introduction to the sport for Willie McAulay's grandson Jack, shown above, with the emphasis on understanding safety and instilling confidence working with firearms under close supervision. More detailed scores are available here.
Jen McIntosh, Kathryn Williamson, Seoc Malone and Andrew Ozmond were all part of the GB team which competed at the excellent 'Meeting of the Shooting Hopes' junior international match in Pilsen this week.
In the Women's Prone, Jen missed out on a medal on inner-ten tie break with a score of 593, finishing with three consecutive strings of 100, being placed 5th in the end.
In the Women's 3P, Jen qualified for the final in second place with 584. A final of 95.8 was not quite enough to hang onto the silver, but she secured a place on the podium with a total of 679.8.
For detailed results, click here.
The Commonwealth Games in Glasgow are now just three years
away. While the choice of Barry Buddon as the venue for the shooting events has
not been a popular one, nonetheless the programme is now moving forward and we
now wish to collect the names of those willing to commit themselves at this
point in time to getting involved.
The requirements for the Games are listed below:-
1. International Qualified Technical Officials
2. National Qualified Technical Officials
3. Sport Specific Volunteers
Interested? Click here to read the full details from the SSRA's Jim McIntosh. Contact Jim here.
Edinburgh's Matthew Thomson won the British 50m Men's Prone title at Bisley as he led a Scots raid on one of Britain's biggest events.
Thomson scored 695.0 (592 plus 103.0 in the ten-shot final) to see off compatriot and Commonwealth Games champion Jon Hammond by just 0.2 points. There were four Scots in the eight-man final with Aberdeen's Neil Stirton sixth and James Henderson from Caithness seventh.
Scotland's men team of Thomson, Hammond and Stirton won the team event with 1774 to England's 1763 and Northern Ireland's 1760. Details of the home country matches can be found here.
Earlier, double Commonwealth champion Jen McIntosh won the Women's Three-Position event and set a record at Scottish Junior and Senior levels as well as the British Junior and Senior qualification mark. She beat Jenny Corish of Wales by 12.2 points with a score of 678.4. Edinburgh-born McIntosh also won silver in the Women's Prone event.
The NSRA has listed scores from this weekend's British 50m Championships at Bisley and you can study them here.
The SSRA AGM 2011 will be held on Sunday 3 July at the Park Hotel in Thurso, from 7.30pm. There will be a pre-meeting for members of the SSRA council at 6.30pm. The agenda and previous minutes will be distributed shortly by email, or post to those who have not registered an email address. Meanwhile, a selection of photos from the recent Grand Prix at Gagie have now been published - see the report below.
The 2011 Scottish and Bisley national meetings will be held in Castletown, Wick (2 to 8 July 2011) and Bisley (13 to 21 August 2011) respectively. The Scottish meeting deadline for entries has passed, however due to the low turnout at the closing date, it has been decided to extend the deadline until 22 June 2011 without the additional late fee being required.
Any competitor who wishes to enter either of the meetings can do so by following the link below where the entry forms can be downloaded, or by calling 01483 485508 and requesting an entry form by mail. Click here for the Scottish meeting and here for the Bisley meeting.
Anyone wishing to enter the Scottish meeting is asked to submit their entries as soon as possible in order that the entry can be processed by the closing date. Payment may be made by credit card; anyone wishing to use this service is to call 01483 485508 with their card details. Please either email or fax (01483 476392) your entry forms before calling to pay by credit card.
For further information, contact the NSRA Competitions Department on competitions@nsra.co.uk
The quest for a purpose-built shooting centre in Scotland took another twist when Commonwealth Games and Sports Minister Shona Robison was grilled by John Beattie and Rhona McLeod on Radio Scotland's Sport Nation programme on funding for facilities. . .
"Jen McIntosh, our top shooter, she hints at what every other sport would ask you," said Beattie. "'We'd like an indoor centre of our own, please' she says.'Any sign of a permanent facility being built for the most successful TeamScotland sport of the Commonwealth Games 2010?' I think she lives in Alloa and trains in Aberdeen. You could build them an indoor centre, too."
Robison replied: "In terms of shooting, we have been having some really constructive discussions with the governing bodies what the legacy may be around shooting for the Commonwealth Games and one of the things I'm hoping we can agree upon is some kind of good quality, fit for purpose, training facility for our athletes. That has been put on the table as something we'd like to work with them towards so they don't have to go to Aberdeen [Denwood] because Aberdeen doesn't have the facilities they require. They require more facilities than are available in Aberdeen, they told us that very clearly. So we're keen to work with the athletes, to work with the governing bodies, to look at how a part of the legacy can be a fit-for-purpose training facility in a reasonably easy to access location and hopefully we can take these discussions forward."
Rhona McLeod asked: "We've kind of heard this before and it's just nailing down the amounts of money and the timeline with this. How serious a commitment is this, is this going to happen before 2014? Is it going to happen in 20 years' time from now?"
"The discussions we've had are at a fairly early stage, it has to be said, with the governing bodies," Robison went on. "But the legacy was to look at something that was from 2014 onwards to make sure that there is something there that is a fantastic training facility, hopefully for those athletes that will be coming through who are inspired to take up the sport and who are reaching a very high level within their sport. Having something for shooting that can allow those athletes to perform at that level I think that would be a great legacy.
"But it's early days, early discussions about timescales and all the rest. But we are, from the Scottish Government's point of view, very very keen to take that forward and hopefully we can achieve something special."
"Good news for the shooters then," said Beattie.
Dave Caughey came through to win the second SSRA Prone Grand Prix of 2011 - an ideal confidence booster for his forthcoming World Cup trip to Munich.
Gagie, so often home to a downpour, was flat calm on Sunday for the first two details of the elimination round. With such benign conditions the competitors took advantage, with an excellent 599 ex 600 from Olly Barron showing the way in A class.
While there were a number of notable performances and personal bests on the day, it was the future of target shooting which was the real winner. Ashleigh Taylor, just one of a number of Juniors present, simply got stronger as the day wore on and won the C&D final.
"One comment I heard at the back was the average age amongst the competitors was cut in half compared to the past, this is great we should be able to sustain our competitive shooters for Scotland in depth in the future," said the SSRA's Jim McIntosh.
The class winners were awarded prizes of R50 ammunition thanks to SSRA sponsors RWS.
For the the A&B final Caughey and Robert Spence arrived on the firing point with the same qualifying scores of 596, just ahead of the other six finalists, with Sinclair Bruce and Martin McGill going great guns. Spence started strongly and held the lead for the first five shots of the ten-shot final, but Caughey dug in and pulled the deficit back by the sixth and from that point on did not relinquish his lead.
All in all it was a great weekend for competitive shooting in Scotland and a great number of PBs collected on the way. Spence did it twice the second one by a considerable margin.
A/B Final aggregates: D Caughey 700.8; R Spence 698.2; O Barron 697.4; S Bruce 694.6; M McGill 694.1; D Simpson 693.4; H Simpson 691.2. M Bexley 687.0.
Full results on the Domestic Results page.
From left: Overall winner Dave Caughey gets yet more Scotch from Jim McIntosh after last year's win at Gagie; Ashleigh Taylor is congratulated by SSRA chairman Ian Thomson after her win in the C+D final; Bobby Spence's trip from Orkney was worth the while and Olly Barron may have come up short in the final but his superb 599 still made it a day to savour. Photographs courtesy of Bruce McIntosh and Sarah Brown.
Jen McIntosh won the Women's 3x20 event and Andrew Ross the Men's 3x40 event in the latest SSRA 3P Grand Prix in Denwood.
In variable temperatures in Aberdeen on Saturday, all the competitors had to deal with tricky conditions.The women showed that their continuing hard work in the three-position discipline is paying off. Maria Bexley managed to beat Sarah Bates this time but lost out to Sarah in the GP final. McIntosh produced a steady show to come out on top overall but she was not happy with her own performance.The gentlemen had to cope with some target malfunctions with Ross taking the honours and the Malone family of Iain and Seoc changing places this time around.
Andrew Ross goes it alone, left, while pictured right, the GP final gets underway.
Full results on the Domestic Results page
The line-up for the Scottish teams to contest the Home Countries International matches concurrent with the British 50m Championships on 10-12 June at Bisley has been announced:
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This news comes hard on the heels of the British team being announced for the next round of the ISSF World Cup in Munich, where Dave Caughey joins Jon Hammond, Neil Stirton and Matthew Thomson in the Men's 50m Rifle Prone, Hammond and Stirton feature in the Men's 50m 3P Rifle, and Jen McIntosh takes part in the 10m Women's Air Rifle and the 50m 3P Women's Rifle.
The University of Edinburgh has honoured Shirley McIntosh by inducting her into its Sports Hall of Fame. The first all-female list of inductees since the awards began three years ago, McIntosh is joined by Cathy Panton-Lewis, co-founder of Europe’s first ladies golfing tour, and world champion orienteer Yvette Baker in receiving the highest sporting honour the university can bestow. Click here to read more.
The first of the SSRA Outdoor taster sessions took place at Alloa's Tullygarth range. The object, to give new target shooters the chance to experience 50m and 100yard shooting, proved to be an ideal snapshot of the Great Outdoors - the range was hit with wildly gusting wind, torrential rain, sunshine...all in one afternoon. But with other, experienced outdoor shots to hand to help with understanding the different techniques required for the discipline, Edinburgh-based Michelle Galea was one of the visitors impressed with her day out and has the bug. "It was a great experience," she said. "I'll be back."
Alloa's Willie McAulay plans further taster sessions, but to register your interest, click here.
Matthew Thomson and Jonathan Hammond's bid for glory in the Men's 50m Prone at the ISSF World Cup in Fort Benning, Georgia fell short in the qualifying round after scores of 595 and 593 respectively. Austria's Christian Planer who scored 599 and Sergei Martynov of Belarus on 598, led the way into the final where 596 marked the cut. In the final, Germany's Henri Junghaenel emerged victorious with 597+105.6, landing gold ahead of Martynov (103.1) and Serbian Nemanya Mirosavljev with 597+103.3.
The day before, Edinburgh athlete Thomson had forged his way in the Elimination with a 598 (included 42 inner bulls). Bested only by Martynov, the current world champion, who delivered what is believed to be the eighth perfect 600 of his target shooting career, Thomson staked his claim with Virginia-based Hammond who scored 595. Fellow Scot Neil Stirton missed the cut for the qualifying round by an agonising one point, with 587.
"I'm definitely pleased with my score especially because it was pretty tricky conditions," said Thomson of his 598 on Facebook.
In his first international Prone final, James Paterson came in a highly creditable sixth in the ISCH event in Hannover recently. After a score of 595 he shot 103.0 in the final itself.
Alloa RC's Tullygarth range hosts the Triple Dewar competition on Saturday and Sunday 25&26 June. First details commence at 9am each day and for entry forms or just to request additional information, please click the link on the Calendar page.
The Scottish Target Shooting Federation, known as Scottish Target Shooting (STS), is seeking to recruit a Chair to head up the Council Executive (Management Board).Applications by letter to be received by 15th June 2011. Click here for details and how to apply.
The Caithness Scottish Open Rifle Meeting web site has been set up to promote this year's NSRA 2011 Scottish Meeting for all small-bore rifle shooters around the country.: http://www.caithness-scottishrm.org.uk
The weather in Scotland threw everything it could at the competitors at Denwood for the Denwood Open and first Prone Grand Prix of the season, the venue having hosted the first 3P GP on the Saturday. Kay Copland won the Junior event with 592, and was just pipped by Martin McGill for A class honours with 593. The Commonwealth Games Women's Pairs champion pulled out all the stops in the A&B final though, where a fine 103.6 ensured she took the major honours for the day.
B Class went to Olly Barron, C Class to Iain Malone and D Class to L Thomson who went on to win the C&D final with 578.
"Saturday was fine weather wise, although the range was not full - we had two ladies and four gents shooting the 3P and three juniors at the far end getting in some range time with their coaches," writes Jim McIntosh.
Sarah Bates won the 3X20 event with a score of 639.3, while Fraser Cheetham took the honours in the 3X40 event with 1084+96.0.
"As for Sunday, the overnight rain made getting to the range tricky," McIntosh went on. "That was the start of a difficult day to say the least, the first detail actually went quite well with no equipment failures. The second detail was fully booked with the range officers getting soaked loading the target changer boxes, so on the detail wet cards stuck to the backing support with subsequent card failures swhich meant that both 'hospital bays' (additional targets set up to cope with such failures) were in use and still on sighters."
At least two competitors moved to the third squad, which by that time was getting full. The list of failures by that time was keeping the range offices having difficult in keeping track of where everyone was. The weather then decided not to punish them any more and the C&D final finished up with the sun coming through.
The A&B qualifying was contested in such fine conditions that sunglasses were being required to find the shots on the cards. The final was shot late (from 4pm) but the sun stayed out.
The event was the first in which, courtesy of our partners RWS, top-of-the-range R50 ammunition was awarded to the first and second prone shooter in each class, along with prizes of Scotch whisky.
Matthew Thomson headed the list of Scots at the Grand Prix of Liberation in the Czech Republic with 597 in the Men's Prone followed by Dave Caughey on 596 and James Paterson on 590. Paterson went on to score 579 in the 10m Men's Air Rifle. Jen McIntosh scored 395 in the Women's 10m Air Rifle and 569 in the Women's 3P while Andrew Ross scored 1113 in the Men's 3P event and 554 in the 10m Men's Air Rifle. For full results data, click here.
Jen McIntosh, Jon Hammond, Neil Stirton, Kay Copland, Shona Marshall, Angus McLeod and Ian Shaw have all been rewarded for their superb achievements last year in the Commonwealth Games. Each gold medallist receives £10,000 and for details click here and, for reaction in the sports press, click here. And McIntosh was voted the Aberdeen Sport Person of the Year ahead of swimmer Robbie Renwick and Hammond.
Results from the recent Watsonian Rifle Club Open are now available here.
British Shooting is on the look-out for a new and independent chair. The Chair will provide leadership and direction to the Board, the Chief Executive and, crucially, to the many parts of British Shooting. The Chair will ensure that British Shooting has a strategic plan and lead the strategic interaction with a range of sporting agencies. Click here for full details.
There's no need to leave the beautiful wilds of Caithness after the NSRA Scottish meeting as you can enter the Caithness Open meeting which includes the second SSRA grand prix. A gentle reminder that entry forms can be found here (and also on the calendar page).
The entry form for the NSRA's Scottish Meeting 2011, which will be held at Castletown between 2 - 8 July 2011 is now available here. Entry forms may also be downloaded from the NSRA website, or if you require a hard copy, please contact the NSRA Competitions Department.
The time is close for selection for this event and those who wish to make themselves available must register with BUCS by 1st May. Click here for details on selection policy and more information or visit the British Shooting site.
No, honestly it's true. No sleeping bags, no mystery competitors, no double hats (probably)...a beautiful day was had for the SSRA All Ranges match, and the results are available on the Domestic Results page.
The final results from this league are now available on the Domestic Results page.
Jon Hammond scored 1157 in the elimination round of the Men's 3P event at the ISSF World Cup in Changwon, South Korea with Neil Stirton on 1145 but it was not enough to make the final stage where England's James Huckle made it through, finishing sixth with 1168+99.1.
Division 1: Bon Accord held off Watsonians, who fell off a cliff in the last two rounds, to win on aggregate after tieing on points. Top average: Ken Silver (Bon Accord) – 1.0.
Division 2: Larbert were runaway winners, only dropping one point over the season with Callander a distant second. Top average: Gordon Motion (Callander) – 1.1.
Division 3: In a very tight division, Inverurie & Oldmeldrum got the better of Alloa & District to win by two points. Top average: Robin Law (Alloa & District) - 2.0
Division 4: George Watson’s College only had the third-best average but kept winning matches and beat their mentors Watsonians B into 2nd place. Top average: Robin Thomson (Watsonians) - 1.7
Division 5: Despite losing their last two matches (their only losses), Orkney B held on to win over Clachnacuddin C. Top average: A M Bexley (Clachnacuddin) - 3.0
The results and averages for Rounds 9 and 10 of the Team Prone League are now available on the Domestic Results page.
Our thanks go to Bill Hamilton for his diligent work in compiling the scores. After six seasons, he has decided to take a well-earned rest and so the SSRA will be on the look-out for a new league organiser for next season – anyone interested should contact the Executive Officer.
A reminder that the All Ranges competition takes place at Denwood next Sunday and also that the new C&D Prone postal league will start next month with the last date for entry Sat 30th April.
Competing as part of the GB team, Neil Stirton (596), Jon Hammond (595) and Matthew Thomson (595) made it through the elimination round of the ISSF World Cup Men's 50m Prone event in Changwon, South Korea. In the qualification round, however, the weather took a turn for the worse. "Nasty cold and windy day in Changwon." tweeted coach Donald McIntosh. Hammond came away with a score of 590, Thomson 588, and Stirton 584 and they did not make the final - the cut-off score being 593. Thomson explained what he had to contend with on his Facebook page: "Still can't get over just how windy the match was this morning! Having 30 shots to go in just ten minutes is not a good way to finish a match. Still, quite fun though!"
Jim Cole-Hamilton won Class A of the SSRA Medal competition after a re-gauge from Hugh Simpson following scores of 300 ex 300. Class B honours went to Wick Old Stagers' Peter Richard and Julie Ballantyne of the Fochabers club took the Class C title. The CanDicap competition was won by Neil McMillan from Greenock. The 3P Championship went to James Paterson.
Final stage results from the Medal, CanDicap and 3P Championship are now available on the Domestic Results page.
Stop press: Final (interim) results from the SSRA Prone League are now available.
The Edinburgh Evening News has today published a story on ISSF rifle judges in the Lothians as they begin their apprenticeships. Read the article here.
Marty Simpson, the County secretary of the Caithness Small-Bore Rifle Association, has advised that the recently-issued SSRA competition entry forms for the Caithness SBRA Open contain an error which competitors should be aware of. The form states that the Open will be held at Wick Old Stagers range in Wick, when it should in fact be at Thurdistoft range Castletown, where the Scottish will be held. In addition, the late entry date is incorrect, it should be 3rd July 2011. A substitute series of forms can be downloaded here.
The latest results for March are now available on the Domestic Results page.
Jon Hammond came agonisingly close to making the final of the Men's Prone at the ISSF World Cup in Sydney, but his score of 594 fell just short, placing him 14th.
After a lengthy stay in Australia - five weeks for Neil Stirton and coach Donald McIntosh - some of the team will return to the UK, while others will take a short break before flying direct to South Korea for the next World Cup in Changwon.
See the full results here.500 rounds of RWS R50 ammunition are on offer at each of the 2011 SSRA Grand Prix prone events.
The first event is the Denwood Open on 8 May, and each class winner from A to D will be awarded 300 rounds of R50 as part of the prizes with 200 rounds going to the second-placed competitor. If you do not already have an entry form for the grand prix events, please click on the event link on the Calendar page to request an entry form either in paper form or sent by e-mail.
The Scotland team to take part in the annual postal match against New Zealand on Sunday 27 March at Balerno & Currie's range is:
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James Paterson, left, won the Men's title and Wales' Sian Corish the Ladies title at the Scottish Open Air Rifle Championships held at the Scottish Police College in Tulliallan over the weekend.
Sunday's championship finals and prize-giving marked the culmination of not only a weekend of great effort from the competitors but the organisers as well who laboured until 10pm on Friday to get the range set-up in working order.
Saturday's first detail, for the aggregate competitions, started at 9am, featured just two competitors, which gave everyone a welcome light run to ensure the flow of equipment control and targetry etc was glitch-free to cope with the busier details throughout the next two days.
"The equipment control was in the safe hands of Colin Watson and Gavin Walker, who were up to date on the ISSF’s latest meanderings with regard to equipment. Unfortunately our competitors were not," explained the SSRA's Jim McIntosh, himself a recently qualified GB Shooting B licence rifle judge. "We did know that trousers and jackets would be a problem and it did turn out that way. For example, the seat patch on the trousers is now a minimum distance (150mm) from the lower belt seam. At the next ISSF meeting it is anticipated that the equipment control will be run according to the latest publication of February 2011."
As far as results went, the performance of the competitors, as in previous years, was great and a number of personal bests were achieved. The finals were run according to the latest ISSF rules clarifications with a fairly slick operation set up to ensure the scores were collected, although Cyril de Jonckheere did his best to keep everyone on their toes by forgetting that each finals shot was permitted a full 75 seconds and not 45....
There were entries from across the home countries, with Wales providing three, so a Celtic Challenge ensued. Wales were represented by Sian Corish, Mike Lewis and David Williams. The Scottish trio were chosen from those who had completed their aggregate on the Saturday and the competition was run concurrently with the Championships and both ladies shooting a full 60-shot match.
The results were: Wales: Sian Corish 587, Mike Lewis 561, David Williams 558, total 1706. Scotland: James Paterson 583, Andrew Ross 562, Kathryn Williamson 563 total 1708 and a narrow win for Scotland.
Among those competing for the first time was Sarah "Two Hats" Bates who shot her first 40-shot match in Air Rifle and her extensive 3P experience paid off as she came up with a very commendable score as well. Kathryn Williamson continues to improve with twice this weekend improving her PB and two Chocolate Creme eggs as a result.
Saturday's aggregate championships saw class wins for Sian Corish in A, Mike Lewis in B, Andrew Laurie in C and Sarah Brown in D.
A fixture clash with the BUCS meeting deprived the Championships of a few top-quality shooters although overall entries were still up on last year. As a result, it has been proposed that next year’s event is on the calendar for 10th & 11th March.
Pictured above right: Sian Corish, Emma Cole-Hamilton, Kathryn Williamson, Emma Parr and Sheena Sharp in the ladies final. Photos courtesy Bruce McIntosh.
Paterson, Corish and Calum Seale (Junior champion) pick up their RWS pellets
Detailed results are available on the Domestic Results page.
Results for Round 8 are now available here.
A recent B squad training session took place at Denwood in Aberdeen, with an opportunity to start some outdoor training but the oddball Scottish weather had other plans to test them, writes coach Jim Cole-Hamilton.
While they set up the range, the grass was green, but by the time they started shooting the snow had begun and stayed with them through the day.
"While the weekend was constructive (thanks to some sleeping bags to stave off frostbite, shown left) it was also cold and for the Sunday we returned to the 'relatively' warm conditions of the indoor range," he said. "We weren't the only fools there, the University held their outdoor SUS over the same weekend, using the long range on the Saturday, and the 50m on Sunday. Those hardy souls did both days outside..."
Do you know who the mystery shooter pictured in the bag is? There's a Tunnock's teacake on offer to the first person with the correct answer to mail webmaster@ssra.co.uk.
For some of the British Team attending the ISSF World Cup in Sydney, the opportunity was taken to go south early in order to prepare for the first major international of the year.
Neil Stirton and Jen McIntosh were joined in New South Wales by Wales' Helen Warnes, and as part of their preparations they took part in the second of the Australia Cup competitions held over the last few days.
With two competitions for some events, there were plenty of opportunities and a number of medals were won:
Women's Air Rifle Match 1 - Jen McIntosh, Bronze Women's Air Rifle Match 2 - Jen McIntosh, Silver Women's Prone - Jen McIntosh, Gold Men's 3P - Neil Stirton, Bronze Womens's 3P - Jen McIntosh, Bronze
Competitions secretary Beverley Burnside advices that all the details on Saturday morning for this two-day event have now been booked. For those intending on entering on the day it would therefore be best to drop her an email here beforehand so she can pre-book details for Saturday afternoon or Sunday and thus avoid disappointment.
Willie McAulay has confirmed that the Alloa & District club will hold an outdoor taster session at the Tullygarth range on Saturday 28 May between 12-00 hrs and 18-00 hrs.
The range will be open for Alloa club members from Sunday 3 April.
The results for Round 4 are now available on the Domestic Results page. Competitors at the forthcoming Scottish Air Rifle Championships are reminded that their scores there can be nominated for the final round should they so wish - simply inform competition organisers Cyril de Jonckheere and Jim McIntosh before shooting.
A new 50m league aimed at Class C+D shooters spearheads the SSRA's outdoor season.
Designed to encourage new shooters to try their hand at shooting outdoor 50m events around Scotland, entries are now invited for this inaugural competition. Click here to have an entry form sent to you.
The entry forms for all the 2011 Outdoor SSRA Competitions, including the grand prix series, are now available. While existing SSRA members should expect a package containing all the season's forms in the post, anyone is welcome to enter the competitions and a form can be sent out by emailing Competitions Manager Ian Henderson.
Check out the SSRA calendar page to select what events suit you.
Bon Accord's Tim Kidner won the SSRA Speedway competition held at the Balerno & Currie range. Watsonians' Callum Seale was the winner of the Class C/D final. Click here for full results.
Home advantage was not enough for Balerno & Currie's Alasdair Horne to retain his LSSA World Cup title - but it took fellow club mate Sinclair Bruce to do it after the drama of a shoot-off. Both men had dropped just two points in the final, but SSRA performance manager Bruce showed he can still shoot as well as he coaches by notching a 100 maximum in the shoot-off to beat Horne's 99. Horne, who made the mistake of issuing the news to the media first instead of his wife, was no doubt "gutted" to relinquish the title he had won four times in the last five years.
Detailed results will appear on the LSSA website.
The latest results in the 3P League are now available on the Domestic Results page.
The final Air Grand Prix of the 2010-11 season, at Glenrothes, saw the irrepressible Robin Law retain the title once more
"The guy has over a hundred caps for Scotland and has not lost the Plate yet, who is out there willing to try and give him a run for his money before 2014?" asked competition organiser Jim McIntosh.
Balerno & Currie's Steven McLeod marked his debut in air GPs with a win in B Class pistol and he went on to top that by by winning his first-ever final by one point from Bruce McIntosh. The overall series honours, however, were lifted by Mark Joyce from Forres. The event also marked the first awards of ammunition prizes from SSRA sponsors RWS. All those competitors who had won their class during the GP season were given RWS R10 air pellets - something to consider when the dates for the 2011-12 season are announced in due course. New competitors are always made welcome, so why not give it a go? The Air GP series is an ideal way to obtain valuable experience and gain fresh insight into your sport.
But the season is not over yet north of the Border. The Scottish Air Rifle championships are being staged at the Scottish Police College in Tulliallan on 19-20 March and the numerous class winners there will walk away with a supply of high quality match grade RWS pellets in addition to a trophy. The SSRA is keen to encourage new - and not so new - air shooters, there is still time to enter this event. Click here competitions@ssra.co.uk and supply a postal address and you will receive an entry form by return of post.
The results from the Glenrothes GP are available on the Domestic Results page.
Latest scores from the Team Prone and Air Rifle leagues plus the qualifying rounds of the Medal, CanDicap and Speedway are now available.
Jen McIntosh has won the Ladies Junior Airgun title at Bisley, reports SSRA Performance manager Sinclair Bruce from Bisley. James Paterson made the Men's final in sixth place and in a close-fought affair made it up to fourth, fighting for third but had to settle for fifth. Emma Cole-Hamilton was eighth but due to entry numbers only seven shot in the final of the Ladies.
Scotland's successful Commonwealth Games athletes are amongst the contingent from north of the Border who been selected for the GB teams in two forthcoming ISSF World Cup events next month.
ISSF World Cup (Shotgun, Concepcion, Chile, 1-9 March): Women's Trap: Shona Marshall. Men's Skeet: Drew Christie.
ISSF World Cup (Pistol, Rifle & Shotgun, Sydney Australia, 21-31 March): Women's Trap: Shona Marshall. Women's Skeet: Sian Bruce. Men's Trap: John MacDonald. Men's Prone Rifle: Neil Stirton, Jon Hammond, Matt Thomson. Men's 3P Rifle: Neil Stirton, Jon Hammond. Women's 3P Rifle: Jen McIntosh. Women's Air Rifle: Jen McIntosh. Men's Rapid-Fire Pistol: Morgan Cook.
After an inexcusable delay, the results from the Air Grand Prix in Carlisle are in plus the latest scores in the SSRA Prone League and 3P League competitions. They can be found on the Domestic Results page.
Jen McIntosh, in the United States with a GB squad including Neil Stirton, continued to grab the headlines when she set a new Scottish Record (both Junior and Senior) for Women's Air Rifle at the Rocky Mountains Match in Colorado Springs. She beat her previous record of 393 (set at the Junior Nordics in 2008) by two points now raising the record to 395.
Results can be found here.
Results for Round 5 of this competition are now available.
The highly publicised "Games Maker" scheme for volunteers to help with officiating at the 2012 London Olympics has attracted a vast number of applicants and now an urgent request has been made to narrow the field by interviewing the hopefuls. With this in mind, a tight deadline has been set of TUESDAY 8 February for anyone wishing to lend a hand in conducting the interviews. There is a specific requirement to interview candidates based north of the Border at the Glasgow Science Centre.
Approximately 50 volunteers are needed within Scotland to help out with a
selection event at the Science Centre in Glasgow between 4 May and 15 May 2011.
As a selection event volunteer, you’ll conduct interviews, support the check-in
desk and provide information to Games Maker applicants. Interested?
Email SEV@london2012.com to apply and click
here for the application form and
here for the necessary HR
form.
Caroline Brownlee and Jessie Liddon from the Scottish Pistol Association produced the star performances from the Scots contingent at the annual InterShoot Air Weapons event in The Hague. Their third and second places in the Women's Air Pistol and Women's Junior Air Pistol respectively led the way but highly notable mentions must go to Jamie Hodgson and Fiona Park who competed for their country in Air Rifle on a self-funded basis and gained valuable international experience.
"Compared to domestic competitions InterShoot was a very high standard and provided excellent experience for all who attended," said Edinburgh's Fraser Cheetham. "There was some very good shooting most notably from Fiona Park who at her first international competition managed to score a new personal best of 379, unfortunately just missing out on a place in the final. The shooting didn't always go to plan but everyone who went came away with valuable lessons which can be put into practice in training and at future competitions."
For detailed results click here.
The Sands/Alloa Rifle Club in Kincardine will be the venue for this event on 26th February. For more information and details on how to enter, contact Ian Henderson.
The extensive SSRA News for 2010 has now been added to the archive.
The scores for Round 4 of the SSRA Team Prone League and for the early rounds of the SSRA Prone League are now available on the Domestic Results page
All five Scots who parachuted into Bisley at the weekend emerged with passes in the ISSF National Rifle Judges course, hosted by instructors David Goodfellow from British Shooting and David Parish ISSF Technical Delegate for Rifle and Pistol. Congratulations to John Buchanan, Iain Malone, Jim McIntosh, Gavin Walker and Colin Watson. For a brief diary of the course and how it went clickhere.
A small GBR squad of Neil Stirton, Matthew Thomson, Jen McIntosh and Wales' Helen Warnes have just completed an excellent training camp at the Eagle Eye Training Centre near Magaliesburg in South Africa.
Hosted by South Africa's 2004 Olympian Martin Senore, Neil and coach Donald McIntosh have spent two weeks on range, joined by the others for the second week.
The full results for both disciplines from the latest Air Grand Prix, at Denwood, are now available here for Pistol and here for Rifle. Mark Joyce from Forres won through in the ISSF-style Pistol final with as score of 541 + 84.8 and Emma Cole-Hamilton from Bon-Accord took the honours in Rifle with 576+99.
Watsonian Rifle Club are hosting their annual Open Meeting on March 12 and 13. The competition consists of 60 shots at 25 yards shot in ten-minute timed details. There are 5 classes A-E with additional prizes for Under 21, Under 18 and Under 15s, there are also Veterans, Ladies and Team competitions. And of course there is a trip to the Bun Room, not to be missed for those not on a diet. Entry forms can be found here, or for more details, contact secretary Beverley Burnside here.
The results for the first three rounds of this competition are now available on the Domestic Results page
The drive for a dedicated Scottish Target Shooting Centre that is fit for purpose for the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games and beyond moved up a gear with Scottish Government backing for the Morton Clays scenario. Read the Edinburgh Evening News articlehere.
Our partners RWS Ammunition have for some time been visiting clubs throughout the UK to allow them to ‘have a go’ with RWS rimfire and pellets. The firm will visit individual clubs and allow them to try their various grades of ammunition free of charge .If your club would be interested in such a session, please contact the SSRA webmaster.