UKPSA NEWS
Despite the rain and wind however, a challenging match was staged that needed speed and accuracy with all three shotgun ammo types - birdshot, buckshot and slug.
The UKPSA Regional Director, Vanessa Duffy was joint Match Director with Kevin Strowger of CSAC and veteran IROA official Martyn Spence was Range Master. German IROA official Juergen Schmidt ran many of the stages and assistance with props, targets and range crew was forthcoming from the UKPSA, Rossendale Fusiliers, Harlow Town RPC and the Blue Team.
The match was also spread over 11/2 days for the competitors, starting on the very wet Saturday afternoon at the CSAC range at Newby East near Brampton in Cumbria. The six stages set up included three needing buckshot and two requiring solid slug. One buckshot stage had a pair of bobbing targets on a swinging backer and on another, you needed to decide whether to use birdshot or buck on three static clay targets - because you had to use buck on the paper targets alongside them. This created quite a lot of advance discussion on the UKPSA’s Forum as strategies were mulled over.
On the central range area, it was apparent who had been practicing with solid slug, when there were four A4 paper targets and three IPSC Classic targets at 20 yards. Less than ten seconds for seven accurate shots was a fair time if you knew where your shotgun printed but that was not achieved by many.
Next to this was an even greater slug challenge with a ‘double bobber’ pair of targets swinging in different directions behind a no shoot through one aperture surrounded by four static targets, then through another aperture, three static targets were behind a swinging no shoots and three more static targets alongside. Timing and straight shooting were the key here.
On the right of the central range was the last of the first six stages, a typical multi-position long course field run (in a field!) with 19 plates and a double point bonus flying clay – not many competitors received the bonus.
Sunday morning brought some respite – the rain was not continuous and the sun even appeared briefly
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(eventually). The competitors reported early for duty at a very large field beside a quarry in Hallbankgate, where ten more birdshot stages had been set up by the CSAC team two days earlier. These were set up in three groups and three squads of competitors worked their way around them taking on clays on swinging poles, clays that flipped up a when popper targets fell, along with an assortment of small steel plates, static clays and mini-poppers, with one sneaky target set well out, needing an accurate crouching shot and ideally quite a bit of choke.
Despite the precipitation, the competitors gave no quarter and the leaders in Standard Auto Division were swapping positions right up to the last stage, when Barry Sullivan clipped a no shoot and won himself a ten point penalty and lost the Championship to Jim Starley and his Winchester SX3 by just over seven points out of 900. 46 points behind Barry was Michael Flatley, designer of the splendid double bobber, who had just spent several months struggling with a cast on his ankle and is now looking to make up some ground.
Jim is a worthy champion and, along with Josie Adam who won both the Ladies Standard Auto Championship and highest Junior trophy with a Remington 1187, is one of a small group of young but very experienced shooters who are now giving the old hands a run for their money. Both of them have competed in multi-day international matches for five years or more, and are looking forward to the World Championships to be held in Hungary next year.
Over in Standard Manual Division it was the original Grumpy Pumper, Graham Hill, who took the Championship from Ade Sell by a little over 20 points, with another up and coming pumper, Brad Fox powering his way to third place. Graham scared everyone by smiling at the prizegiving, and we think that’s what made it rain yet again.
Colin Alden took Modified Division from Kevin Strowger by 75 points, despite failing to engage a group of three targets on his first stage of the day. Colin does not let things like that worry him, and just turned up the wick for the rest of the day to claw back the points. Pete Starley tagged along in third place, having wiped out the big slug stage the previous day when his gun broke and he could not finish the stage. Gavin Rose triumphed in Open Division with an RR Targets box-magazine shotgun that had been built in
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