Healey took 50m first Junior, whilst I took first Junior in 22 Light Varmint and Air-Rifle Hunter classes. Day one was a brilliant day, as usual full of top laughs. The day was beautifully finished off, thanks to Richard and my Dad, in the local Indian for a lovely curry.
Day two, I knew on a personal level would be harder, as I was shooting 50m - my hardest event - later that day. I was also suffering, with everyone else, due to the odd weather conditions - switching from sunny to awfully cold. This was just before the freak 30 minute downpour drifting over in the last few targets of the 50m competition at the end of the day.
I was shooting Air-Rifle Heavy Varmint class in the morning. I knew it was going to be hard with a twitchy wind and odd dead still patches, so it was hard to pick your moment. To say it was challenging is an understatement and I was happy to walk away from the first target with a 244. This gave shooters some competition to contend with.
50m scores were also looking great with a 246 shot by Ken Stockham, hotting up the competition. The indoor Heavy Varmint also got off to a good start with a 250-21x being the highest of the scores shot. The 50m HV ended up a very close competition, with all the top four shooting 490 and all coming down to the ‘x’ count. Jake Healey narrowly missed out on a medal but still picked up first Junior, whilst Robb Harrison took first place with 490-24x. This was two ‘x’s clear of Andy Dubrieul’s score, closely followed by Ken Stockham with 490-18x.
Air-rifle proved to be a very close one again, with John Rogers taking first place with a 483-14x, which was fantastic shooting considering the conditions. I took second with a 483-12x followed by Graham Freeman on an identical 483-12x. However, ‘first miss’ for Graham was target 2 and mine was target 6 so it gave me the silver medal. I also took first Junior.
Indoor 22 Heavy Varmint proved to be an ‘x’ count decider again, with Andy Dubriel winning Gold with 500-39x. Brian Kelly took second with 500-36x and Geoffrey Kolbe from Border Barrels winning the Bronze - with a fantastic first-time score of 499-36x. Jake Healey again took first Junior and finished fourth overall.
It was a day of showcase shooting and everyone was pleased with the results. The final evening was spent with around twenty shooters for dinner in our hotel, where we had a lot of fun! Jake and I pushed ourselves
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For all the results please click website link to see them on our website;
www.benchrestshow.com
UK 22 Rimfire Nationals at Portishead 2011 by Scott Grayson
to the limit with absolutely enormous dinners, with all of us having a great laugh.
So, after two days of excellent shooting, the medal ceremony arrived. Once we had left the cafe from yet another ‘healthy’ breakfast, we arrived to a fabulous medal presentation, with many beaming faces picking up medals including 4 out of 5 team Golds for
St.Giles and 2 team Golds for my Buxted team.
Andy Dubrieul won both aggregate score trophies for Rimfire, with Colin Renwick taking the aggregate for Air-Rifle. I picked up the Junior aggregate cup which added to my 10 medals earned at the Nationals and thoroughly finished my Junior career off with a bang!
Brian Kelly had also very kindly set up the 3 Gun Aggregate competition with cash prizes for first, second and third. Brian Kelly himself came first! However, he generously gave his prize money to the UKBR22 Association. My Dad, Alan Grayson came second with a score of 1456-56x and Richard Healey came third with 1455-49x. All in all it was a fabulous weekend and most shooters came away beating personal bests and, as always, we had a very friendly, cheery atmosphere.
So, the UK Nationals are over and what a fantastic weekend it was. Such camaraderie between all that took part and the scores were the closest I’ve seen for a long time, which shows how good all of the competitors are when it comes to shoulder to shoulder shooting.
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