The Cobar Clay Target Club welcomed 149 shooters from Queensland, Victoria, South Australia and all around New South Wales for the 45th annual Golden Clay Tar-get Shoot over the weekend.
The popular annual event on the shooting calendar, also featured the NSW Junior State Championships and Night State Point Score Championships titles.
Cobar club member, Matthew Stokes (from Wagga Wagga) won the coveted Overall Gold-en Clay Championship 2022 title taking home the 9ct solid gold miniature trophy, sponsored by Peak Gold Mines.
After an absence of competition for two years, this year’s event numbers were up on the 2019 field of 130 shooters and also bettered those attending the 2018 event (97 shooters) and the 2017 shoot of 69 competitors.
The weekend carnival kicked off on Friday night with the State Night Point Score Champi-onship.
The 50 Target event, sponsored by Cobar Shire Council, was contested by 105 shooters with a number of Cobar club shooters being successful in their respective grades.
Among the local winners were: Rob Thomp-son who finished 2nd in AA Grade with a score of 232/234; Greg Brush won B Grade with 145/150; and James O’Neill was 1st in C Grade with 136/150.
Clear skies and sun greeted the full field of 149 shooters on Saturday for the big Golden Clay and NSW Junior Masters programs.
Cobar club shooter Kevin Hatch claimed 1st place in A Grade in the Cobar Powerhouse sponsored, 30 Target Point Score Champion-ship, with a near perfect score of 89/90.
Stokes took out the second event of the day, a 45 Target Medley sponsored by CSA Mine Glencore, winning AA Grade with 149/150.
He also finished the day with a win in the 30 Target Double Barrel Championship, spon-sored by SH Shooting. Stokes didn’t drop a shot to finish as the Overall winner with 209/209.
O’Neill was also back in the winner’s circle winning C Grade with 31/32.
Sunday morning started off well with the 30 Target Single Barrel Championship, sponsored by Epiroc, the first event on the program.
Hatch, with 55/56, won A Grade, with Chris-tie Wheeler winning C Grade (33/34).
Next on the program was the 30 Target Bry-an’s Empire Hotel Mafeesh Handicap, which is also sponsored by the Hawkins Family in memory of Neil ‘Frosty’ Singleton who was instrumental in the commencement of Clay Target shooting in Cobar.
This event carries a reward of the Mafeesh Cup with prizes for placings from 1st to 5th and there’s a good deal of interest in the event which is held in conjunction with a Calcutta.
A total of 15 competitors shot a possible (perfect) score, and they went to shoot-off until the final placements were achieved.
O’Neill with 57/58, came an impressive 3rd, with Cameron Ford (the Australian Junior Sin-gle Barrel Title holder) the eventual winner.
The final event of the weekend was the 15 Pair Double Rise Championship sponsored by LGB Marine & Contracting with Cobar shoot-ers Ray Schiller finishing 2nd in C Grade 33/40 and Bryan Manns was 2nd in A Grade (29/30). Continued Page 17.