Bright, sunny and lovely shooting condi-tions attracted 36 competitors for the Cobar Clay Target Club’s Christmas Novelty Shoot on Sunday.
Along with locals, some shooters had trav-elled from Darwin, Bourke, Brewarrina and Tamworth to vie for the renowned excellent prizes, the challenge of unusual events, and to experience the club’s welcoming hospitality.
In the opening event, a 10 target Eye Opener, 17 competitors ranging from AA to C Grade capabilities shot a possible 10/10.
That was however the last of the easy targets for the day, with the remainder of the program proving to be a challenge for both experienced and junior/novice shooters alike.
The second event was 15 Mixed Targets (five single barrel off 11m; five point score off 15m; and five double barrel off 20m) with Kevin Hatch the AA Grade winner with 25/25.
In A Grade, Tony Polack had 25/25 for the win and John Martin (24/25) was the B Grade winner.
Damien Wray (23/25) was the best performer in C Grade, the Encouragement award was collected by Joe Webster and the Novice prize went to Darcy Manns.
The winners of the 15 Target Graded Handi-cap were: AA Grade—Rob Hunter 23/23; A Grade— Matt Harland 17/17; B Grade—John Wild 18/18; C Grade—Luke Scales 15/16; Encouragement award—Jay Webster; and Novice—Carol Pritchard.
In the 15 Target Crazy Points event, the win-ners were: AA Grade—Hunter 54/75; A Grade—Dick Tulloh 66/100; B Grade—Wild 46/75; C Grade—Scales 51/75; Encourage-ment—Tony Rogers; and Novice—Julianne Foster.
The 10 Pair Continental event, where targets fly out two at a time at varied heights and an-gles, proved interesting and threw up some new winners in the mix.
Aaron Marsh was the AA Grade winner with 17/20; Mark Holstad won A Grade with 13/20; B Grade’s best was Brad Kendrick (18/20); Wray won C Grade with 12/20; the Encourage-ment award to Todd Polack, and the Novice winner was Aiden Barraclough who had to contend with some very low fliers.
The final event was a 10 Pair Deauville Dou-bles competition that was drawn out of a hat.
Six teams of pairs shot a possible score, which was an excellent effort, and after a shoot-off the winners were Matt Harland and Tracey Boon with 14/14; followed by Jay Webster and Cliff Overton second with 13/14 and Dick Tulloh and Damian Wray finished third with 17/18.
The Highguns of the day were: Veterans—Max Betts 110/145; Juniors—Todd Polack 87/145; Ladies—Tracey Boon 98/145; C Grade—Luke Scales 106/145; B Grade—Brad Kendrick 105/145; A Grade—Mark Holstad 104/145; AA Grade—Kevin Hatch 116/145 and Aaron Marsh with 116/145 was the Over-all Highgun.
A lovely Christmas lunch and a visit from Santa topped off a great day for all.—contributed
