Once again Southampton University Rifle Club journeyed to the Isle of Man for the Easter weekend. The weather forecasts seemed ominous and certain members of the team did not relish the prospect of a 4 hour crossing on rough seas! Other members decided to oversleep on the morning we left, resulting in some interesting antics in the early hours.
Friday saw a good practise session with the wind largely behaving itself. Unfortunately this weather did not extend to the higher altitudes, and the planned pistol shooting was cancelled in favour of the pub due to the knock on effect and other pistol competitions being postponed. The pub as it turned out was not wholly uneventful… Allan Skellett ordered and saw away a mission impossible… a burger containing three ½ pound burgers (one and a half pounds of meat) plus cheese, bacon, and chips on the side. It was an achievement which unanimously won him spoon of the trip – even against Lawrence leaving his bolt in Southampton…
Friday also allowed James Paterson and Mark “Shim” Szymankiewicz to compete in the air rifle event, coming a respectable 6th and 7th respectively
Saturday comprised the first of two sixty shot prone competitions and the 3 position (3P events). The wind once again wasn’t too bad, enabling Michelle Smith, a friend of the club, to set a new British 3P ladies record (subject to confirmation). The men’s 3P final saw James Paterson to defend his title admirably to win silver, losing out to former Southampton student, Duncan Farmer. Shim narrowly missing out on Bronze in fourth place and Mark Girling coming 7th, despite leading the field in both Prone and Kneeling disciplines all the way through the competition.
Saturday night came the real competition – LaserBlast! AUP Allan “Bermuda” Steynor joined the club for a few games as a wind-down. Embarrassingly in one game his accuracy (% of hits from shots fired) was higher than that of any other shooter. His team still lost though… twice.
Sundays Prone competition was the qualification competition for both the mens and ladies prone finals. 5 Southampton, or former Southampton students, made the top 20 in the prone event, with Katie “Cap’n” Sullivan, Rich Ward and Mark Girling all making the prone final. Michelle Smith was the run-away winner in the ladies final with a 106.1 – a score never before seen or heard of by any ISSF Judge present.
Awards were also given out for other competitions, scores for which were formed from the main Saturday and Sunday competitions. Our medal tally is yet to be finalised due to the late award of silver and bronze medals, but is expected to be over a dozen. A full list of results can be found at http://www.isleofmanshooting.com/easter/results2010.shtml
A few special mentions must also go to Ryan, Sam, Sherman, Jen and Sarah for outstanding performances.
A massive thank you to all who came along, for the banter, the scores, for signing my “cards”, and for the bottle of port!
The Club’s congratulations go to Mike Bagot and Michelle Smith of Havant Rifle Club who became engaged on the trip.
