For the final time this summer, the 50 metre Megalink electronic targets made a 24 hour round trip from their base at Denwood to Gagie and back, all thanks to our very own man with a van, Gavin Walker. Unfortunately there were no entries for relay 1 so the decision had already been made to cancel this relay - this is something that we hope will not be repeated in the future. On a brighter note, 11 of the 26 shooters were juniors and 50% of the medals were won by juniors. We hope this will strengthen Scottish target shooting for the future.
Weather conditions for the day were mixed, the morning started cool and overcast with a light rain shower. The afternoon brightened up with a light breeze rising for the A/B qualification and final.
The full shooting results and final GP points table.
High points of the day include Ruaraidh Macleod having a very successful day by winning the A Class, winning the GP final and winning the overall 50 metre prone GP series by 2 points. A special mention also goes to Tom Diggle who came third in B class, then set a much improved personal best to top the qualifiers going into the final and finishing third in the final behind Ruaraidh and Sheena Sharp. Note that two of the eight finalists were juniors.
In the C and D final, juniors again put up a strong fight but Ian Henderson won on the day but lost out on the overall series to Robin Thomson by the tightest of margins. Both tied on total points but the title was given to Robin who had two wins and a 2nd against Ian who had two wins and a 3rd.
I would like to thank Gavin Walker for driving the Megalinks back and forth, setting them up and running the finals, Bruce McIntosh for assistance setting up the Megalinks and operating the system throughout the day, he also produced a steady supply of printouts, Robin Thomson for assistance setting up and the commentary during the finals and Ian Thomson for doing such a great job recruiting and mentoring the large entry of juniors.
I wish you all good shooting over the winter and look forward to seeing you all and your club mates, at Gagie next year for the 50m Prone GP2 and GP5 competitions.
Report by Peter Gray, Steeple Rifle Club