Report courtesy of Jim Latham
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Benchrest Shoot #4 at Mission Rod and Gun Club: Sunday, June 10, 2012
Another cold, damp and slightly breezy midwinter day, except it was June 10th! Once again the Meteorologists lied. Maybe they are in training for politics! No problem with Global Warming at the Mission Range. I could swear the next Ice Age had started moving down on us. However this did not dampen the spirits of the 8 shooters who braved the elements for the Shoot. We had two new shooters. If all our shooters managed to make it we would have taken up the entire range! As it was there were a few other shooters who came up so there was enough room for all and everyone played nice and had a good time. It is always interesting to watch the others saunter over to see the targets we have fired with our itty bitty 6 ppc’s. I make sure someone like Joe’s targets are sitting on top of the pile where almost every shot is a 10 or an X. But it does intrigue them and almost every time someone asks about the Benchrest Discipline when they see what these guns and some of the shooters can manage. Highlight for me is always the new shooters. We now have our first female shooter, Bob Hampton’s wife, Dori, so the dropped shots now illicit comments like “darn” instead of “$%##$$%^^&**” Joe did his usual great job of mentoring. I had promised newcomer Wally McDonald that if he came to day it would be the best $5 he ever spent. He said afterwards it was, but he did not offer to pay me an extra $5. Both shot very well indeed. Congratulations.
The course of fire for this match again was five 100 yard Hunter score targets. This time we threw in a Racoon fun target to finish the day. Maybe I should get back to shooting real varmints as I managed a score of 50 on that target today, something I have never done before. For me following the bypass surgery it was just great to be able to shoot again, period!
Despite the very cool day everyone shot very well; I think everyone had a personal best. Special congrats to Joe for setting a new record which he intends to rub into arch rival Chris Klump.
We were very pleased to have a visitor with us from Sunshine Coast Rod and Gun Club, Rob Finnigan where they also have a few Benchrest shooters and he informed me that Powell River has some as well. Hopefully we are going to be able to get a few of us joining up with one another for some good meets.
Following the match and scoring everyone went to go the clubhouse for coffee, lunch and lies. It was good to see many folks using the Clubhouse food services and enjoying the camaraderie after the match. It was a very big day for the concessions.
We welcome newcomers and if more information is wanted please contact me, Jim Latham, at lathamconsult@telus.net or phone me at 604-795-0618. Please feel free to pass this summary on to anyone you wish who may be interested.
Next match is planned for Sunday July 22nd, meeting at the Rifle Range at 8:30, Match commencing at 9:00, completing at 11:30 with Coffee, Lunch and Lies to follow at the Clubhouse.
Please note that we do not shoot in August or September due to the Public Range Use but that our BIG MATCH is October 14th
Name Rifle Class Clbr. Target1 Target2 Target3 Target4 Target5 Aggregate Position
Bob Hampton benchrest 6ppc 52 48 50 53 52 255 2 (tie)
Dori Hampton benchrest 6ppc 50 51 51 50 49 248 4
Sam Parrotta factory .223 41 42 34 24 37 178 2 (fac)
Wally McDonald benchrest 6ppc 49 42 47 49 46 233 6
Joe Mendham benchrest 6ppc 54 54 53 52 53 266 1(record)
Travis Kienas factory 6mm Rem 38 42 41 35 39 195 1 (fac)
Lowell Boyd benchrest 6ppc 42 50 47 49 47 235 5
Jim Latham benchrest 6ppc 50 50 51 52 52 255 2 (tie)
For those of you wondering about the scores over 50 per target, we score the pencil dot center as an 11 rather than counting as X rings. But touching that dot is no easy task. A couple of guys were thinking they should build a .338 ppc just to get a wider bullet!!