Shoot reports and news 2024

[wynno]

I shot the CPSA comp at Barbury on Wednesday. First squad out and was hammered by rain, wind, hail and SNOW! We all wrote off any chance of making something that resembled a decent score before we had even left the top of the Deer Park!

I was there as well, got very cold towards the end and was so glad to finally finish.
Some decent targets ruined by the unpredictable weather

 

[Cuffers]

I was there as well, got very cold towards the end and was so glad to finally finish.
Some decent targets ruined by the unpredictable weather

I went up this morning (Saturday) and the weather was beautiful. They have left some of the competition targets out and they are far more hittable in the weather!

 

[SBL]

Lovely day for shooting in the NorthEast today so 100 sporting it was. A lot of small changes to last week made it quite a challenging shoot at times and a couple of targets that were simply just too tough for me. Never mind, reasonably happy with a 75 but definitely a few left out there.

 

[Daz W]

AGL for me on Friday. Good course hampered by the gusts of wind. A considerable amount of no birds as well, which is very unusual for AGL. With trap filling happening as well, resulted in a round of over 3 hours.
Came out of the gate pretty well, dropping 2 on the first 3 stands. Got to stand 4, and saw IMO an easy A bird, followed by a big looper. Thought to myself "Here's a 4 on the card" Relaxed into it and walked away only dropping 1.
Fortunate on stands 6 and 8, where lots of people we dropping targets due to wind. When it was my turn to shoot, the wind stopped. Straighted both.
Then I mucked up what should have been an easy stand 9, smoked all the A birds of the tower, and dropped 3 of the incoming B birds. Walked off of that shaking my head, and wondering what the hell had happened.
Dropped the first pair in the grouse butt, thinking they needed more than they did, wound it back and hit the rest.
Finished up on an 89, which I'm well happy with. HG was 96, which was outstanding due the conditions.

 

[Sian]

AGL for me on Friday. Good course hampered by the gusts of wind. A considerable amount of no birds as well, which is very unusual for AGL. With trap filling happening as well, resulted in a round of over 3 hours.
Came out of the gate pretty well, dropping 2 on the first 3 stands. Got to stand 4, and saw IMO an easy A bird, followed by a big looper. Thought to myself "Here's a 4 on the card" Relaxed into it and walked away only dropping 1.
Fortunate on stands 6 and 8, where lots of people we dropping targets due to wind. When it was my turn to shoot, the wind stopped. Straighted both.
Then I mucked up what should have been an easy stand 9, smoked all the A birds of the tower, and dropped 3 of the incoming B birds. Walked off of that shaking my head, and wondering what the hell had happened.
Dropped the first pair in the grouse butt, thinking they needed more than they did, wound it back and hit the rest.
Finished up on an 89, which I'm well happy with. HG was 96, which was outstanding due the conditions.

We shot it too. Very tedious with the amount of no birds we had. We may have had one or two stands with a few, the rest were a lot. One 4 pair stand I had to shoot 8 pairs. Spoils it a bit and I lose interest. Good company though going round otherwise I’d have been off back to my warm car.

 

[Clear Miss]

I shot the Westfield long range day yesterday.

I was definitely expecting the targets to be a lot harder than they were given the course setters reputation. I arrived with 3/4 and 7/8 chokes in the gun but quickly changed back to 1/2 and 1/2 when watching the targets from the car park. The furthest targets were probably around 50m-60m with most of the long birds being at 40m-45m with some gimme targets thrown in so no one could leave with single digit score. A lot of varied presentations with some being slow and hanging in the air and others rifling across the sky. One highlight was the teal on stand 12 which needed the shot to be about 15 ft above the target to get it in the traditional manner.

I finished on a 45/100 which sounds poor on paper but was a well earned, mid table score. It didn't help that I missed 3 from 4 of the 20 yard crosser on stand 1 which was a warm up stand and shot a simmo pair of crows the wrong way around and missed 4/8 of them as a result. I did manage to straight one of the long range stands and came away with only one zero on the card which is a bonus.

What it did highlight is just how far away from competition standards most of my local practice grounds are. A lot of the sight pictures and leads required were completely alien and required gun speed that I just don't see on an average weekend.

Worth noting that the shoot was very well run and not once were we held up by a breakdown, trap refill or the squads in front. The ground staff were very proactive in keeping the shoot moving. I didn't even have to queue up for a coffee at the end. It was a very enjoyable day made better by the squad we shot with, very friendly with good banter and chat.

 

[donna]

I shot the Westfield long range day yesterday.

I was definitely expecting the targets to be a lot harder than they were given the course setters reputation. I arrived with 3/4 and 7/8 chokes in the gun but quickly changed back to 1/2 and 1/2 when watching the targets from the car park. The furthest targets were probably around 50m-60m with most of the long birds being at 40m-45m with some gimme targets thrown in so no one could leave with single digit score. A lot of varied presentations with some being slow and hanging in the air and others rifling across the sky. One highlight was the teal on stand 12 which needed the shot to be about 15 ft above the target to get it in the traditional manner.

I finished on a 45/100 which sounds poor on paper but was a well earned, mid table score. It didn't help that I missed 3 from 4 of the 20 yard crosser on stand 1 which was a warm up stand and shot a simmo pair of crows the wrong way around and missed 4/8 of them as a result. I did manage to straight one of the long range stands and came away with only one zero on the card which is a bonus.

What it did highlight is just how far away from competition standards most of my local practice grounds are. A lot of the sight pictures and leads required were completely alien and required gun speed that I just don't see on an average weekend.

Worth noting that the shoot was very well run and not once were we held up by a breakdown, trap refill or the squads in front. The ground staff were very proactive in keeping the shoot moving. I didn't even have to queue up for a coffee at the end. It was a very enjoyable day made better by the squad we shot with, very friendly with good banter and chat.

We didn’t shoot that comp but I never come away from Westfields thinking it was a waste of a day, always thoroughly enjoy Steve’s shoots even when I’ve put a bad score in! Well done

 

[Martinj]

I did the Owls Lodge EASTER SHOOT & HAMPSHIRE SPORTING CHAMPIONSHIPS on Saturday. I found it interesting to say the least, all targets were hittable but, for me, not all of the time by any means . I ended up around 10 points down on my average and thought I was having a bad day but that was about par for the course among others I know so it was just a measure of the firmness of the course.
I don't mind dropping a few on a shoot like that, it was still fun, the weather was good and we all had a good day. Queues weren't too bad after stands 1 and 2 encouraged people to disperse.

 

[Freddypip]

AGL for Daughter & me on Friday. I enjoyed the shoot but the sim pair half way round was badly affected by the wind & no birds - the wind made shooting the first one early essential. Apart from looking up a lot I do like the ground (which is a journey for us) and there was something to think about. I dropped 4 on the first stand (I think my head was still in the car park) so I was happy with a final 79. I'm impressed with your 89 Daz,

Sporting Targets on Sunday. 81 & daughter 70. Nothing easy but nothing stupid - I dropped a few but also made the required changes when I needed to and given I dropped 4 on the tower stand at the end (mobility issue with my shoulder) I was happy.

Orston then on Monday for the Masters. Missed the bad weather and it was a very nice day socially. Some clever clays. Dropped three on the simo pair half way round trying to shoot them with one cartridge - couldn't resist. Managed to do it with the last pair for the highlight of my day. No, that's wrong, they do a great breakfast so that was probably it. Ended up on 115 and the little one was 103 - she said at the start a really good day would be anything over 100 so it was a content drive home for both of us.

 

[Bebo]

AGL for me on Friday as well. The only high point was that I got to shoot in Sian's squad. I had a complete melt-down on stand 8, couldn't hit either of them. I did OK on both sim pairs only one away on each of those, but only managed to straight the first and last stands. Finished on a fairly dismal 70 - 89 is a cracking score as so much of it was wind affected. The no birds and trap breakdowns did get on my wick though and I don't think I'll be rushing back.

 

[donna]

I did the Owls Lodge EASTER SHOOT & HAMPSHIRE SPORTING CHAMPIONSHIPS on Saturday. I found it interesting to say the least, all targets were hittable but, for me, not all of the time by any means . I ended up around 10 points down on my average and thought I was having a bad day but that was about par for the course among others I know so it was just a measure of the firmness of the course.
I don't mind dropping a few on a shoot like that, it was still fun, the weather was good and we all had a good day. Queues weren't too bad after stands 1 and 2 encouraged people to disperse.

We shot that too Martin but started about 2 pm. Car park was rammed but didn’t have too many hold ups. Shot badly myself but it was a good course I thought. Thought Phil was going to get me an Easter egg on the rabbit stand but he dropped the last one . Nice to catch up with a few shooters I’d not seen for a very long time.

 

[donna]

AGL for me on Friday as well. The only high point was that I got to shoot in Sian's squad. I had a complete melt-down on stand 8, couldn't hit either of them. I did OK on both sim pairs only one away on each of those, but only managed to straight the first and last stands. Finished on a fairly dismal 70 - 89 is a cracking score as so much of it was wind affected. The no birds and trap breakdowns did get on my wick though and I don't think I'll be rushing back.

Same as last shot we done there a month or so ago. So many breakdowns/no targets etc, it was nearly dark when our squad actually walked off with one stand to go. Will leave it a while!!

 

[leighH]

Owls lodge for me as well on Saturday, usual dismal performance. Dropped 1 target over six stands, but dropped an average of 4 on each of the other seven to finish on 71.
Rushed the two teal on 4, did not see anyone shooting the report pair of crossers on stand 5, so treated the first 2 pairs as quartering incomers, attacked last pair to kill them both well. Lack of concentration on 12 & 13, but real mystery to me was the 3 lots of simo pairs, just one second barrel kill, just seemed to be poking at 2nd bird and could not adjust.
Still a lovely afternoon in the sunshine and nice to see Donna and Phil (and I did get an egg).
Hope to get some time soon to sort the fit out on my MK38, bruising my cheek a bit even with adjustable comb set where I think it needs to be.

Leigh

 

[Martinj]

We got there about 11am, everyone wanted to start on stands 1 & 2 which were off to the right, these were very busy but once people spread out things were a lot better.
Report pair of long crossers - I broke the first one and thought I had it in the bag, then missed the remaining five. getting the lead right was a bit of a mystery and I think I was shooting high too.
Dropped 2 on the double closeup rabbit
Missed all (3) the overheads on the stand to the right of the rabbit, concentration was going by then as this was the last stand we shot.
I should have taken a photo of my card because I think I was robbed of 2 points not that I was ever going to win anything (74 or 76)
I broke all the orange teal but struggled with the black one, the more lead I gave the orange one, the better it broke..
I thought it was a well run shoot, no trap malfunctions at all, a few no birds, the only delays were when the guys were refilling the traps - which has to be done.

 

[Sian]

Saturday shot College Farm and shot rubbish. It was a good shoot, great company, weather good but my beloved husband forgot my eyes and ears as he was packing the car. Rage is what I felt trying to shoot in his prescription sunglasses which I could do if they didn’t keep falling off my face. Gave up and asked Kevin for the cheapo ones they use for have a go. Ears - had to use Tony’s spares which are far too big for my ear canals and really hurt. It literally took me half a shoot to get my blood pressure normalish. Sunday got up really early drove to Wales shot Nigel Hart’s Welsh selection shoot which I shot well as it goes. Got diddled out of a hit but really wasn’t the end of the world. Dropped the cards near the last stand so had to trek back for them having got back to the car! Went to my parents down the road a bit and made a full on roast beef dinner, tidied up and went back to London. Monday did the long range shoot which was just for fun but actually knackered me as too much energy required after the long Sunday .

 

[Westward]

Hats of to young William. Great shooting to be top gun today at Ian Coley's.

 

[wynno]

Hats of to young William. Great shooting to be top gun today at Ian Coley's.

And he went birds only…..

 

[Freddypip]

Of course he went birds only - It was just for fun !!!

 

[donna]

Hats of to young William. Great shooting to be top gun today at Ian Coley's.

It was a good shoot too. Had a fair few no birds but apart from that a good course.

 

[Westward]

It was a good shoot too. Had a fair few no birds but apart from that a good course.

I almost went.

Trouble is I don't like to book too far ahead and these days the mid week shoots are always full by the time I try to book. Note to self: Get a grip man!