Roseville Rifle Club Australia

Archive for July, 2018

In an astonishing display of marksmanship, Mark Buchanan top scored in the Queens Prize Stage III Final, shooting 134.10 over 900 yards and 1000 yards, to give him a total Aggregate of 280.24. This placed him 4^th in H.M. Queens Prize, Bisley 2018, only one point and five centres behind the winner, David Luckman on 281.29.
Mark was also only one centre behind both Matt Button and the great Parag Patel who shot off for second and third place with 280.25 each.
Conditions were extremely difficult with strong and variable winds racing across Stickledown range for both shoots at 900 yards and 1000 yards. Mark shot 65.4 at 900 yards and 69.6 at 1000 yards, his 69.6 being the highest score shot at 1000 yards on the day – by three points!
Mark had shot 102.10 in Stage I to qualify for Stage 2, where he scored 146.14, placing him in 54^th position. This effectively gave David Luckman, this year’s Commonwealth Games Gold medalist and arguably the best rifle shooter in the world at the moment, a 3 point lead going into Stage III, as David had scored 149.20 in Stage II placing him in 3^rd position.
Luckman took a further 3 points lead over Mark at 900 yards shooting 68.6 to Mark’s 65.4, but Mark piled on the pressure at 1000 yards with his 69.6. Luckman replied with 64.3, which was enough for him to finish just one point ahead of Mark and to win H.M. Queens Prize for 2018.
Mark was the top scorer of a sizeable Australian contingent and congratulations must also go to James Corbett who finished 5^th with 279.32 and Angus Bell who finished 9^th with 279.16. Mark Horsnell finished 52nd with 271.18. Well done mark! Associate member Keirin McCamley was unlucky to finish Stage II with 144.15 in 108th position, missing out on a place in the Final by 1 point and 3 centres.
James Corbett was unfortunate in that he went into the final with 148.23 and shot a brilliant 70.6 at 900 yards to put him in the lead, only to finish with 61.3 at 1000 yards, thus indicating the extreme difficulty of the conditions on the day.
Mark’s 4^th place is his best performance at Bisley so far and a just reward for many years of dedication and application. UK Queens results are HERE.

Good report written by Captain of Australian Rifle Team to Bisley 2018 Geoff Grosskreutz is available HERE

Well done Mark! You have done yourself, your club and your country proud.

Tim Walter.
30 July 2018.

Roseville had some busy shooters this weekend (15-16 July)… and before going into the details I want to thank Mike Hodder who did all the hand-loads for some RRC junior shooters (due to the factory ammo shortage). We also want to send hearty congratulations to Angus Martin who was also selected for the NSW State Team and received his numbered cap! Well done Angus!!!

Saturday

NSW Rifle Association’s District Rifle Competition team shoot (5 per team) was held at Malabar in the afternoon (with a bit of a breeze blowing) with 2+10 at 700m and 2+15 at 800m (max score of 125.15 TR and 150.15 F-Class) on manual targets. Roseville had a huge contingent with 11 representatives in the various NSDRA Target Rifle and F-Class teams. Our Rosevilleans did very well:

o   Angus Martin (TR Gold team) : scored 125.15
o   Phill Hodder (TR Gold team): scored 122.9
o   Adam Beale (TR Gold team): scored 119.8
o   Pat Jacombs (TR Green team): scored 119.6
o   Mike Hodder (TR Green team): scored 117.7
o   Gary Faulkner (FTR): scored 147.13 <<<  part  of winning team!
o   Alan Patrick (FTR): scored 144.10 <<<  part  of winning team!
o   Eva Patrick (FTR): scored 142.10 <<<  part  of winning team!
o   Michael Cuda (F-Std): scored 143.7
o   Allan Humbert (F-Std): scored 137.5
o   Peter Walters (F-Std): scored 149.7

While the NSDRA teams shot admirably, it was only the NSDRA FTR team who came home with winners prizes. Congrats to Gary, Alan, Eva and the rest of their NSDRA team!

Sunday

NSW Rifle Association’s City vs Country match was also held at Malabar starting in the morning (brrr very cold!) with 2+10 at 500m and 600m, and finished in the afternoon with 2+10 at 700m and 800m using manual targets. As you will see below, Roseville had a lot of representatives there which shows what a great, vibrant and active club we have.

The day had its issues (e.g. Pat lying down to shoot on a colony of ants and being bitten and having to move, Adam having only a few minutes to do his first detail due to team running out of time, mechanical target D6 was not working properly affecting Dmitri’s shoot etc) but overall everyone enjoyed themselves.

Despite it being a teams’ event, listed below are the individual results from RRC members (max score of 200.40 in TR and 340.40 in F-Class):

o   Angus Martin (City TR) scored an impressive 200.24…..and was top scorer of the day!
o   Dmitri Kazakov (City TR) scored 195.22 with 50.9 at 500m, getting the bull after his rifle cheek-piece had to be removed to replace a misfired round…
o   Phill Hodder (City TR) scored 195.12
o   Adam Beale (City TR) scored 194.19
o   Pat Jacombs (City U25 TR) scored 184.11 <<<part  of winning team (despite the ant bites!!)
o   Angus Langsford (Country U25 TR) scored 182.12
o   Gary Faulkner (City FTR): scored 236.16  <<< part  of winning team!
o   Alan Patrick (City FTR): scored 230.17 <<< part  of winning team!
o   Eva Patrick (City FTR): scored 221.6  <<< part  of winning team!
o   Michael Cuda (City F-Std): scored 225.14
o   Peter Walters (City F-Std): scored 224.11
o   Bob Kozminski (City F-Std): scored 220.15
o   Allan Humbert (City F-Std): scored 211.9

All in all the RRC members did a great job in their respective teams – well done to one and all with special congrats to Angus M, Pat, Gary, Alan, and Eva for making it to the podium and coming home winners.

Janet Beale

The West Wallsend Open Prize Meeting was held on Sunday, 1st July which was a beautiful but a bit chilly day ….rifle shooting is a good way to start the new financial year!

There were 53 shooters competing across the various disciplines and the order of the day was 2+10 at 500yds, 2+10 at 600yds and 2+10 at 600yds.

The intrepid Roseville shooters were Phill Hodder, Angus Martin and Tim Walter in A grade; Adam Beale in B grade; Angus Langsford in C grade and Alan Humbert in F-Standard A grade. Similar to the Wingham OPM, Alex Macaulay (B grade) was an “adopted Rosevillian” for the day because he shoots with Shore School with our other junior shooters.

Highlights of the day

• Angus Martin shot his first 50 with 10!! CONGRATS Angus you have nerves of steel!!
• Tim Walter came 4^th at 500yds
• Angus Langsford won 1^st/2^nd/1^st as 3 range prizes in C grade plus 1^st in aggregate score in C-Grade
• Phill Hodder came 4^th at 600 yds and 4^th in aggregate score in A Grade.

At the end of the day the aggregate scores in target rifle out of a max of 150-30 were as follows:

• Phill Hodder: 149-19 (99.3% accuracy)
• Angus Martin: 148-21 (98.7% accuracy)
• Tim Walter: 146-14 (97.3% accuracy)
• Alex Macaulay: 145-13 (96.7% accuracy)
• Adam Beale: 144-12 (96% accuracy)
• Angus Langsford: 144-11 (96% accuracy)… this should mean he is now moving to B-grade!

The aggregate score in F-Class out of a max of 160-30 was:

• Alan Humbert (F -Std A grade): 175-12 (97.2% accuracy)

So I think you can see Roseville was well represented particularly as almost 50% of the top 4 in each grade/discipline have this range as their home range which would provide them some sort of “home advantage”. Congrats to all!

Author and photos Janet Beale

And so, it came to pass, after about 50 weeks of Club competitions, that the best from each club was assembled to do battle to find the best of the best.  Competitors and club members assembled just after high noon.  The frogs were started.  Blackboards placed in strategic positions.  The Hexta targets were prepared with new aiming marks. The air was electric with anticipation.

The field of fire was 2 + 10 shots each at 3, 5, and 700M with a 2+15 at 800M.

The F class shooters were first to step up for a 1pm start.  Michael (Barra) Cuda our Champion with 1765.144 ex 1800.300 was not available to shoot as he was at the Belmont Range (QLD) for the Nationals.

Alan Ashworth took out F-Std-A clean, with 270.33 from Terry Howell (North Sydney) 268.17.

F-Open-A was Alan Seaman (Manly) again clean with 270.32 from Wu B Lau (Hornsby RSL)

F-TR-A winner was Alan Bowyer-Tagg (Hornsby RSL) with 263.19 from Sandy Mansfield (Manly) 245.11.

Roseville were represented by Phill Hodder (Club Senior Champion 1483.158) and Adam Beale (Under 25 Champion 1210.87) in Target Rifle.

Conditions were excellent for the first three ranges with fine, light overcast and virtually no wind.  At 800M the wind picked up a little with a bit of a fish tail.  The low sun became much more of a problem making sighting difficult.

After 45 counting shots, Adam took out both the Under 25 and Top Overall Shooter with an excellent 223.28 (50.5, 49.6, 50.7 & 74.10, one centre ahead of Phill 223.27 (50.7, 50.5, 50.7 & 73.8).  Adam was 6.11 points ahead of Angus Mansfield.

Competition was intense, and it came down to the wire; the last range.  A demanding 15 shots at 800M with the lowering sun cause sighting problems on the targets.  Phill’s win was against strong opposition, succeeding to beat Bill Ballantyne (Hornsby RSL) by 4 centres, JR Mitchell (Hornsby) by 1.4, Richard Jones (Manly) by 1.5 and Grant Roberts 8.11.

Thanks go to Vern Norrgard (Range Officer), Doug Bowen (Butts Officer), Adrian Bonanni (Statistics) and several others from various clubs who helped make the competition work. Special thanks to Allan Humbert who single handily repaired the front and rear centre rubbers.

Results in more detail here: – https://shooting.hexsystems.com.au/competition/monitor/136

Photos Janet Beale and Uncle Mike.

Author Uncle Mike.