Roseville Rifle Club Australia

End of April means ANZAC Day and, for some, an extra long weekend. This provided the potential to shoot for 3 days at Malabar in 3 separate but conjoined competitions. First was the ANZAC Day OPM (25^th) where Roseville had 6 entrants, then the City of Sydney OPM (26^th) where Roseville had 2 entrants, then the City of Sydney Long Range Championships (27^th) where Roseville had no qualifying scores but 1 entrant (Janet paid for entrance but did load testing at 800m and didn’t submit her score).

After the solemnities at the ANZAC gates, the Roseville crew gathered for a photo proving we had 3 in attendance for Target Rifle (Alan (TR-A), Adrian (TR-B), Chris (TR-C)) and 3 in F Class (Ross (FS-B), Eva (FTR) and Janet (FTR)). The first day of competition (2+10 and 2+15 at 600m) commenced under reasonably nice conditions with wind over the right shoulder. Roseville’s best showing was Chris Sefton gaining a Bronze medal for the day (TR-C) and Janet also getting a bronze for the day (FTR) despite the fact she was load testing and changing powder weights mid-shoot. Special commendation to Alan Patrick who only dropped 2 points (TR-A) but had a high centre count and was unfortunately out of medal contention.   Overall, at the end of the day, all the Roseville competitors had top 10 placings in their respective disciplines / grades (Chris and Janet 3^rd, Ross 5^th, Alan and Eva 7^th, Adrian 9^th) showing the strength of our club shooters against people who were mostly on their home range.

The second day of competition was a holiday for some and a work day for others. The competitor numbers were therefore quite different to the previous day; but then so was the wind which decided to carve up the field somewhat. The competition was 2+10 at 500 twice and 2+10 at 600 twice but it wasn’t easy.  Roseville was down to only 2 competitors: Adrian managed a 1^st place and 3^rd place in two of the details (TR-B) and Janet, still load testing, also surprisingly had two 3^rd place details (FTR). Adrian finished the day in 4^th place (TR-B) just out of medal contention.

The final day of competition was at 700m, 800m and 800m with very nice mild flags. The day was not without an interesting event:- the police closed the range for a period at lunch time while they searched for someone in the bushland on the side of the range and on the headland. Even a police helicopter checked things out.  Everyone was instructed to stay very close to their rifles in case the person being sought appeared. But after an extended delay, with no additional drama, the police left and the shooting commenced.  No Roseville competitors had scores recorded because Janet was our sole representative there doing one detail of load testing at 800m but without submitting her card.

Janet Beale