Friday, August 19, 2005
Shoot wrapup
I know...I know. "You've been home 4 days and you're just now writing the shoot wrapup from last weekend?" This was the first week of school for the kids and I had jury duty for the last 3 days. I was busy. Do you want the wrapup or not?
This trip was done a little differently than the last few and was quite a bit more fun. Instead of staying in a motel during the shoot we teamed up with my Greg, my assistant coach, his daughter Megan, and their 30' fifth-wheel trailer. Sure, at a motel you have a pool, a shower, and cable tv, but nothing quite compares to staying at the range in a camper. Watching the sun rise over the trap fields.....coffee bubbling on the stove.....swapping stories with the other live-in shooters....and the best part: stepping out the front door with your shotgun and walking directly to the line to shoot. As they say in the commercials, "It doesn't get any better than this." Of course, one by-product of staying together like this is that the kids are all firmly convinced that all adults are crazy. Perhaps the midnight serenade of "The ant and the rubber tree plant" had something to do with it.
Greg and the kids all shot 400 targets over the 2 day shoot - 200 each day. Greg and Megan had never shot competition trap before and both did very well for their level of experience. In fact, by the time she was finished Megan had improved here scores by almost 50%. I really think her main issue at this point is vision. She wears a pair of very stylish, very small prescription glasses that look nice but simply do not have a large enough field of vision to use effectively for aerial shooting. A good set of prescription shooting glasses (or contacts) will allow her to see the target much more clearly and should improve her scores dramatically.
Kathy and Nathan got their butts kicked in the Saturday singles event by some kid named Josh that we had never seen before. They didn't let it get them down and went out for the doubles event (two targets thrown simultaneously) with fire in their eyes.
They tied for first place in their division.
It was starting to rain by the time all the scores were in, so they flipped a coin to see who got the title and Kathy won. She's planning to frame the quarter.
Josh was back for the Sunday singles event and beat them both again, but not by much. The Sunday handicap event was Nathan's last chance for a trophy that weekend and he wanted it bad. He buckled down and shot his highest score ever, beating his sister by 2 broken targets. He practically danced his way to the scoreboard.
How did I do? Well........some good, some bad. I shot all 6 events for a total of 600 targets. I learned that it is very distracting for me to shoot with my kids, simply because I keep trying to be a coach when I should be concentrating on my shooting. After blowing the first singles event and the first handicap event, I got my head on straight and broke 96 out of 100 targets in the doubles event, winning my class by 1 target.
Saturday's singles event went well, but in the class I shoot in 97% just isn't good enough. You can usually get away with missing one target, but missing three generally puts you out of the running for the trophy. Still a good score, but not quite enough. I broke another 97 out of 100 in the first Sunday handicap. That score was good enough to win my class and increase my handicap as well, moving me back to a 26 1/2 yard handicap. (27 yards back is the maximum) A storm blew in while I was shooting the second Sunday handicap and I spent more time watching the lightning than the targets, coming out with a score of 91 out of 100 from my new handicap distance. Not in the money, but any score above 90% from way in the back is a good score.
I ended up winning enough money in the purses that all of the entry fees for both kids were paid for, with two event titles to boot. The kids won one event each, and even took home some $$ themselves. As far as I'm concerned, prize money = fun money so we all trotted down to the bank on Monday to cash our prize checks together.
The money and trophies are nice, but the smiles on the kids' faces are worth a whole lot more. It was a damn fine weekend.
_
This trip was done a little differently than the last few and was quite a bit more fun. Instead of staying in a motel during the shoot we teamed up with my Greg, my assistant coach, his daughter Megan, and their 30' fifth-wheel trailer. Sure, at a motel you have a pool, a shower, and cable tv, but nothing quite compares to staying at the range in a camper. Watching the sun rise over the trap fields.....coffee bubbling on the stove.....swapping stories with the other live-in shooters....and the best part: stepping out the front door with your shotgun and walking directly to the line to shoot. As they say in the commercials, "It doesn't get any better than this." Of course, one by-product of staying together like this is that the kids are all firmly convinced that all adults are crazy. Perhaps the midnight serenade of "The ant and the rubber tree plant" had something to do with it.
Greg and the kids all shot 400 targets over the 2 day shoot - 200 each day. Greg and Megan had never shot competition trap before and both did very well for their level of experience. In fact, by the time she was finished Megan had improved here scores by almost 50%. I really think her main issue at this point is vision. She wears a pair of very stylish, very small prescription glasses that look nice but simply do not have a large enough field of vision to use effectively for aerial shooting. A good set of prescription shooting glasses (or contacts) will allow her to see the target much more clearly and should improve her scores dramatically.
Kathy and Nathan got their butts kicked in the Saturday singles event by some kid named Josh that we had never seen before. They didn't let it get them down and went out for the doubles event (two targets thrown simultaneously) with fire in their eyes.
They tied for first place in their division.
It was starting to rain by the time all the scores were in, so they flipped a coin to see who got the title and Kathy won. She's planning to frame the quarter.
Josh was back for the Sunday singles event and beat them both again, but not by much. The Sunday handicap event was Nathan's last chance for a trophy that weekend and he wanted it bad. He buckled down and shot his highest score ever, beating his sister by 2 broken targets. He practically danced his way to the scoreboard.
How did I do? Well........some good, some bad. I shot all 6 events for a total of 600 targets. I learned that it is very distracting for me to shoot with my kids, simply because I keep trying to be a coach when I should be concentrating on my shooting. After blowing the first singles event and the first handicap event, I got my head on straight and broke 96 out of 100 targets in the doubles event, winning my class by 1 target.
Saturday's singles event went well, but in the class I shoot in 97% just isn't good enough. You can usually get away with missing one target, but missing three generally puts you out of the running for the trophy. Still a good score, but not quite enough. I broke another 97 out of 100 in the first Sunday handicap. That score was good enough to win my class and increase my handicap as well, moving me back to a 26 1/2 yard handicap. (27 yards back is the maximum) A storm blew in while I was shooting the second Sunday handicap and I spent more time watching the lightning than the targets, coming out with a score of 91 out of 100 from my new handicap distance. Not in the money, but any score above 90% from way in the back is a good score.
I ended up winning enough money in the purses that all of the entry fees for both kids were paid for, with two event titles to boot. The kids won one event each, and even took home some $$ themselves. As far as I'm concerned, prize money = fun money so we all trotted down to the bank on Monday to cash our prize checks together.
The money and trophies are nice, but the smiles on the kids' faces are worth a whole lot more. It was a damn fine weekend.
_
