John-R Jones
Saturday the 4th of March was the first of the two planned field target competitions. The field target format:
- Springbuck – 5 shots at 25m sitting with shooting sticks.
- 5 Handgun Chickens at 40m standing unsupported.
- Warthog – 5 shots at 50m standing unsupported.
- Duiker – 3 shots Heart/Lung area at 100m standing with shooting sticks.
- Duiker – 2 Head shots at 100m sitting with shooting sticks.
Scoring: Paper targets; Kill shots 5 points (Head or Heart/Lung) & 3 points spine or outer rings, other hits anywhere on body 1 point, Silhouettes 5 points for knock down only, i.e., max score is 5 x 20 = 100.
We were 6 shooters, one of whom was my 12 year old grandson Joshua. He as hunted with me on one occasion (June 2023) and bagged himself a nice impala ram with my 6.5×55 Swedish Mouser. His dad Anton had hunted with me before, but for both of them we went through a vigorous training and evaluation routine including shooting with the .22 over bags, then over sticks and then with the 6.5. This was the first time he attempted to shoot in the competition. As outlined above the first five shots were from a sitting position over sticks; some of us got 4 shots in the 5 ring and one in the three ring; Joshua shot all 5 shots in the 5 ring. He shot his standing shot using bipod mik-stiks and he shot all five chickens down at the 40m rail. He also shot the warthog that was in the same position, but struggled a bit with that on only managing to put 1 shot in the 5 ring, 2 in the 3 ring and two outside the 3 ring.; Anso decided to help him out and put one of her shots in the middle of the 5 ring obliteration the number “5” in the center. This means that he gets that score (Anso new she did this so she shot a 5th shot on her target and scored well with that one too). Joshua managed 3 good heart long shots on the 100m duiker but missed the two head shots. Low and behold Joshua ends up in first place, beating me with my own rifle. Well done, Joshua. We are going to encourage him to pursue shooting as a sport.
The top 5 were:
1. | Joshua Coetzee | 83 |
2. | John Rutherfoord-Jones | 81 |
3. | Anso Spencer | 79 |
4. | Markus Diedericks | 70 |
5. | Tom Diedericks | 64 |
The next shoot will be the Field Target format, see you all there.