Newbury revisited

This was our second visit of the season to Newbury and today the course explored other areas of the woodland. It was an excellent test; congratulations to Andrew Slade and the Newbury team for their hard work and course design.
There was very little wind, the occasional gust might inadvertently cost a target but in the main it was shoot within the kill, hence high scores were expected. The morning session was topped by ex world champion Dan Eley who dropped just two targets. With such benign conditions performance on the discipline lanes will likely decide the winner and today there were ten to test and six of them were standing. The morning scores were littered with high 40’s including three shooters in A grade on 44. So the gauntlet was laid down for the afternoon squad could anyone better 48?
Here are two well dressed morning shooters: Kilty's coat hints of the Winter League
and it looks likes Lee Marshal has found a sponsor!

By 1pm it was very hot so the shaded woodland brought welcome relief. The odd breeze was for once appreciated though perhaps not by those on the firing line. I started on lane 3 with Hugh Osborne and Brian Samson. To my left Greg was hoping to pick up some tips from another ex world champion James Osborne.

It is a pleasure just to be in the woods at Newbury, sometimes the position of the lane can give the impression that you’re on your own and only the regular sound of targets falling over breaks the spell.

After eight lanes the course rotated 180 degrees, at the turn of four lanes two were standing and one was kneeling; was this to be amen corner?

British Champion Nick Murphy competing in the piston class shows off his standing style

There then soon followed another adjacent pair of discipline lanes and when, after these, James Osborne was still clear a buzz of anticipation could be felt; could he clear the course? FT has this way of spreading information, quickly it was established that a 50 shot GP course had never before been cleared. There were still plenty of targets to conquer and many were testing; a good number were long range that would surely punish a nervous twitch. As he came to his last lane, still clear, I paused from my own turn to watch. He was shooting the lane I had started on so I knew the first was close to full range; it went over. With number 49 down I heard his shooting partner, Chris Briscoe, comment “that’s the hard one“. James replied “no, this is the hard one”. Over it went and the BFTA had its first clearance on a 50 shot GP course; well done Mr Osborne!

And here's the proof!

The clearance perhaps overshadowed some other high scoring. Once again Marc Fisher with 46 scored more with a springer than most AA shooters do with a PCP. A grade was won with a incredible 48 from Simon Pattle, 44 took B grade honours for Peter Moore and congratulations to Jack Harris who won C grade, at his first GP, with 39. Hats off also to Brian Samson who showed great shooting skill to record the highest ever SFT score of 42.

Pete Rowley pondering "surely 47 will win A grade!"

So after a 49 at Iceni James goes 1 better at Newbury; will it be 51 next time!

So we leave Newbury until the Masters on September 5^th and for those lucky 64 the Showdown on the 6^th.