FOR the fifth year in a row a Jersey team of shooters have won the Overseas trophy at Bisley, yesterday beating Canada by six points.
Third were Guernsey, fourth were Kenya, with Germany lagging behind in fifth place.
‘We had a team of 12, with one sighter at 300, 500 and 600 yards,’ explained Jersey marksman Daniel Richardson.
‘Each shooter had seven shots with a maximum score of five points per shot.
Colin Mallett top-scored with 104 points ex-105.
Graham Harris scored 102 points, Mary Norman, Bruce Horwood, David Le Quesne and Cliff Mallett 101, Richard Benest 100, Chris Cotillard, Wally Langley, Ian Jones and John Norman 98 and Peter Stock 95.
‘We finished with 1,192 plus 102 v-bulls; they had 1,186 and 101 v-bulls.
We’ve now won it five years on the trot.’ Following the Prince of Wales competition three Jersey shooters finished in the top 50 from over 1,300 top-ranked world shooters in the cumulative Grand Aggregate.
Richard Benest was 23rd, David Le Quesne 32nd and Colin Mallet 49th, with Daniel Richardson top scoring in the Prince of Wales competition (15 shots to count at 600 yards) with 74 points ex-75, including 11 v-bulls from a possible 15.
Also scoring a creditable 74 points were David Le Quesne, Richard Benest, Colin Mallett and Mary Norman.
Meanwhile, seasoned marksman Alex Langley has finished a creditable sixth overall for distance shooting at 900 yards in the Brigadier event, which attracted a total entry of over 800 shooters.
‘I seem to concentrate more at long distance,’ he explained.
‘I had some luck, because I was shooting early on in the day and then, with one exception, later on in the evening, but I’m confident in my ability at distance, having competed abroad at ranges in the States and South Africa.
‘When you go up to the range at distance, you have to take every shot at a time.’ Conditions were far from perfect yesterday, with strong winds gusting mainly from the left, but Jersey’s next big hurdle is this morning, when they take part in the prestigious team event, the Kolapore, which they have won twice before and have targeted to win again.
This event, for an eight-man team shooting at 300, 500 and 600 yards, allows Jersey to pick from a squad of 20.
Great Britain, on the other hand, have 1,200 shooters to choose from.
Even when they whittle the number down to 200, this is still ten times the number of shooters Jersey have to call upon.
‘But the omens are good,’ said Langley.
‘We won it in 1984, 1995 .
.
.
and now, to continue the sequence, we ought to win it in 2006.
It seems like a natural progression.
Having said that, tomorrow there is no excuse; we have to perform.’ The Kolapore is Jersey’s main chance in the two days remaining to win a trophy of some international importance.
To do so, however, every shooter has to perform to the limits of his or her ability while such is the delicacy of selecting eight shooters from 20, that the selectors were deliberating well into the night yesterday evening, long after many other competitors had gone to bed.
Article posted on 21st July, 2006 - 12.00am
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