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Eventual F/TR winner, Stuart Anselm - 308Barnard, Robertson stock, Sinclair bi-podnormally start around 10.30 am and most of theprevious evening was spent answering the phonetelling the ‘Dollopers’ – “Yes 8.30 am was not amiss-print on the entry form and no, we don’t needflood lights!”First up would be the Open Class shooters and mostof the highest placed League shooters from lastyear had entered, as had the F/TR guys, so it wouldhopefully shape up to be a good competition. Aswith previous years, the order would be reversed thefollowing day to hopefully give everyone the sameweather ‘window’. Once the ‘sneaky’ sighters wereover (sorry, I mean blow-off shots) the competitionproper got underway at 9.00 am., so almost on time.The first distance to be contested was 800 yards andthere was only a light wind blowing down the valleybut still, at this distance even in a light wind, hittingsomething not much bigger than a CD (our five-inchV bull) with any degree of regularity is still a difficulttask. By the time the Open Class guys had finished,seven of them had managed to keep it in the 5-ringand two shooters, Simon Rodgers and Paul Hill putin scores of 75.10v.On count-back the honours went to Simon with AndyMassingham a close third on 75.8v.The conditions remained the same formost of the morning and by the time the FT/R guys took to the firing-point they alsoposted some impressive scores withDiggle’s Ian Dixon shooting the highest with a 73.4v.The 2008 F/TR League Champion, Russell Simmondsand Steve Rigby were close behind, both on72.6v.For Match 2 we dressed back to 1000yards and just adding that extra 200 yardscertainly brought the scores down.Conditions hadn’t changed thatmuch but the wind was nowfish-tailing. One Open Class score was head andshoulders above the others, with John Campbellposting a very impressive 72.7v. The next highestGrant Taylor on 70.4v, then Peter Wilson on 69.4v.As you would expect, scores also tumbled in F/TR,112 Target Shooterwith the highest being a 63.2v posted by StuartAnselm with yourTarget Shooter writers Vince Bottomley and LaurieHolland not far behind on 62.1v and 59.2v respectively.When you consider that F/TR is limited to the308 Win. cartridge, unlike an Open Class competitorwho can pick any calibre he likes, Stuart’s scorewas good enough to have bested almost half of theOpen Class shooters.So by the end of day one, John Campbell wasleading the Open Class on 146.8v, with Grant Taylorclose behind on 145.12v - a remarkably high V count,especially as this was the first outing for Grant’shome-smithed rifle in 284 Win. Improved. The F/TR competition was also fiercely contested with 2ndplace on the day going to Vince Bottomley on 133.4vbut just in the lead, Stuart Anselm on 134.7v.We finished the shoot in scorching sun and allshooters who were members of the GB F ClassAssociation made their way into the Diggleclubhouse for the Annual General Meeting.which you can read about on the Associationwebsite at www.f-class.org.uk Once the AGM wasover, the traditional shoot dinner - or obligatoryDiggle curry evening - was the order of the day.Day two again started bright and early with yet againmore sun, possibly the first time in the hundred yearhistory of the range that the sun had shone on twoconsecutive days! The squadding was now reversedto hopefully even out the weather conditions andallow everyone to shoot early morning whenconditions were most favourable.This time we started at 900 yards with the F/TRshooters taking to the point and again, the conditionsappeared to be fairly benign but that light breezewas fish-tailing dangerously. None the less, severalof the F/TR guys posted great scores with StuartAnselm shooting an excellent 71.6v but the firstplace went to Paul Harkins with a stunning 73.6v.You will see further down this article that Paul’sscore also beat every Open Class shooter at thisdistance - well shot Paul. The conditions appearedThe Open Class guys at 900yards