Winter 2002 - National Rifle Association

“C“CHALLENGEFOR A LOWERSCORECORE”by Tony Di DomenicoOn 10 and 11 of May 2002 the target rifle shootingteams from within BAE SYSTEMS gathered togetherfor the annual Inter BAE SYSTEMS target rifleshooting competition at Bisley. Competitors weredrawn from all over the country, including some fromLancashire in the North and some from Frimley, justaround the corner from Bisley ranges. The sites beingrepresented were BAE SYSTEMS Warton, Stevenage,Stanmore, New Malden, AMS Frimley, Astrium UKand ROF sites Radway Green, Summerfield, Glascoedand Nottingham. One or two of the sites couldn’t raisea complete team of four, but that didn’t stop them fromtaking part and making up the numbers with the othersites.Since Royal Ordnance is part of BAE SYSTEMS, ROFRadway Green donated some excellent quality 7.62mm 155 grains match ammunition and also sent twoteams to represent their site. Joining us for a secondyear to present the medals and trophies was Major-General John Russell-Jones, BAE SYSTEMS’ Armyadviser.There were four competitions being competed for overthe two day event, two team and two individual.Firstly, the long range Weybridge Memorial Trophyis shot for at 800, 900 and 1000 yards on Stickledownrange. On the following day the short range WartonChallenge Shield is shot for at 300, 500 and 600 yardson Century range. Both events are for teams of four,each member shooting two sighting shots followedby ten scoring shots at each distance to give anindividual score out of 150 and a team total out of600. Both competitions are run according to NRArules, sighters are convertible and, as it is a team event,coaching is encouraged. Team coaches can be one ofthe team of four, or a fifth non-shooting member. Infact, for some members, the main challenge is thechance to practice their coaching skills at Bisley undercompetition conditions.Matthew Nightingale from BAE SYSTEMS Warton acting as RCOduring the Short Range Competition. (Photo: A Di Domenico)Running concurrently with the team events are theindividual competitions, introduced for the first timethis year. All competitors were divided into differentclasses, essentially class X for NRA class X and Astandard competitors, and class T for most of the rest.The Summerfield Challenge trophy is awarded to theclass X competitor who achieves the highest combinedscore in the long and short range competitions; theGlascoed Challenge trophy is awarded to the class Tcompetitor who produces the highest combined score.The individual competitions were introduced as it isacknowledged that some of the best shooters may becompeting in relatively inexperienced teams, so theirhigh individual standards often go unnoticed.Essentially, we wanted to introduce an element ofindividual challenge and to recognise the standardsof individual competitors and I am happy that we havedone just that.This year’s competition began with the long rangeevent, on Stickledown range, for the WeybridgeMemorial Trophy. During the day the weatherremained cloudy and dry, although it was quite cold,not that that put anyone off! At 800 yards there wereno less than four scores of 50, with Nick Verduyn fromStanmore scoring 50.7, beating his team mate JeremyLangley and Stevenage’s Geoff Alcock by just one Vand John Deane, also from Stevenage, by three Vs.And would you believe that no less than ninecompetitors all scored 49! Stanmore took an early leadwith a team score of 195, just two points ahead of AMSFrimley and five ahead of Warton in third place.During the 900 yards shoot two people returned scoresof 50, with Nick Verduyn from Stanmore scoring 50.7,beating Mark Roberts from Summerfield by two Vs.Four competitors turned in scores of 49, so thestandards were proving to be very high indeed. Again,Stanmore produced the best team score, with 190, justthree points ahead of AMS Frimley and ten ahead ofWarton. At 1000 yards the individual scores were alldropping a point or two, as you might expect withthe distance increasing. Even so Jeremy Tuck fromNew Malden still achieved a 50.5, beating CharlesDickenson from AMS Frimley by one point and twoVs with just two competitors scoring 48. This timeAMS Frimley made a very spirited fight back to score189, nine points ahead of Stanmore and 16 ahead ofSummerfield in third place. In the final reckoningAMS Frimley had pipped Stanmore to the trophy byjust four points out of 600, with Warton taking thebronze medals.In the individual competitions; in X class Jeremy Tuckfrom AMS Frimley had scored a very impressive 148,just one point ahead of his team mate CharlesDickenson, who was one point ahead of Nick Verduyn18