August 10th to 17th 2019 saw the Bisley Rifle meeting taking place, and despite lower numbers that the NSRA would like to see at their National Flagship meeting Cheshire & North Wales went to Surrey in force. In all 18 Cheshire & North Wales shooters competed in part (or all) of the 10-day event.
For those who are unfamiliar with the Bisley Meeting, it can be divided into two distinct parts – there is the Weekend Aggregate, shot over the first Saturday & Sunday; and the Week Aggregate shot between the Monday and the Thursday. The Weekend Aggregate comprises 60 shots at 50m and a further 60 shots at 100 Yards. The course of fire for the Week Aggregate is 140 at 50m and a further 140 shots at 100 Yards – quite a marathon really especially for those who chose to shoot both the Weekend and Week Aggregate. There are also 2 different ranges that we shoot on at Bisley, the vast majority of the competitions are shot on Century range, with some (like the Double English Match) being shot on electronic targets at the Lord Roberts Centre.
The conditions were ‘challenging’ to say the least, and even in X class there were a number of us who visited the 7 ring at 100 yards – it really wasn’t difficult, just look at the wind-flags in the picture below, and note how the sand is blowing off the stop-butt.
Thursday also saw a day of pretty solid rain – I mean it rained all day, not that the rain was impenetrable! But brollies, wellies and waterproofs were definitely the order of the day!
Setting that aside, Cheshire & North Wales entered teams in all 3 of the County Shoots: The County 50 Meter; The County Sextette; and The Astor.
In the County 50m – Simon Green, Neil Almond, Mark Parry, Nick Clark, Carl Taylor, Shelbie Marsland, finished in a credible 6th place with an aggregate score of 3,467. The match was won by Hampshire with a score of 3,491.
In the Sextette we fared slightly better finishing in 5thplace with a score of 2,263 against the winners Essex on 2,283. Our Sextet Team was Simon Green, Neil Almond, Mark Parry, Mike Arnstein, Carl Taylor and Gavin Scott-Brooker.
In the Astor Trophy (a Dewar Course) however, we did somewhat better winning the trophy (which will be on display at the Appleton & County AGMs later in the year), but our team of Simon Green, Neil Almond, Mark Parry, Nick Clark, Alan Bain, and Shelbie Marsland made a score of 2,292 to tie with Middlesex, but took the title due to a better 100 yard score!
Individually a number of our members won prizes and collected various accolades throughout the week, including 3 Finalists in the Earl Roberts British Championship and 1 in the BoBs Championship final.
A number of the attendees were at their first Bisley meeting, and despite the weather and the somewhat daunting course of fire all did exceptionally well, and I hope we will see them, along with many others at Bisley again next year. The Dates for your diary for the 2020 Bisley Meeting are 13thto 22ndAugust!
Full list of Cheshire and North Wales Attendees:
|
Simon Green |
Neil Gibbons |
Neil Almond |
|
Alan Bain |
Tom Keay |
Anna Maughan |
|
Matt Manton |
Shannon Davies |
Carmen Kilgannon |
|
Gavin Scott-Brooker |
Brendan Newport |
Mike Arnstein |
|
Shelbie Marsland |
Wayne Davis |
Carl Taylor |
|
Mark Parry |
Mike Sinfield |
Ian Beeston |
As far as prizes for the individuals were concerned
Simon picked up the silverware in 4 competitions, finishing in an excellent 3rd place overall in X Class, winning the Any-sights as well as Competitions 1 and 3, he also made the Roberts Final, finishing in 3rdplace, securing English Long-Range Championship to boot
Alan ended the week on a definite high finishing in 3rd place in the Bobs Final, and wining promotion to A class, as well as finishing within the top 10 in each of the 6 individual competitions during the week
Anna’s 5thplace finish in C class will also win her promotion into B for next year’s meeting, and she also picked up 2 bronze medal places in the Weekend competitions.
For Shelbie her first Bisley was also very successful, and it saw her win the Junior Championship, as well as finishing 3rdin Class, so she too will be competing in B next year. Shelbie also made her debut in the County Teams, in both the 50M team and the successful Astor Team
Matt also picked up silverware for his excellent shoot in Competition 8 during the weekend aggregate and finished in an excellent 5thplace in the week Aggregate, to back up his 3rdplace finish in the Weekend Aggregate.
Gavin followed up an excellent performance in Scotland with a top 10 Aggregate finish, as well as being part of the winning Astor team
Shannon breezed into the Roberts Final as well, and secured the British Junior Long-Range Championship as a result
Neil & Simon won the Club Pairs in the Weekend Aggregate, and despite an amazing 399 from Simon on his half of the Week pairs only managed a Bronze in that Competition.
3 of our members in Simon, Mark and Carl represented their Countries in the Home Countries International on the Thursday afternoon, obviously Mark & Carl shooting for Wales, and Simon for England.
In the Champion of Champion Shoot at the Lord Roberts Range on the Wednesday afternoon Neil managed a respectable 13th place out of the 31 Counties represented. Neil also made the Roberts Final finishing in 14thPlace.
Finally for anyone who read my Scotland report you may remember that Mark had 'bragging rights' having finished up 19 posts ahead of me overall, well he retained these bragging rights but his margin was cut to a single point over the entire aggregate!
A full set or Results from the meeting are available on the NSRA Website here
Neil Almond - CNW Rifle Captain