Our local East Central District Rifle Association team won the 2017 McAuliffe Shield pennant final with a final score of 889 points over Karramomus with 870 points on the Karramomus Rifle Range last Saturday. This makes it a clean sweep for the ECDRA winning all MCAuliffe Shield matches this year and seventh consecutive winners of the McAuliffe Shield (2011 to 2017) a fantastic effort and exemplar teamwork by all members.
The final was hotly contested under what can be best described as very difficult conditions. A freezing, gusting wind out of the North East, straight off the snow fields blew down the range into the faces of the shooters. The wind not only caused eyes to water, it cut through the many layers of warm clothing with a wind chill factor close to zero. As it swept down the range it changed both strength and direction in an almost unpredictable way. The scores tell it all, with only four possible scores for the whole day three of these were the target rifle shooters for the Karramomus team using peep sights and one for the ECDRA, Rosco Davis who shot a brilliant 60.5 at 500 yards. Despite the pressure and the conditions the ECDRA team was up to the task and the wind coaches Geoff James ( using all of his 60 plus years of rifle shooting experience) and Captain, Marty Kelly must be congratulated on their efforts throughout the entire shoot. ECDRA ended up with 47 of the teams shots being in the dead center of the target while the Karramomus team on their home range could only manage 16 dead centres. Rosso Davis shot brilliantly all day with very tight groups to top score for the ECDRA both off rifle (174.11 out of 180) and on handicap saving 6 handicap points scoring 180 just ahead of David Wallace who also scored 180 on handicap. Captain, Marty Kelly had the hard luck story of the day shooting last a 600 yards after a solid days coaching had a perfect score going until his 6th shot when he missed the target - a quick recovery meant he finished with 52 out of 60. The over 80’s best shoot went to Norm Linehan who finished the first two 500 yard ranges only 4 points down with a couple of very tight groups then the long cold day took its toll at 600 when he shot a 53. Well done Norm. The ECDRA handicap team results were: top shot, Rosco Davis 180.11 followed by David Wallace 180.6, Norm Linehan 178.10, Des Coulter 176.13 and Matt Frazer 175.7 . Other ECDRA handicap scores were: Marty Kelly 174.6, Geoff James 172.4 and Roger King 168.7. The consistency of the team and the ability of the ECDRA shooters to shoot to their handicap has been a feature of the team’s performance all through the competition. Next week it will be the annual Goulburn Vally DRA prize shoot on Saturday followed by the Karramomus picnic shoot on Sunday both shoots will be on the Karramomus range. For those not going to the prize shoot there will be shooting at the Violet Town in preparation for the Chas Hayes Long range pennant consisting of three matches over 800 900 and 1000yards. The 800 to 1000 yard distances are regarded as the First Class distances where the shooters have very little margin of error in both shooting and adjusting their sights for the prevailing conditions. All State, National and “Bisley England” ( the home of long range precision shooting) finish at 1000 yards or just over 900 metres and a lot can happen to a projectile as it travels the 1.5 seconds from the rifle to the target. We wish our local ECDRA team the best to retain the Chase Hayes Trophy that they won last year.
