Nearly four weeks have passed since ECDRA members were last able to shoot, and thankfully today we learned that we can resume practice with 10 shooters on the mound on Saturday. Masked up of course, and out of doors only, a small price seeing the weather is looking to be good.
Sadly all the clubs we compete with in the regional competition, other than one, are bound by the Greater Shepparton restrictions that are yet to run their course.
ECDRA members were looking forward to shooting the short range final against the Karramomus Rifle Club, but alas Karramomus is 800 metres inside the Greater Shepparton municipal boundary. A review of the team scores has revealed that ECDRA were the only team over the shooting year to have not suffered a defeat in the McAuliffe Shield (handicap) competition, well technically speaking, because one match was a draw.
The association steering committee has declared ECDRA the 2021 champions without the requirement of a final match.
In this competition small handicaps adjust the score just like golf, and as a result the "champion team" (of up and coming competitors) has the advantage over the "team of champions". The pile of membership cards in the photo below attests to ECDRA's growing strength, with 2 - 3 times the membership of the other clubs, most members having been recruited over the last two to three years.
Speaking of the "teams of champions" the Katandra rifle club were similarly declared Parker Cup champions, the Parker Cup being a non-handicapped team competition in the traditional Target Rifle discipline. That result was not unexpected since most of Katandra's members are current or past national team representatives in this sport which represents the oldest of international competitions that Australia has contested. Older even than the America's Cup in yachting, and older too than the Australian nation.
In the lockdown, a number of ECDRA members have taken the opportunity to discuss a project that had been proposed some time back, stimulated by the formal opening of our new clubhouse at Violet Town range. There is a desire to establish a written history of the member clubs of the region, and this includes some of the oldest clubs in the State. So far a lot of material has been gathered about the Euroa and Violet Town rifle clubs, and we know 1883 or 1884 was the time that the rifle ranges were constructed from research of old newspapers and some histories collated locally. We even know a "Miss McKenzie" fired the first shot on the Violet Town range, but there will be a bit of work to track down her descendants, and others mentioned in the papers.
Eildon, Gobur, Merton, Yea, Euroa and Mansfield rifle clubs have their own story too, and that will require some research of non-digitised local papers.
It was noted by our late President Rob Chaffe and the club committee at the time of the range improvements that a rich history of competitive target shooting and past membership could be lost and we needed to collate trophies, written records and newspaper articles, ephemera and notate verbal history of the relevant clubs,
We have just started the process so we will be very grateful if any readers of our FB page that have been past members, or associated with the clubs through family and friends, can help in any way. Please use Messenger to contact us.
We remind our followers that competitive rifle shooting could be your sport, and we invite you to find us. Our range caters for Hunter/Sporter class shooting for those of you that are already marksmen or lady marksmen. Fingers crossed, we may just get to shoot the 800 yards, 900 yards and 1,000 yards competitions in 2021, and have a shot at the Avenel Shield which is the non-handicap (first past the post) competition for F Class shooters.