Trap shooting expensive

Press, 9 April 1980, Page 24

Trap shooting expensive

By

BOB SCHUMACHER

fflC Bolstered by a continS’gent of almost. 100. marks-f-men from Australia, the /•■New Zealand trap ehooting at the Yaldt#jhufst. range . recently at).|itracted more than 500 •t It was one of the biggest national championships for ♦•individuals in the country | and the value of the shot--guns on display and the r cost of 'ammunition used—- | about 150,000 cartridges | were spent—would make fit the most expensive of all (..championships. | With conditions remain- 1 t ing favourable throughout i'the week, there were many | possibles recorded—the I only exception was the « double .rise" event—and £ shoot-offs were, needed to sdecide the firet. placing in ('six of the seven champions ships. y The rivalry between the | top Australian ...and . New > Zealand shooters was in* J tense and. increased in* «terest in the championships, ? especially as both countries were represented in f all the shoot-offs. After six of the seven i: championships, the score * stood at three all in vic*

tories and honours were also even in Fittingly, New Zealand’s only nomination in the shotgun events for the Moscow Olympic Games, John Woolley, broke the deadlock.

There were four competitors who scored the possible 150 in the points score championship, but only one Australian—and he was first to miss in the shoot-off.

However, several .Australians, lightheartedly, claimed Woolley’s triumph as a further success for them. Although representing the Christchurch Gun Club, Woolley ha-s been living in Melbourne for the last 12 months.

No competitor was able to win more than one title, although the experienced John Thomson (Rotorua) and Murray Cameron (Hutt Valley) were placed) ihitwo events, Cameron finishing second in the ’ single -rise event after the shbot-off lasted a record 505 targets. The victories of John

Maxwell (Australia), Joe Wilson (Southland), Roger Wasley (Manawatu), Kevin Thomson (Australia) and Jim Elliot (Australia) were their first at New Zealand championships. Woolley had his second title, but for the remarkable Southland shooter, Jim McKenzie, his skeet win was his seventh in that competition and advanced his over-all championship tally well into double figures. McKenzie, a farmer from Seaward Downs, has won .more than 300 trophies during the, list 30 years—a total unequalled by any New Zealand shotgun shooter. His well-worn /.German model shotgun provided a dull contrast to the. many shiny and more ■expensive ’ weapons at Yaldhurst, but it proved a trusty gun in his proficient -hands.

McKenzie’s successful Southland ’ teammate, Wilson, considered it ironical that his ■first; national title should occur in the double rise event. “Last year I

missed the New Zealand event by one target and it was the double rise shoot that let me down.”

As far as Canterbury shooters were concerned, one of the highlights of the week was the victory by the Amberley pair, Ivan Boyce and Colin Streeter, in the two-man skeet shoot.

They were two of only eight marksmen to break the possible 50 targets and the two veterans of 30 years shooting won the Lewis Trophy unchallenged with the maximum score of 100.