By Malcolm McKellar

Saturday brought clear and warm conditions with a light variable breeze and well-shadowed targets, making for excellent conditions for shooters in a double 700m match at Mossman and District Rifle Club.

In the first 700m match, Neil Attwood opened the full-bore target rifle (308 cal., non-telescopic, manually-supported) competition with a pair of two-pointers, blaming the mirage, and built to a five-point bulls-eye before fluctuating between three and four-pointers and closing with another bull to post a disappointing, given recent form, 34 points (out of 50, this 10-shot match) with no centre-bulls.

Veteran Ron Schild followed, opening with two four-point ‘inners’, but then struggled to find the centre with a string of three-point ‘birds’, interspersed with the odd four-pointer, before retiring with equipment failure and a score of just 21 points for the match.

North Carolina visitor, Norm Bunting, familiarized himself with the 308 target rifle, but declined the opportunity to shoot, saving himself for the double 300 metre match next Saturday.

Mal McKellar was last down and was in the centre of the target from the get-go, opening with a bulls-eye and following with a string of bulls and centre-bulls (also worth 5 points, and used to differentiate tied scores on a count-back) punctuated by just one wayward three-pointer, and closing with an impressive 48 points with five centre-bulls to take the win for this first match.

Norbert Schmidt opened the F-class standard (308 cal., telescoped and bipod-supported) category with a four-point ‘bird’, but quickly found the centre. However one more ‘bird’ and a fluctuating pull between the bull and centre-bull saw him post a disappointing 52 points (out of 60 this 10-shot match), one point behind McKellar’s F-class-equivalent score of 53.

In the second 700 metre match, Attwood again opened for full-bore, this time with two bulls-eyes, but dropped away mid-match with a string of also-ran shots before pulling a late bulls-eye to close out with a marginally improved percentage and 38 points (out of 55, this 11-shot match), but still no centre-bulls.

Schild was unable to repair his damaged bolt in time for the second match and withdrew from the competition.

McKellar was again the last of the contenders on the mound, and once again opened very strongly with a string of four straight centre-bulls, followed by an uninterrupted mix of seven straight bull-eyes and centre-bulls, to close with a perfect shoot for this second match and a score of 55 points with six centres and the match win.

Schmidt’s second range for F-class saw him improve his percentages marginally, however one four-pointer mid-match and a wayward three-point ‘bird’ to finish, diminished an otherwise fine shoot and saw him post a moderately respectable 58 points (out of 66 this 11-shot match), three points behind McKellar’s F-class-equivalent score of 61.

In summary, under excellent conditions, the full-bore target rifle double 700m match was taken by Mal McKellar with an outstanding 103 points (out of 105) and 11 centre-bulls, over Neil Attwood second with 72/0 and Schild third.

The F-class competition was taken by Norbert Schmidt with 110 points out of 126, four points shy of McKellar’s F-class-equivalent score of 114.

Mossman and District Rifle Club meets every Saturday at 1pm at their club range mid-way between Port Douglas and Mossman on the Captain Cook Highway. Visitors are always welcome.