Bisley 200 Weekend 2022 - Day 2 - Bisley Gun Club 31/7/22
I’m writing this the day after because a 3 and a half hour drive home along the A303 in summer after a days shooting doesn’t leave much time or mental energy for writing reports, especially when it’s a 6am leave for work the next morning!
Day 2 was the most comfortable we’d been all weekend. A proper cloudy day, somewhere around 26 degrees, very welcome after nearly 30 for 2 days. For context, my hotel room was 28 degrees overnight...
It was even nicer when you added in the stiff breeze blowing through the shooting range.
No, we're not in the desert!
That wind was coming from directly behind us, and it pushed down more than a few targets as the day went on.
Once, Lorrie Greening, who shoots from a wheelchair, never saw the target she called for before it hit the floor – it was so low that it never popped up above the trap house! A swift query with the referee had it rightfully declared a no-bird, and she called another one – which didn’t stay whole long!
But, as expected, nothing bothered the man of the moment.
First, a quick recap of the situation after day 1. Steve Janes obliterated his way through a 99/297 to top the scoreboard. Harry Lufflum and myself are sharing overall 2nd, 8 points behind Steve on 289 each. Martin Jeminson is 4 points behind us on 285.
Realistically, Harry and I are the only ones who might be able to catch Steve, but only if we shoot perfect, and he has a nightmare of a day.
Surprisingly, (which it wasn’t at all!), it didn’t happen that way!
Steve carried on from where he left off, the 8 point margin giving him more than enough room for comfort. He cruised through the day to victory with many a target blown to atoms, and a 99/295. Even if Harry and I had shot 300s, we wouldn’t have caught him.
In fact, Harry finished up with a 288 which was a solid result, and put him in overall 3rd place at the end with 577 when his scores were added together. That was also a very convincing A class win.
Martin had a much better 2nd day. He wasn’t entirely happy with his comb height on day 1, so after some small tweaks, he finished off his weekend with a 293, ending up in overall 2nd.
Which should tell you something about my 2nd day! Long story short, it wasn’t my best work. I missed 2 whole targets and 3 second barrels in my first round, and that swiftly turned my innings into a damage limitation exercise.
Charging too hard at targets to try and make something happen cost me dearly, and it wasn’t until the last round that I returned to shooting how I did on Prelim day, methodically and smoothly smoking my way through a 24/72 to finish on a good note, and a 96/281.
That note got rather better when I found out that I’d picked up the prize for 2nd in AA with 570!
Ladies Champion for the weekend was Lorrie, who had to cope with severe back pain on day 2. She wasn’t sure if she could shoot at first, but decided to give it a try, and managed a 279.
Added to her 284 from day 1, that gave her a commanding lead of 16 points in Ladies with 566.
She thought that wasn’t very good, but a lot of them disappeared in balls of soot and I told her it WAS rather good, considering the pain she was in!
Congratulations and well shot Steve, Lorrie, and everyone who picked up a class or category prize over the 2 days.
It was a shame that we didn’t have more entries, but any number of reasons could have caused that.
Thank you to everyone involved in running the weekend, the referees Jack and Tony, Bill Logan for acting as relief ref, Janine for running the office side of things, and to the catering department for providing much needed refreshments in the hot weather!