05 ORA Meeting Final Day

Coach Derek show us all how its done (twice)

Sunday saw the culmination of both the ORA Grand Aggregate, with ten-shot shoots at both 600m and 900m in the morning, before the final of the Lieutenant Governor’s in the afternoon, which entailed a 15- shot shoot at 900m to add to the 200 points contested yesterday (over 300m, 500m, 600m and 800m).  

It was another hot, sunny, damp-underfoot morning with a deceptively strong, but steady wind from the right.  Half the team capitalised in full with Liam Cheek leading the way with 50.7, leading to a tie shoot – more of that later.  The other diarist put in a strong 50.6 to put him a clear point ahead of his nearest competitors for the Grand Agg.  900m was even hotter, with mirage the only indicator of the wind strength as the flags seemed to have been turned off.  Oli Russell was not fazed by this, posting 50.7 to win the Long Branch competition outright, a mere 5 V-bulls ahead of this diarist’s score.  With the other diarist scoring 48.4, that opened the door to the ORA Grand Agg for remaining GBRT team members, with five of us ending up on 3-off (347 ex 350): Jon Underwood, Nigel Ball, this diarist and Chris Haley, but Derek Lowe’s 41 V-bulls proved enough to ensure he secured his victory by 2 V-bulls.

Whilst waiting for stats confirmation, we moved swiftly on to Liam’s tie shoot, where, despite forgetting his ammunition (again – see lollipop section below), he recovered well to post 25.3, meaning it went to shot-for-shot, which is always a crowd-pleaser.  Unfortunately his ordinary bull was not enough on the first of the sudden-death shots, with Bernie Pepin victorious with his V-bull.  2-0 to Canada versus GB on tie-shoots this weekend.  Lunch enabled a brief respite from the heat before the Lieutenant Governor’s final.  In the interim the flags had been turned on with the wind now coming fairly steadily from the right, with most seeing brackets of up to 4 minutes through the shoot – enough for the odd magpie along the range.  Not content with winning the Grand Agg, the other diarist also succeeded in being chaired off the range after his 74.6 ensured he pipped Pat Vamplew by a single V-bull.  A well deserved end to the consistent performance from Del over the weekend, which, more importantly, earned him his first lollipop.

On to prize giving, with heartfelt speeches of thanks from competitors and hosts, particularly for the many cadets who acquitted themselves in exemplary fashion – Canadian shooting looks to be in fine fettle and should provide strong competition for years to come.  GBRT featured well in the prizes, with the top 7 places in the Grand Agg, 7 of the top 10 in the Lt Gov’s final and a host of individual range/agg/team prizes – a happy treasurer this evening.  Dairy Queen rewards all round tonight before curries/italians (other food types are available).  Tomorrow is a rest day with plans for seaplanes, spas, sightseeing and a bit of shopping (possibly with some laundry thrown in too), before we head off on Tuesday for a bit of R&R 150km south, in Glen’s Resort in Gananoque.

Lollipop update:  in addition to Liam and Del (per the above), today’s recipients were: Nigel (suffering in silence through the daily ammo rodeo), Crispy/Lauren (for service to incorrect register keeping), Oli (being quite good at long range), David & Stuart Young (for being the only (?) parent/child combo on a GB TR team and smashing it in the Families competition) and Graham (for having butter fingers when carrying large quantities of beer).

Full details of the team scores can be found in the usual places.