The John Reynolds annual 2 day skeet Carnival – 10th 11th May 2008

A warm and still morning greeted the 30 or so shooters as they assembled in the clubhouse for the first day of the inaugural 2 day Caboolture Clay Target competition.

The early morning dew glistened on the freshly mown grass as welcoming music provided a background to the good natured ribbing as the shooters greeted each other and said their G’days during sign on.

The grounds were immaculate and the clubhouse and its facilities positively glistened such was the standard of the preparation for the event, even the spare pencils for the score cards had been sharpened just in case a scoring emergency situation arose.

The organisers had injected an element of fun into the proceedings by providing some shooting themed songs to get everybody in the mood and Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries’ from the film ‘Apocalypse now’ was soon blasting over the Tannoy system. As the first squads made their way to the respective layouts ready for a prompt 9:30 start it was quickly silenced as the first shooters called for their sighters and the competition began.

The first event was a 25 target cash divide. Maybe the thought of winning cold hard cash caused jitters amongst some shooters but many struggled to read the high house correctly and consequently returned some lower than usual scores, in fact not one possible was shot for the event. The highest score was shared between Nick Aird and Laurie Sceresini who both dropped one target each to finish on 24/25.

With the ‘eye opener’ out of the way it was time to start the days 100 target event and the office staff were hunting for the red marker pen as a number of perfect 50’s  were handed in and by the lunchtime break it was obvious that things had settled down and people had got their skeet heads on!

However the excellent lunch provided was too much for some as the early high scores slipped away in a blaze of fluorescent disbelief. With shooters falling by the wayside it was a close run to the finish between Nick Aird and Laurie Sceresini for overall and as they began their final 25 it could have gone to either shooter. With conditions now near perfect it was Nick who came closest to the perfect score with a very commendable 99/100 with Laurie chasing him all the way just one target behind. Nigel Hughes took A grade with 96/100, Roy Shelvey with 85/100 took B grade honours and Matthew Rhue shot an impressive 92/100 to take C grade honours.

With all competitive shooting finished for the day it was the usual herd who shuffled across the layout to the clubhouse to wash the dust of broken targets from their throats.  Many a tale of the lost target that would have made all the difference was told to anyone who able to provide a sympathetic ear.

Day two began with perfect targets being thrown in perfect conditions. Caboolture can easily be taken for granted as the targets can be deceptive and the combination of fluoro targets against a backdrop of trees and sky can easily catch out the best of shooters and so it was with added concentration that the shooters lined up for the first event of the day – the ever popular handicap.

The beauty of the handicap is of course that theoretically anybody can win it regardless of grade or experience and after the initial fifty targets there were some 13 shooters from across the grades lining up nervously in two squads for the shoot off.

As is the norm with the handicap there were several lower grade shooters all with several birds in hand lining up next to some seasoned pros who were ‘on wood’. But the unpredictable factor here is nerves which can soon devour those extra ‘lives’ and see shooters dropping like flies.

This was the case with squad 1 who by station 8 had only one shooter left; the young Josh Teague. Josh was shooting very well and kept his nerves in check to make it this far only to miss the high house and bow out. But with squad two still shooting on the next layout it was by no means over yet…. Squad 2 contained some old hands and experience showed as they moved smoothly from station to station until only two shooters remained on station 6, Nick Aird and Nigel Hughes who were both on wood. But it was a deceptive low 6 that saw Nick leave the way open for Nigel who cleared the station and went on alone to complete the round unaware that upon clearing station 8 he took the handicap. 

After another relaxing lunch it was onto the ‘love it or hate it ‘doubles event and it went to a shoot off with Laurie Sceresini and his trusty Krieghoff shooting a commendable 65/68 against Nick Aird who dropped his 65th target of the event and allowed Laurie to claim the top spot.

With shooting over for the day it was time for the bar to open and the stories to begin while the office staff hastily prepared the results. With all the results in, bribes offered and threats made the results for the high gun prizes were as follows:

Overall – Nick Aird with a tightly shot 221/225.
Loveable Laurie Sceresini won AA high gun with a superb 220/225.
Nigel Hughes will be finding room in his wife’s trophy cabinet for his A grade trophy while the ever jovial Roy Shelvey shot well to win B grade high gun. C grade was awarded amidst a round of encouraging applause to young Josh Teague who showed many of the more seasoned shooters how to do it and looks like he could well become a force to be reckoned with.

Caboolture is rare. It is one of the few clubs where there is no snobbery between the disciplines and it is a testament to the members love for the sport of Clay target shooting in general and their desire to develop the Caboolture club itself that this shoot ran so smoothly.

Many people from the other disciplines gave up their own time in the days leading up to the weekend to help out with the preparation. There are not many clubs where you will see the DTL members helping prepare for a skeet shoot, a sporting member cutting the grass on the layouts or trap shooters helping out with the catering. Long may this spirit continue and grow within our sport and well done and thank you to all those who helped.

Of course non of this would have been possible without the generous help of the sponsors and thanks go once again to John Reynolds for his continued and very generous sponsorship of the event and thanks also to the additional sponsorship from Nigel and Lorraine Hughes who sponsored some additional prizes and also supplied the ‘Hughes high gun skeet trophy’ for the overall high gun.

It was felt in hindsight that the shoot was held too close to Mothers day and that this was reflected in the number of shooters able to attend and so it has been suggested that next year it will move to the latter part of the year where there will be more opportunity for people to attend, perhaps as a pre-runner the State carnival – once a date has been confirmed it will be advertised on the website – www.cctc.com.au.

Caboolture Clay Target Club
Skeet results for the annual 2 day skeet carnival
Saturday and Sunday 10th & 11th May 2008.
5 squads. Warm and dry