Greetings,
Today, May 8 2021, we held our first Outdoor Air Rifle Benchrest Match for the 2021season. This season is already starting out better than last year. This morning we were greeted with some cool weather and warm smiles from shooters that have endured one heck of a last year and are ready to start fresh and do this. There was a chance in the schedule to allow for a “spring tune up” benchrest match so we quickly got it scheduled it for this week. We had other events at the club which pulled some club regulars from our attendance, but we did very well with the shooters we had.
I should mention that Joe and Jon brought a friend, George Shoup with them from the Lansing area. This was George's first air rifle benchrest Event, and I believe he had a good time. We hope to have George back with us soon. George shot a Springer .177 rifle, and learned a lot in his first outing. The main thing was to have fun, learn the benchrest ways of managing wind, mirage, time etc. Thank you for coming out George, and we hope to see you again soon.
So as far as how well our diverse group of regulars shot. We had a shooter in the Open Class Ryan Parks, he did very well with a high X count. We Had Mark King in the Springer class, he shot very well battling the switching wind conditions and the cold. We had my wife Michelle Becigneul, our only female, and only LV shooter, she shot her best scores ever today, having practiced all winter at the indoor matches. We had Tom Evans, club member and master carpenter that helped so much with the new barn. He shot very well today bringing out his HV Thomas rifle. We had my Father Francis shooting my Thomas rifle, he also shot about his average, not bad for a tough day. Jon Wulff did very well with his RAW HV, and Joe Chapman did very with his RAW HV. Scores will be below in attached files. We shot 2 matches of 25 Meter USARB Benchrest. The scores will show scores for the first match, and the second match, and also the combined aggregate taking both matches into account.
When we finished the regular USARB match we offered a chance for some shooters to try the new National 50 League targets for 50 yards. IT WAS WINDY… about halfway through I reminded the shooters that there is a handicap in place that allows for pellet shooters score to be measured with a .35 cal plug… boy were they happy to hear that. Although I did hear some grumbling that a .45 plug wouldn’t help them…. All in all these guys had fun with the N50L target system.
!!! PROMOTION !!!
Before the match Chris Martin and I got a chance to get together other than phone conversations and finalize a date and a plan for an upcoming Main Event. From here forward we will be referring to this event as the "Michigan Invitational”. Our plans are to hold a weekend Championship for Outdoor Air Rifle Benchrest. Which will consist of a Friday practice session with an evening Meet and Greet, followed by combined USARB style 25 meter and National 50 League Outdoor matches, which will have a points placing system to come up with a combined winner. The match will be on Saturday with catered lunch and dinner with awards and merchandise drawings and raffles. This will give us a little time for some “fun" shooting on Sunday before breaking and heading home. The weekend we chose will be the second weekend in September, Sept 10-12, 2021. Our plans are to do this each year to promote Air rifle accuracy and Benchrest competitions. Chris and a few local members will have a list that I will put out of restaurants, and Hotels in the area for those traveling from out of town. We will be taking RSVP’s and preregistration very soon as soon as we lock in a price package for this Event. Chris and I also agree that putting together a list of local attractions, for those that travel with “non-shooters” so they can spend some time taking in some of the beautiful Michigan Early fall sights.
Match 1>>>
COMPETITOR CLASS MATCH 1 "X" MATCH 2 "X" MATCH 3 "X" TOTAL "X" Cal.
0 0
Ryan Parks Open 239 4 238 3 242 2 719 9 22
Tom Evans HV 238 6 230 3 244 8 712 17 177
George Shoup Spr 0 0 177
Michelle Becigneul LV 229 0 227 2 237 3 693 5 177
Francis Becigneul HV 229 2 228 3 238 4 695 9 177
Joe Chapman HV 239 4 245 6 244 7 728 17 177
Jon Wulff HV 230 3 234 1 230 2 694 6 177
Mark King Spr 213 1 196 1 205 0 614 2 177
Match 2>>>
COMPETITOR CLASS MATCH 1 "X" MATCH 2 "X" MATCH 3 "X" TOTAL "X" Cal.
0 0
Ryan Parks Open 244 8 241 3 236 7 721 18 22
Tom Evans HV 233 3 231 2 215 0 679 5 177
George Shoup Spr 0 0 177
Michelle Becigneul LV 223 2 220 0 219 1 662 3 177
Francis Becigneul HV 226 0 228 2 227 2 681 4 177
Joe Chapman HV 247 10 240 1 234 3 721 14 177
Jon Wulff HV 233 3 234 4 234 2 701 9 177
Mark King Spr 217 0 225 0 217 2 659 2 177
Combined>>>
Competitor Class Total X Cal. Place
Ryan Parks Open 1440 27 0.22 1
Michelle Becigneul LV 1355 8 0.177 1
Mark King Springer 1273 4 0.177 1
Joe Chappman HV 1449 31 0.177 1
Jon Wulff HV 1395 15 0.177 2
Tom Evans HV 1391 22 0.177 3
Francis Becigneul HV 1376 13 0.177 4
