Tag: rugeley

Rugeley shooters represent at Welsh Airgun Championships

by RichHin Competitions

Shooters from Rugeley Rifle Club collected medals in Cardiff this weekend at the Welsh Airgun Championships. Held at the Sport Wales centre in Sophia Gardens, the meeting rolls in three days of shooting with three matches. Competitors participate in the Cardiff Grand Prix; an AirOShoot qualification match (in which top scorers can qualify for the Super Final in Belgium) and finish with the Welsh Open Championship.

Shooting Air Pistol, Pavelas Voitiukevicius placed 2nd in the Cardiff GP on Friday, before placing 3rd in the AirOShoot qualification match on Saturday – climbing in the final to win silver. On Sunday, he qualified for the final in the Welsh Open Championship match, narrowly missing a medal to place 4th.

Paul Watkiss placed eighth in the Cardiff GP and qualified for the Bronze medal match in the Mixed Pairs, where he finished 4th with randomly-allocated partner Ina Gulowsen Knudsen. Paul finished 12th in the AiroShoot match and 17th in the Welsh Championship.

Kiril Voitiukevicius placed 5th in the Cardiff GP, and qualified for the final of the AirOShoot match, finishing 7th. He placed 23rd in the Championship.

On Air Rifle, Zoe Perkin placed 12th in the Cardiff GP and 10th in the AirOShoot match, finishing 25th in the Championship.

Friends of the club Mike & Megan Bamsey also shot strongly, with Megan claiming silver in her AirOShoot and Cardiff GP matches, whilst Mike placed fourth in the Cardiff GP and won silver in the Welsh Championship.

Three medal winning shooters stand on a podium with their medals
Pavelas takes silver at the Welsh Airgun
A young man aims an air pistol at a shooting match
Two athletes are presented at the start of a finals match
Paul and Ina in the Mixed Pairs final.
A man aims an air pistol during a final at the Welsh Airgun Championships.
Pavelas in finals action
A young lady aims an air rifle at the Welsh Airgun Championships
Zoe on aim

Rugeley awarded Performance Club status by NSRA

by RichHin Club News1 Comment on Rugeley awarded Performance Club status by NSRA

Rugeley Rifle Club is delighted to have been registered as an NSRA Performance Club.

Scan of a certificate showing that Rugeley Rifle Club is registered as an NSRA Performance Club

NSRA Performance Clubs are those with an ethos of competition and athlete development. Achieving recognition as a Performance Club is testament to the hard work by the club committee and members in developing the facilities to allow quality training activities – particularly the new club room, training building and availability of electronic targets at 10m and 50m. It also recognises the effort by the club’s volunteer instructors and coaches, not only in developing athletes, but also providing support and continued development for instructors and coaches.

A cone depicts a performance pathway, with clubs feeding into performance clubs. These lead to Regional and National squads, culminating at a World Class Programme.

Top 5 finish for Paul at NSRA-Eley Final

by RichHin Competitions

Rugeley member Paul Watkiss placed fifth in the A-Class 10metre Air Pistol final of the NSRA-Eley Postal competition this weekend. Having shot two postal stages at the club, Paul qualified with the top 15 shooters nationally for the final at Bisley.

Well shot Paul!

Rugeley RC joins the Fediverse

by RichHin Club News

We’re delighted to announce our newest social channel – the Fediverse! Using the ActivityPub plugin for WordPress, this site is now also an ActivityPub instance. All news posts from this site will be accessible, and users can follow our feed from their accounts on any federated server. Find us at “rugeleyrifleclub@www.rugeleyrifleclub.org.uk”.

ActivityPub is the foundation underlying a new type of social media, where users can run their own servers or join other public servers, which can all communicate with one another – think of it like email. You can send an email from an Outlook account to a Yahoo account. You are not limited to sending email only between Outlook addresses.

No single company controls the “fediverse” – the community of “federated” ActivityPub servers. Anyone can create or join a server – large or small – and follow their friends and interests on that server and other servers. There are a variety of different types of instance. Pixelfed is oriented towards image sharing, much like instagram. You may have heard of Mastodon in the news – which is more like Twitter. If you’re interested, the easiest route is to visit joinmastodon.org, pick a server (it really doesn’t matter which) and have an explore. mastodonapp.uk is a UK-oriented server, which may be a good place to start, but you can access accounts on any server from any other server and you can move your account later on if you want to.

Victory for Zoltan in club Through the Ranges competition

by RichHin Club News, Competitions

Zoltan Papp won Rugeley’s 2023 Through the Ranges competition on Sunday.

Shot Prone over 25yards, 50metres and 100yards, the competition tests shooter’s abilities indoor and out.

A trophy is awarded to a target shooter
Zoltan wins the Kershaw Trophy in the 2023 Through the Ranges competition
A trophy is awarded to a target shooter
Dave wins the Buttery Trophy in the 2023 Through the Ranges competition
A group of target shooters on an outdoor range. The firing point is covered by a tin roof.
A group of target shooters on an indoor range.

National Selection and Championship Finals for Hemingway

by RichHin Club News, Competitions

Rugeley member Rich Hemingway had a sterling weekend at Bisley, shooting for Wales and qualifying for the Final of the British Prone Championship (the “Earl Roberts Championship”) at the close of the NSRA’s 2023 National Meeting.

On Friday, Rich warmed up by comfortably making it through the First Stage of the Earl Roberts, placing 9th of the 50 who qualified. That afternoon he went on to shoot in the Home Countries International, competing for Wales against England and Scotland. Wales narrowly placed third, close behind Scotland. Rich had the second highest score in the Welsh team, just a point behind Sian Corish – who was awarded the “Tartan Dragon” trophy for highest Welsh scorer.

Rich Hemingway with the 2023 Welsh Home Countries Team
photo credit: Eleanor Shorey theshorey.co.uk

On Saturday morning, competitors took to the range for another early start to contest the Second Stage of the Roberts, from which 40 qualified to the final. Placing 27th, Richard entered his first Roberts Final, making him the first Rugeley or Staffordshire shooter to compete in the final for some years.

Shooting a Double Dewar course – 40 shots each at 50metres and 100yards – the wind picked up significantly, as is appropriate for championship finals! In gusty conditions, many competitors struggled to keep their scores above 190, with a smattering of big flyers (including 4s and 6s!) seen along the range, especially on the 100yard portion. Keeping their cool amongst all of them though was 2022 champion Lina Jones, who retained her title with a score of 772. Rich finished his debut Final with 756, placing him 20th.

Trophies galore at County Championship

by RichHin Club News, Competitions

Rugeley cleaned up at the Staffordshire County Championships on Sunday with members winning nine trophies.

Richard Hemingway retained his title as County Champion, ultimately earning five separate trophies – the Association Cup (Overall Confined Championship), the 50Metre Challenge Trophy, the Miniature Rifle Cup (A-Class Champion), the Michelin Cup (best 100yard scores in A-Class) and the Greatrex Cup (top NSRA County Medal holder).

Deb Truman became Staffordshire Ladies Champion. Graham Delaney won D-Class, with Lee Featherstone runner up. Paul Watkiss narrowly missed out on a medal, placing fourth in C-Class.

Youth Shooting Camp

by RichHin Club News

Rugeley Rifle Club is delighted to announce it’s Youth Shooting Camp 2023.

Running from August 19-22, and on August 26th this is a tented camp at Target Sprint Burntwood.

Saturday, Sunday and Monday nights will be spent under canvas. Airgun shooting will take place at Burntwood with .22lr shooting at Rugeley Rifle Club. There will also be team activities and camp fires.

On August 26th, the campers will be invited back to Rugeley Rifle Club with parents and guardians to see the progress made and have an end-of-camp shooting competition including air rifle, air pistol and .22 rimfire rifle. The young person showing the most promise will earnt he Young Gun Trophy and a years club membership, with free ammunition sponsored by Eley!

Apply to Lee Featherstone (RRC Secretary) at rugeleyrc (at) outlook (dot) com.

The cost of the camp is £50.

More than 80 take aim at Club Open Day

by RichHin Club News

More than 80 visitors from the local community tried their hand at Rugeley Rifle Club’s Open Day on Saturday. Despite drizzly weather, young and old received a tour of the club’s facilities and tried their hand at air rifle and air pistol, before enjoying the barbecue on the outdoor range.

Local councillor Olivia Lyons formally opened the new range wall on the 100yard range. The club successfully crowdfunded to replace the old wall, which had been in place 51 years.

Club Chairman Martyn Buttery & local Councillor Olivia Lyons stand in front of a tape as they formally open the new range wall.
Club Chairman Martyn Buttery & local COuncillor Olivia Lyons open the new range wall.
A young boy and an adult man fire target air pistols.
Visitors try their aim with air pistol
Two young people are sat at benches shooting air rifles from rests.
Juniors take instruction on benchrest air rifle
Visitors sit at benches shooting air rifles from rests. They are shooting at 10metres on the club's 25yard indoor range.
Visitors shoot benchrest air rifle at 10metres on the club’s 25yard indoor range

Rugeley Members represent Wales in Commonwealth Championships

by RichHin Competitions

Megan Bamsey, Mike Bamsey and Richard Hemingway represented Wales at the recent Commonwealth Shooting Federation (European Division) Championships. Club Chairman Martyn Buttery also attended, captaining the England team.

Mike medalled in every event he contested, winning:

  • Gold – 50Metre 3-Position Rifle(Individual)
  • Silver – 50Metre Prone (Pairs, with Mark Parry of Appleton RC)
  • Bronze – 50Metre Prone (Individual)
  • Gold – 10Metre Air Rifle (Individual)
  • Gold – 10Metre Air Rifle (Pairs, with Emily Bale)

Rich Hemingway placed 4th in the 50M Prone Final, whilst Megan placed 6th in the Women’s 10M Air Rifle. Friend of the club Liam Webster earned his first cap for Wales, shooting in the Prone Development match.

The 2022 Championship was hosted by the Welsh Target Shooting Federation, with airgun shooting taking place at Sport Wales in Cardiff and .22 at Tondu Target Shooting Club near Bridgend. Free practice opened on Thursday 8th September. With the passing of Her Majesty the Queen on Thursday evening, it was initially thought the Championships might be cancelled. Guidance was received from the Lord Lieutenant to continue discreetly and respectfully in memory of Her Majesty. A minute’s silence was held before each match.

Full Results can be found on the WTSF website.