Performance: BUCS Success for Clay Shooters
7 March 2011
Cardiff University's Clay shooting club Is only in it’s 4th official year as an affiliated AU club, but it’s not one to sit in the background and follow the lead of those who have a more established reputation. They are in fact a club who has, successfully, gone to the annual BUCS competition, and won medals. This year was no different.
For Cardiff the competition started at 9 which meant an early start from the hotel and the weather wasn’t on their side, cold rain and cloudy conditions – not the perfect start to the day!
The arrival to West Midlands Shooting ground saw them split into squads and made their way to one of the 14 stands to start the 100 clay shoot. The difficulty was instantly apparent as the targets that had been experienced in previous years were replaced with challenging and awkward ones.
The hours flew by, the rain came down and the number of clays left to shoot tumbled, till all that was left to do was wait for the scores. The reputation within the club is to go and match and ideally improve on last years results. This year the aim was to stomp on last years results of Bronze for the mens and ladies teams and an individual Bronze for the ladies.
The results trickled in and the prizes were announced. Cardiff had done it. Individual GOLD for David Kidner with a massive 92. Joint silver for the Men’s team with a total score of 325, this included David Kidner’s 92, Mark Hampton with 81, Tasker Rufus Thomas with 77 and Henry Bales with 75. The Men’s team missed gold by 4 clays losing out to Harper Adams. The Ladies team also won Silver medals, again losing out by 4 clays to – guess who?- Harper Adams, however contributing to the massive score of 231 was Nat Davies with 74, Harriet Parfitt with 59, Lissy Elis with 49 and Georgie Handasyde-Dick also with 49.
Club President Ryan Luffman says “It’s such an achievement for the club, some of our members only started shooting in October, and are putting in competitive scores!”. Cardiff managed to dominate the score boards for the 5th year running and plan to continue their success next year as well.
- Written by Harriet Parfitt
