16th June 2009

Four Scottish Rifle shooters have been selected as part of the Great Britain team for the forthcoming European Championships, which will be held in Osijek, Croatia, in July.  Jon Hammond and Neil Stirton will compete in the Men's Prone and 3x40 matches, Rory McAlpine in the Junior Men's Prone and Kay Copland in the Junior Women's Prone.  They will also be joined by Scottish Shotgun shooters Shona Marshall and Sian Bruce in the Women's Trap and Junior Women's Skeet respectively.  Full details of the team are available on the British Shooting website.

16th June 2009

Graham Rudd was the sole Scottish medal winner at the British 50m Championships last weekend at Bisley, taking silver in the Men's 3x40 event, with James Paterson 4th and Martin Sinclair 6th.  In the Women's 3x20 Jen McIntosh qualified for the final in 3rd place, ending up 6th after the additional ten shots.  Dave Caughey, Mike Ozmond and Mel Mutch qualified for the final of the Men's Prone, ending up in 4th, 5th and 7th places respectively.

In the Home Countries matches, the Men's Prone team lost out to Wales - their first win since in a Prone match since 1909! - by one point, and trailed England in the 3x40.  Both Women's teams fared less well, coming third behind England and Wales in each of the Prone and 3x20 competitions.

11th June 2009

6th June 2009

Jen McIntosh set a new Personal Best of 590 in the Junior Women's Prone at the Shooting Hopes competition in Pilsen this morning, winning the Bronze medal on the tie-break.  The GBR team of Jen, Kay Copland and Wales' Helen Warnes also took third in the team event.

6th June 2009

The second Prone Grand Prix of 2009 saw more fine shooting.  Martin MacGill led the way in the Angus Open, winning Class A with 596, four points ahead of Hugh Simpson and Dave Caughey.  Things were closer in Class B, Patrick Jess on 589 one point ahead of Cliff Ogle, with Cyril De Jonckheere a further point behind.  In Class C James Ross won with 583 ahead of Andrew Ozmond on 583 and Jon Malone on 576.  Sarah Brown was runaway winner in Class D with 585, ahead of Simon Batchelor on 579 and Brian Atkinson on 578.

In the Grand Prix events James Ross secured his second win in the C&D event, ahead of Jon Malone and Bruce McIntosh.  Jon moves into first place in the Series.  In the A&B event there was another fine 596, this time from Mike Ozmond, giving him a four point lead ahead of Bill Vaughan going into the final.  Those two remained first and second after the final, with Hugh Simpson moving up to take third place.  This moves Bill into first place in the A&B series, with the next event in Wick next weekend.

28th May 2009

Kay Copland, Jen McIntosh, Ollie Barron and Rory McAlpine will be returning to Pilsen for the Shooting Hopes competition as part of a combined GBR team with juniors form Wales and Northern Ireland.  Kay, Ollie and Rory will shoot in the Prone events, with Jen taking part in the Prone, 3x20 and Air Rifle matches.  Sinclair Bruce will attend as one of two coaches.  The competition runs from 4th to 7th June.

28th May 2009

Sheena Sharp, Matt Thomson & Dave Caughey will be attending the Danish Masters in Aarhus from 4th to 7th June.

20th May 2009

Neil Stirton came very close to the final in the Men's Prone at the World Cup in Munich, ending up as one of ten athletes in a Shoot-Off for one place in the final on a score of 596.  The Shoot-Off, a new introduction from the beginning of this year, consisted of five shots, scored decimally.  Neil didn't make it through to the final, ending up in 14th place.

11th May 2009

The first Prone Grand Prix of 2009 produced an equal Scottish Record for Hugh Simpson, with a superb score of 599 in the Open section of the competition, winning Class A by a margin of five points ahead of Dave Caughey, with Martin MacGill third one further point behind.  Class B was also won by a substantial margin, James Brown four points clear with 594 ahead of Fraser Cheetham on 590 and John Sinclair on 589.  Things were a little tigher in Class C, Gary Rose winning with 583, one in front of Andrew Ozmond and Mary Melvin.  Ian Henderson takes the award for bandit of the day, winning Class D ten points clear of Simon Batchelor, 586 to 576, with Brian Atkinson third on 574.

Ian went on to win the C+D Grand Prix also, but his 584 was only one point ahead of Andrew Ross on 583, with Simon Batchelor third on 581.

In the A+C Grand Prix, a resurgent Bill Vaughan with 593 led Cliff Ogle and Kay Copland on 592 into the final, with four more shooters on 591 and Mike Ozmond last man in on 589.  Bill shot a very steady 103.8 to extend his lead, with Dave Caughey moving up to second ahead of Cliff in third.

updated 12th May 2009

Thanks to James Paterson who spotted an error and led me to find some others as well!

8th May 2009

The Scottish team of Jon Hammond, Graham Rudd and Neil Stirton broke the Scottish team record for the Men's Three Positions match today in Pilsen, with scores of 1152, 1147 and 1140 respectively.  This adds 12 points to the mark set by Jon, Donald McIntosh and Martin Sinclair in 2003.

The Grand Prix runs for two more days, with Men's Air Rifle and Women's Prone tomorrow and Women's 3x20 on Sunday.

7th May 2009

Neil Stirton qualified for his second international final of the year, with a score of 597 in Pilsen today.  This took him into the final in 6th place, but he was unable to make any progress and finished in 7th.

Neil combined with Jon Hammond on 594 and Martin MacGill on 592 to set a new Scottish Record of 1783 for the Men's Team of Three, adding three points to the score shot by the Scottish team who won at this competition two years ago, and two points ahead of the existing British Record.  Today however the team were less fortunate, ending up just off the podium in 4th, with England's score of 1786 well ahead, denying the Scots a British team record.

4th May 2009

Kay Copland has returned from the ISCH competition in Hannover with a Bronze medal in the Junior Women's Prone event.  An equal Personal Best score of 594, shot with a new rifle she has been using for a month, tied for second place, one point off the lead, unfortunately losing out on the Silver on the tie-break.  This is the first Scottish medal at this competition.

Elsewhere there was some positive results: James Paterson setting a new Personal Best of 1134 in the Men's 3P; fifth place for the Men's Prone team of Sinclair Bruce, Dave Caughey and Martin MacGill; 15th place with 593 for Dave Caughey in the Individual event in only his second International match, along with a solid performance of 591 from Robin Honhold in his first year as a Senior and Ollie Barron just one point away from the Junior Men's Prone final.

With some of the team now home, the remainder have a day of training in Hannover and then make their way to Pilsen in the Czech Republic for the Grand Prix of Liberation, where they will be joined by Neil Stirton and Jon Hammond.

4th May 2009

West Atholl Rifle Club are once again hosting the Scottish Multi-Discipline Shooting Championships 2009 to be held at Blair Atholl on 17th May.  An entry form is available here.  Please note the principal organiser this year, to whom entries should be returned, is Tony Langford.  Mike Baillie-Hamilton will also be assisting.  As usual they would be very grateful if you could circulate this entry form amongst other target shooting clubs of which you are a member.  Please also consider cajoling two others to join you in a concurrent team of three and enjoy a day doing something a little different to your normal shooting.  There is no need to be proficient in all four disciplines - most entrants have only one or two stronger cards.  Coaching and equipment is available in all disciplines.

updated 7th May 2009

Aberdeen University came close to a clean sweep of the team and individual events at the recent British Universities Championships held at Appleton in late May.  Teams from the University won the main event for a team of eight, along with the quarter and pairs, missing out only on the ladies triad.  Kay Copland (Aberdeen) won the Individual Championship, with Emma Cole-Hamilton (Robert Gordons) and Robin Honhold (St Andrews) taking second and third respectively.

4th May 2009

Jen McIntosh won the British Schools Smallbore Rifle Association's short range championship, with a perfect score of 300 in the final round.

15th April 2009

Jim Cole-Hamilton has repeated his feat of winning both the Scottish and British Short Range Prone Championships in the same year.  Jim won both events in 2002, and has achieved the same success again in 2009, with a combined total of 799 ex 800 points across the two finals - 399 successfully defending the "Daily Record" Scottish event, with 400 required to take the British "News of the World" version. 

Andrew Ozmond won the U18 title Scottish title for the Sir Harry Lauder trophy.

15th April 2009

Jon Hammond, Graham Rudd and Neil Stirton have all been selected as part of the small GBR teams which will be competing at the ISSF World Cups in Munich and Milan in the second half of May.  All three men will be taking part in all three events - for more details see the British Shooting website.

15th April 2009

Somewhat belatedly comes news from Dortmund last month, where Neil Stirton produced the best performance in the Scottish team, reaching the final of the Men's Prone with a score of 597.  In a tight final, with four Olympic finalist alongside him, Neil took fifth place.

Elsewhere, there were personal bests for Jen McIntosh in the Junior Women's 3x20 and Fraser Cheetham in the Junior Men's Air.

8th April 2009

8th April 2009

Jon Hammond returns to Beijing later this month, in the company of Neil Stirton, as the two British shooters competing in the second ISSF World Cup of 2009.  Both men will shoot in the Men's Prone and Men's Three Positions events.

23rd March 2009

The following teams represented Scotland in the annual postal international match against North Island, New Zealand:

16th March 2009

The Scottish Air Rifle Championships were held over the last two days at the Scottish Police College in Tulliallan.  The Open title in the Senior Men's event went to Ken Parr, with a steady 590 in the qualification round giving him a three point lead going into the final.  Graham Rudd took second place, winning the confined Scottish title in the process, with Robin Law second in the Confined and third in the Open.  Fraser Cheetham won the Junior Men's title ahead of Andrew Ross.

In the Women's event Jen McIntosh was unchallenged, winning both the Junior and Senior titles with a qualification round of 390, seven points ahead of her Mum, Shirley McIntosh.  Emma Cole-Hamilton took third place in the Senior event with Kathryn Williamson second in the Junior.

Full results will be posted once they become available.

16th March 2009

Aberdeen University won the British University & College Sport indoor team title on Saturday, one of a number of sports combined into a large BUCS finals event in Sheffield.  The team of Ollie Barron, Gordon Cox, Nikki Sammels, Andrew Laurie, Kay Copland and Harry Ball defeated Southampton in the final, helped by a perfect 200 from Ollie Barron.

James Paterson, representing Southampton University, won the Individual Short Range title with a steady 395 three points clear.

16th March 2009

Scotland's Jon Hammond led his West Virginia University team to the NCAA National Championships in the USA.  Jon has been coach at West Virginia now for three years, and had set a target of winning these championships in five years after the reinstatement of the Rifle programme at WVU.  For more details, visit the WVU Mountaineers homepage.

13th March 2009

Cyril De Jonckheere reports from the Speedway final, held last Sunday at Balerno & Currie:

We had a good day with up to 4 possible winners up to the last two details.  Mike Ozmond had a good lead but allowed it to slip in the last two squads, which meant that Richard Simpson, Hugh Simpson and John Sinclair could catch him.  Richard was scuppered by Eddie Jones getting 198 in the last round and John faded as he was worried about the weather getting home with rumours the A9 was closed!  Hugh duly won his match so we had a tie shoot to determine the winner and Hugh's experience won the day 99 to 98.

13th March 2009

13th March 2009

Callander Target Sports Club is celebrating it's Centenary this year with a special Prize Shoot.  In order to be fair to all classes A, B, C & D, we have allocated the same prize money to each:

1st £100

2nd £50

3rd £25

Following the return of your entry form - which can be downloaded here - the relevant number of stickers will be issued for shooting on any day up-to-and-including Sunday 29th March 2009.  The cards will then be returned to an independent marker (Ian Gray from the Perthshire Association) for marking.  We would like to wish you and your shooters - good luck and good shooting.

John W Russell
Perthshire Match Secretary
Callander Target Sports Club

3rd March 2009

The Scottish team will return to Dortmund this month, attending the annual ISAS match held on the excellent indoor facilities operated by the Westphalian Shooting Federation.  The following team is attending:

23rd February 2009

There were medals in the Senior Men's Air Rifle and Junior Women's Air Rifle events yesterday at the British Air Rifle Championships at Bisley.  Graham Rudd took the Bronze in the Men's event, his fourth podium finish in this event in the last six years.  Jen took the Silver in the Junior Women's event, which she had won last year, after a very close final that saw the lead change hands three times.  Jen also won Class A in the Aggregate competitions, her third successive Aggregate win.

The Scottish team of Graham, Jen and debutant Neil Stirton were second in the Home Countries International Match, and unfortunately we were unable to field a Ladies team.

23rd February 2009

Click here for more information.

Shooters McAlpine and McIntosh win medals at Australian Youth Olympics

21st January 2009

Lasswade’s Rory McAlpine, bronze medallist in India, won the gold in the Men's 50m prone rifle event this time around in Sydney.

Falkirk's Jennifer McIntosh, silver medallist in India and daughter of former Commonwealth Games medallist Shirley McIntosh, took the bronze in the Women's 3 Position Rifle, just behind Sheree Cox, the English girl she finished second to in in Pune.

Their medals contributed to an outstanding Team GB haul of 68 - 26 gold, 16 silver and 26 bronze medals.

“I trained incredibly hard for this, I managed to stay relaxed and I’m relieved more than anything that all the work has paid off,” said Rory, after stepping of the plane at Edinburgh Airport today.

McAlpine, who turned 18 last week, showed steely nerves when two of his targets jammed in the final. As a consequence he finished his match 45 minutes after the field but still he produced an impressive 591 points from a possible 600. He was followed into second by Northern Ireland’s Mathew Hall.

“On my first target, the rubber on the target stopped which meant the scoring wasn’t accurate so I had to move to another one,” said McAlpine. “The same thing started happening to that one as well so I had to move to another one to finish. It took a lot longer but the main thing I had to do was keep focussed and keep going.

“I’ve only ever had 591 points in one previous competition and I’m very happy with the score.”

Finishing third in the Women’s 3 Positions was especially pleasing for McIntosh, following on from her fifth place in the air rifle event.

“It feels pretty good and it was a good confidence boost after my air rifle which didn’t go as well as I’d hoped,” she said.

“It gives you that extra push you need now and again to remind you “yes you can do this,” and it makes you want it more. Now I feel I really want to go back to the range and train harder than I did before.

“Yes I got bronze but I want gold. It helps a lot with that drive to train and do better.”

“It was a great experience to be part of a British team that did really well and all the shooters came away with a medal.”

Supporting both athletes in their endeavours is the Scottish Area Institute of Sport network - its expert teams work together to deliver essential support services locally in sports medicine, sports science and strength and conditioning.

“I’m getting physiotherapy support as well as Strength & Conditioning training and I shoot a lot better as a result of going to the gym on a regular basis,” said McIntosh, a member of the Central Scotland Institute of Sport.

McAlpine, supported by the East of Scotland Institute of Sport, said, “Shooting is mostly in your head so it’s good to have the psychology support. I’ve had a meeting to discuss Strength & Conditioning training, which I’ll start pretty soon.”

The AYOF provided the perfect opportunity for McAlpine and McIntosh to prepare for a major Games and test themselves against the best in the world. The experience was highly beneficial to both shooters.

“London 2012 would be incredible but there are a lot of good male prone shooters in Britain, so 2016 could be a more realistic ambition,” said McAlpine.

“It was an amazing experience, to be part of such a successful team and be around athletes from so many different sports, get a taste of an Olympic experience.”

6th January 2009

Graham Rudd will represent Scotland at the 10m Grand Prix in Pilsen between 15th and 17th January, and again at Intershoot in The Hague between 5th and 8th February, where he will be joined by James Paterson.