SARA Queens F-Open Diary

[AlanF]

Hello from Lower Light. This will be very brief because my wireless card is being affected by a severe case of Telstra . Results are being posted quite promptly here.

Calibres: Rod Mahon, Gary Hunt and myself all using either 6 Dasher or 6.5-284. Richard Braund 284 Win, Stuart Braund 6x47 and 284 Win, Glen Hutchins 284 Win, Graeme Minchins 308 Win,Paul Janzso 300 WSM, Trev Otto 6BR.

I'll try to get a cure for the Telstra, but as I said SARA seems to be prompt with the results.

Alan

[AlanF]

Hello again from Lower Light,

As you will know from the SARA website, Paul Janzso took home the bacon in the leadup - he's apparently been the in form SA shooter at OPMs lately with his big 300WSM. Well done Paul who came over the top of everyone at the last 800.

I believe the 12 F-Open shooters in the Queens is a new attendance record for SA - very encouraging. Calibres of the additional competitors are Wayne MacFarlane 284 Shehane, Ron Hatton 280AI, and Ian Pavy 6.5x47. Ian was up with the leaders after 300 and 400, but had a disaster in the switching headwinds at 500. Wayne has his 7mm humming, and Ron's specialty was entertainment rather than shooting high scores .

Today started off dead calm at 300 with a shower then the SW wind came up with a couple of shooters to go. For the rest of the day it was moderate winds generally straight into our faces but with some unpleasant patches of variable direction and speed. The scores tell the story of who got lucky and who got caught, mixed in with an occasional demonstration of good windreading skills e.g Richard Braund.

Will get back tomorrow night if there is anything worth reporting.

Alan

[Lynn Otto]

My heart felt congratulations to Paul Janzso for a weekend of good shooting and a well deserved win. Well done in winning The Hunt, the Queens and the Grand Agg.

I think the entire field probably needs a pat on the back, I gather the conditions were not always very friendly. So, rough spots aside, I hope you all enjoyed the shooting.

Lynn

[AlanF]

Thanks Lynn, and sorry you didn't make it out to the range.

My congratulations to Paul (Pestbird) Janzso on a great 5 days shooting which resulted in a clean sweep of leadup, Queens and therefore Grand Agg . He used his 300 WSM throughout and showed that .30 cal is a highly competitive proposition for F-Open. I'm sure we'll see more of them soon. Stuey Braund won the daily agg just to remind us that he was the defending champion. Weather was tricky and bit patchy all day. Mirage wasn't quite as bad as yesterday, but the quick changes in wind direction resulted in at least one 7 for most of us.

This was a very enjoyable Queens for all the F-Open shooters I believe. The key reason was that we seemed to take the sport for what is - fun , and there's a few individuals who made sure no-one took themselves too seriously. I said on another thread that we'd get the opinion of the F-Open shooters about squadding if/when the super V is adopted. We had a very quick meeting of all 12 (plus B Moulds who dropped in to say gidday) behind the 800m mound today, and the vote was unanimous that at Queens shoots, we should be squadded on our own target(s). Not at all surprising after the way things went here.

Next diary will be at Canberra. Catch you then.

[Lynn Otto]

Sadly priorities dictated I be elsewhere, besides shooting is not really a spectator sport, if there wasn't going to be a rifle in my hand there was no point being there.

Lynn

[RAVEN]

Well done Pesky Bird Dang that 300 is hummin
Thanx also to our good mexican friends Alan,Gary,Wayne and Rod its always great to catch up and I look forward to the next time we cross sword you may be able to win you $10 back Gary
We had some great laughs and although difficult and challenging there was some great shooting.
I have learnt a new wind reading skill during this queens and let me share it with you all
What a hoot
RB

[RDavies]

Sounds like everyone had a good time, I dont find that too hard to believe. I dont suppose the crew was filled with serious, dowdy, boring types, except for Gary that is, being the staid old gent he is As for separate squading, I would say if the usual suspects were acting up as I expect they were, then everyone else would want us squaded separately as well. (except for non queens shoots that is). I wish I could have been there.
Contrats to Paul Janzo, was it a win on your first Queens?

[a.JR]

A Big Congrats to Paul , The 30 cal bit doesn't supprise me at all ..JR..Jeff Rogers

[IanP]

That was my first Queens and thoroughly enjoyed the experience and the good company. I learned more about wind reading in 3 days than I have in the past 6 months!

Congrats to Paul, great shoot, nice bloke and deserving winner.

You should see the elephant gun he is in the process of putting together for the next Queens!

[Paul Janzso]

Thanky you all for your warm wishes, it was a tough shoot, with tough competiton from all.

It was great meeting Rod and Graham for the first time and catching up with Wayne and Allan again. Not forgetting all the S.A. shooters that made it a very memorable 5 day event.

Yep, it was my second Queens shoot, but my first Queens win, I'm still jumping for joy but not very high, my back is stuffed and I'm having the rest of the week off.

Cheers
Paul

[Mitcon]

Here's a couple of pics PJ asked me to add in

Here's a pic of the "Friendly" Class Squad, minus Ron Hatton


And here's PJ driving his Ferrari

[AlanF]

One thing that hasn't been discussed yet is calibres. I don't know how much you can read into it but the 7mms didn't set the world on fire, in fact if I'm correct in saying that Stuey Braund used a 6mm throughout, then two of the 6mms finished ahead of all the 7s in both leadup and Queens, and while we're discussing 6mms, how about Trev Otto's winning the agg for the long range day in the leadup with his 6BR!

So really the general performance of the calibres doesn't seem to say that bigger is better despite the fact that the big .30 cal won. Here's a list of Queens placings by calibre :

1 .30 cal
2 6.5mm
3 6mm
4 6mm
5 7mm
6 7mm
7 7mm
8 6.5mm
9 6mm
10 .30cal
11 6mm
12 7mm

There's many factors apart from calibre of course, but just thought it was interesting to look at it from that perspective.

Alan

[Matt P]

We had a very quick meeting of all 12 (plus B Moulds who dropped in to say gidday) behind the 800m mound today, and the vote was unanimous that at Queens shoots, we should be squadded on our own target(s). Not at all surprising after the way things went here.

.

Alan
If numbers get to where we want, you wont have a choice of where your're squaded, I think everyone needs to look at the bigger picture regarding squading and targets.

Matt P

[RAVEN]

Hi Matt
The consensus was that the competitors are looking at this a whole event experience not just pandering to the organises
At a queens event the numbers should be enough to accommodate our wishes
My personal opinion is I don’t want to be squadded with TR nothing personal just I prefer to be with like minded ppl as to would a TR shooter

A good example is a new shooter to are club who I encouraged to participate in the lead up only shooting a few month with the club was squadded with all TR ppl and as you would probably understand they were not very understanding when he called there V a 6
I have seen this happen on more that one occasion or a leading TR shooter scoring for a FS shooter last on the mound in that squad the TR check scorer thought that it was only an FS shoot so they decided that they didn’t need to check score and left the mound leaving the one person to do the lot the scorer call a 6 a 4 when the shooter queried the call he was told the scorer “4 as indicated” this then involved the RO to challenge the value which was given as a 6 you wouldn’t have to many challenges for a 6
If this person was squadded with FS this wouldn’t have happened

Local OPM's is a total different matter.

Matt what is the bigger picture??
RB

[Matt P]

Richard
The bigger picture is numbers, for FO to survive across Australia and not just in SA, numbers have to increase for FO to continue at any level above club level, less and less clubs include FO at their OPM.
Your examples of what goes on is nothing new, I've also seen those sorts of bad sportsmanship before but does it happen that often ????
Anyway what's the harm in trying something new ????

Matt