Tuesday, May 25, 2010

2010 TSRA Highpower Rifle Championship

2010 Highpower Rifle Champions Michael Carter with his 6mm Tubb Gun.

Sam Houston State University JROTC group.

Andrew Trampus is now 6 feet tall and has grown into his rifle.

Garand on the line.

Tommy Liang near the start of the firing line.

Ken Bartling.

Switching, gusty, 6:00 winds made everyone miserable.

Offhand at 200 yards.

Travis Rogers, TSRA Junior Team.

New faces on the line.

Royce Brown, TSRA Junior Team.

Tommy Liang, Distinguished Rifleman.


The red dust of Camp Swift gets into everything, coating your rifle, cart, mat, scope, clothes with a fine amber tint. Its like the black mud from the Waco/Watt range: once it's on you have to chip away at it for years. I'm sure I will be laying on the mat at Camp Perry during prep and look over to see red dust on a cart wheel.
Team day was friday with 15 teams. Thats a lot. We put all the National Match folks on teams to practice pair-firing and working together. It was unseasonably hot. Dangerous hot. By the time we got to 600 we were suffering. I went through six or more bottles of water. The three TSRA teams were first second and fifth, though nobody shot very well.
Saturday was day one of the Championship. We cut it back to a 50 shot match because of the weather and nobody complained. Conditions were a little better. 106 folks on the line. I shot awfully standing with a 90 and ended at 477 in fifth place.
Sunday was the best weather day with a nice breeze cooling us off. The field had dropped to 96. I had the high score at 489 but it wasn't enough to overcome the previous days bad shooting. I ended up third. Keith Stephens was second and Michael Carter won the Highpower Rifle Championship. 1,2 and 3 were spread across four points.
Kind of a break coming up, then Camp Perry and the National Matches.
Ken Gaby and Rick Crawford ran another big Texas match. Seems like every time I looked over from my bunk in the barracks they were sorting and computing. They do a great job for everyone while the rest of us just shoot. I think we are in the golden age of Texas Highpower shooting with them running the show.

1 comment:

Earl said...

How does one get a JROTC at a college or university? All my JROTC experience was in high schools. Wonderful shots of the competitors, and the cheek welds...