at Lane End village shoot/pig roast when I first met Roger Hance (of Roger Hance Sporting Guns).
Jeremy and I went as guests by invitation from my old friend Andy Rigsby. After our shoot we discussed
the possibility of him staging a shoot for the ALRFC. At the time we talked in terms of 10-15 people from our Club.
This apparently was an ideal number for a morning shoot.
Back in November when the ALRFC Committee agreed to make it a Club event I informed Roger that it looked as
if we could get as many as 20-30 members interested.
As numbers increased over subsequent weeks we decided to expand it into a whole day event.
On the day itself, we had 46 members participating! A glorious day it was too, with unbroken sunshine, zero wind
and a perfect setting within a lush green fold on the Chiltern hills near Gt.Missenden.
The ALRFC set up crew (Gary, Jeremy, Ian and Carlo) arrived at 9.15 and greeted by Roger and his team who well
advanced with their side of things.
Wayne Pugh who was scheduled to shoot in the afternoon had decided to arrive early and he immediately
helped with the setting up. He joined the kitchen staff as ‘onion fryer’ to Ian who was ALRFC burger Chef for the day.
After registration, Roger Hance gave a brief and interesting talk about shotguns, antique guns with gunpowder
and shooting technique to all early session attendees.
After managing to free myself from the registration desk I walked over to the shooting stands to
try and record some footage. I caught Jamie Pearce finishing off his first eight
on Roger’s stand. Everyone gasped as he finished a straight run of 8/8 hits.
A fantastic start for anyone let alone a novice!
I wandered around from stand to stand and everyone I met
seemed to be enjoying the experience.
I continued with taking video and caught ‘Lal’, Bob Adaway’s mother-in-law missing her ‘nth clay.
She turns around and shouts, "Bob can you get over into that field I need an easier target”.
Bob replies, “Well given your shooting skills I’d be perfectly safe!”
Tim Kempster (ALRFC) was instructing on one of the three stands for the morning session
and doing a fine job too.
I had arranged in advance with Roger that we could provide an experienced shooter to man one
of the three stands in order to keep costs down. In the afternoon Tim was relieved my old mate
Andy Rigsby from Lane End.
As the morning progressed the satisfying sound of 410’s 20’s and 12 bores being fired
was dramatically interrupted by the KA-BOOM and smoke from the blunderbuss.
The reaction of the astonished on-lookers is hard to put into words but ‘WOW!’ ‘WEYHEY!’ and ‘GOOD GOD!’
are a few publishable examples.
One thing is for sure, when this weapon goes off, it never fails to please!
As more members arrived for the afternoon session Ian and Wayne were kept busy feeding those
coming off the stands and those going on. They did a splendid job making sure the food was available on demand.
Having said that, at one point it looked as if a couple of stray clays had landed on the warming grill. …”Erm… don’t look at
them. They got slightly burnt”, was Ian’s explanation.
Roger Hance had set up this event as a total of 40 birds (clays) over 5 visits per person.
Apart from Jamie’s excellent start, other notable ‘straight 8’s were achieved by Tim Freshwater, David Catt, Ian Price, Jeremy Price, Bob Adaway, Colin Coleman, Tim Kempster, Wayne Pugh & Tim Wyborn.
The fabulous weather continued throughout the day and the blunderbuss continued to excite the crowd.
I had last go on the old gun and… WOW! As Roger had said
“It’s a FLASH BANG WALLOP and… It’s memorable!”
For me, the whole day was one I’ll never forget.
My sincere thanks to:
Roger Hance Sporting Guns for their hard work, dedication in accommodating our large number and superb, top quality tuition.
Tim Kempster & Andy Rigsby for their excellent tutoring.
Let’s not forget Ian & Wayne who did a great job in the kitchen; the ALRFC set-up crew
and our portable paymistress, Paula. (We made around £150 profit)
Congratulations to David Catt for the highest score (29) of the day
and, James Barber with the highest child score of 22.
James was a particularly great score given his age (14) and, the fact that
he had never fired a gun before! Well done boy!
The best results of day are below and trophies to be awarded at March Club night.
Lastly, thanks to all who attended. We’ll have to do it again! (Perhaps over two days)
Top Results of the Clay Shoot:
Top Gun: 29 score – DAVID CATT
Second: 27 Score:
Third: 25 Score
Best child: 22 Score – James Barber
