Note that clickable links to today's ranges, matches and aggregates are provided following the commentary.

Fri 19 Aug 2005

To put it mildly, this was a pretty unpleasant day! Rain, heavy at times, started in the late morning, and continued for much of the afternoon. This, along with a blustery wind made life uncomfortable for shooters, staff and markers.

 The latter, our great group from Smiths Falls, did a wonderful job, especially at the long range, coping with wet targets, patches falling off and difficulty in seeing the fall of shot. By late afternoon, it seemed that no relief was in sight, so it was decided not to fire the Ottawa Regiment, the first of the TR/F warm-up matches this evening. That match will be fired later in the week.

 Although, of course, once the decision was taken, the rain let up, everyone had by then had enough torment and went off to try to dry out and to enjoy the evening. However, with the exception of the Ottawa Regiment, we were able to complete all the other events on today's programme.

The Black Powder group fired most of their short range matches, from 200 to 600 yards, stopping only when the wet made it impossible to pour out powder for loading.

 The Long Range Challenge has a record entry this year, though it is not clear yet how many actually fired this afternoon.

 Peter Vaughan, our statistician has now found out how best to dry soggy match tickets in a microwave oven. This process is not yet complete, so preliminary results for the Challenge are not available.

 The final two ranges will be fired on Saturday afternoon. The Canadian 223/556 Championship also got underway, with shoots at 300 and 800 (twice) metres. Both the latter shoots were fired in quite heavy rain, with the first one having an interesting wind varying from 4 left to 7 right.

The TR leader is Dennis Flaharty, Irvine, California, with 222.24, who is just ahead of Stan Frost, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, 221.20, and Gary Bowman, Mississauga, Ontario, 220.20. Jim Thompson was the only F Class shooter to brave all three ranges.

The Canadian 300 metre ISSF Prone Championship, sponsored by Sierra Bullets, was fired in the morning. In the TR/ISSF Class, the winner and Canadian Open Champion is Emil Praslick III, Columbus, Georgia, 592. counting out Paul Tremblay, Charlesbourg, Quebec, 592, and just ahead of Terry Glenn, Auburn, New York 590. In the F class, the winner was Jim Murphy, Owensbord, Kentucky, 598, from Emil Praslick, Brewster, New York, 597, and Heinz Vollenweider, Richmond Hill, Ontario, 596.

The forecast for tomorrow is a little better, as long as the anticipated overnight thunderstorms don't linger too long, but it may not be until Monday or Tuesday that things settle down.

 The DCRA Executive Committee met this evening, making two decisions which may be of interest to shooters coming to the CFRC in 2006 and future years:

The use of 223/5.56 calibre will now be permitted in all international team matches at the CFRC, except where specifically prohibited in match conditions. This means that 223/5.56 will be allowed, along with 308/7.62 in the Outlander, Commonwealth and Canada Matches, but not in matches such as the America, Australia or Palma Matches, when held at the CFRC, since these currently only allow 308/7.62. 223/5.56 is already allowed in all individual matches, except for the Bisley Aggregate.

 Secondly, it agreed that an F Class International Team Match would be held alongside the America Match to be held at Connaught on 27th August 2006. This will be for teams of four firers, a coach and a captain. The date is immediately following the 2006 CFRC and immediately prior to the F Class open Tournament to be held 28-30 August. Further details will appear in due course on the DCRA web site.

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