A sunny day up at the Auckland Metropolitan Shooting club grounds made for a great day of clay target shooting. 70 of the best shooters from around the country came to make a day of stiff competition.
In the first round of single rise, the St Paul’s team started strongly with both Alex Purdie and Ben Spring shooting the possible 20/20 (not missing one target), Tom Storey shooting 19/20, Kane Stirling shooting 18/20, and Alex Quested shooting a 17/20. The team’s collective sharpshooting was enough to claim gold in this discipline.
St Paul’s won the team point scores, taking home a gold medal and the AMCTC Shield for the first time in 12 years. The top individual scores were Alex Purdie and Kane Stirling on 55/60.
In the third and final single barrel event, the top scorers went to Kane Stirling with the possible 10/10 and Alex Quested and Alex Purdie on 9/10.
Total individual points for the day placed Alex Purdie in 4th overall with 84/90 and Kane Stirling 5th one point behind.
The second Interschool Shooting competition was held on the last school day in Term 1 in Thames. Once again, the team performed impressively, with several excellent scores recorded throughout the day.
The best single rise score went to Alex Purdie and Tom Storey with 20/20. Ben Spring and Jack Ward were close behind on 19/20.
In the second points event, Alex Purdie and Jack Ward scored the possible 60/60, with Isaac Albery on 59 and Ben Spring with 57.
The final single barrel event saw Jack Ward shooting the possible 10/10, Alex Purdie and Alex Quested on 9/10. Unfortunately, Alex Purdie made a very uncharacteristic technical error costing him one point and effectively eliminating him from the chance at the gold medal round.
However, the overall individual placings for individuals were excellent. Both Alex Quested and Jack Ward had combined totals of 89/90. In the shoot off finals, Alex placed 3rd, and Jack placed 5th. Other commendable scores were Ben Spring and Isaac Albery on 85 and Tom Storey with 81.
