The Isle of Man Archery Club met at Greeba on Sunday to shoot a variety of metric rounds for the Club’s Scratch League. The weather conditions were rather erratic; the sudden gusting winds caused problems all day but there were sunny spells.
The Gents Compound 1440 round produced a close competition between Pete Mumford, Dave Moore and Compound novice Rhys Moore. Rhys, who switched to Compound at the beginning of the Outdoor Season, held the lead after the 90m distance. He dropped into second place behind his father Dave at the 70m distance but recovered at 50m to take a 13 point lead into the final 30m distance. Unfortunately Rhys had a miss at the same time that Dave hit his stride. The victory went to Dave Moore by a margin of 4 points. By way of consolation Rhys shot a 6 Gold end at 90m and can therefore claim a badge.
Joy Gough was the only lady Compound archer to shoot the 1440 round (70, 60, 50 and 30m). Joy shot solidly but had an uncharacteristic miss at 50m due to the weather conditions.
Danny Cowin was the sole adult Recurve archer on Sunday. Danny had a couple of misses over the course of the day and was a little disappointed with his performance.
Karen Lott and Barbara Harris shot Recurve 1440 round. Karen shot well at the 70m distance but dipped slightly at 60. She had a nightmare of a 50m round but recovered her form at 30m to run out a comfortable winner. Harris, who had missed most of the Indoor season due to health problems, was looking for form rather than scores. She shot consistently over the day and was pleased with her progress. Karen and Barbara were joined over the two longer distances by Lesley Sleight. Lesley practices the art of Field Archery but also likes to do a bit of Target Archery as well using her Traditional Bow. Unaccustomed to shooting anything farther than 50m, Sleight good humouredly ignored the weather conditions to set a New Club Record for the Long Metric in her bow style.
Two Junior archers also shot the 70, 60, 50, 30m round but it is designated as a Metric I for their age group. Josh Trafford shooting the round for the first time posted a terrific score. Charlotte Harris, who has not shot the round for two years, added a jaw dropping 174 points to her personal best and smashed the u18 Girls Club Record by 55 points.
Kirsten George, Sarah Rigby and Aalin George shot a 50m round in the morning with Sarah taking the honours from Kirsten in second place and an off colour Aalin in third.
The afternoon session saw the arrival of several more Junior archers who shot rounds according to age group. Bradley Layton shot a Short Metric (50 & 30m) and surprisingly struggled most with the shorter distance but still added 124 points to his pb for the round.
Toby Young and Joseph Reaney faced off against each other in a Short Metric II (40 & 30m). Joseph added 17 points to his pb but it was Toby shooting the round for the first time who took the win. James Hill added 67 points to his pb for the Short Metric III (30 & 20m) he shot.
Results: 1440 Gents Compound - 1. D. Moore 143/1239/37/12, 2. R. Moore 141/1235/44/17, 3. P. Mumford 142/1202/36/11. Ladies Compound 1440 – J. Gough 143/1225/26/7. Gents Recurve 1440 – D. Cowin 142/945/10/3. Ladies Recurve 1440 – 1. K. Lott 144/1071/11/3, 2. B. Harris 143/989/11/4. U18 Boys Metric I – Josh Trafford 144/1029/13/6pb. U18 Girls Metric 1 – C. Harris 140/985/8/2pb NCR. Long Metric – Gents Compound – C. Moore 72/487/2/1. Ladies Trad Bow – L. Sleight 34/167/1 NCR. Ladies Compound 50m – 1. S. Rigby 72/665/28/6, 2. K. George 72/655/26/5, 3. A. George 71/618/19/4. Short Metric – B. Layton 65/455/8/3pb. Short Metric II – 1. T. Young 59/359/1/0pb, 2. J. Reaney 62/343/2/0pb. Short Metric III – J. Hill 63/369/3/0.
