Irish Practical Shooting Association - IPSA

SLEMISH MOUNTAIN OPEN 2008
Kells Rifle and Pistol Club Graded UKPSA Competition
By David Thompson

Kells Rifle and Pistol Club held its first 2008 UKPSA Graded Practical Pistol Competition on the 19 April. As well as local Northern Ireland UKPSA members, a group of over twenty travelled over from Great Britain and a similar sized squad of competitors from the Irish Practical Shooting Association ( IPSA ) attended from the Republic of Ireland. With a group of competitors also attending from the Isle of Man, the total number of entries was 70.

Kells Rifle and Pistol Club is a combined indoor and outdoor range complex situated on a farm, some 20 minutes drive from Belfast International Airport and 40 minutes from Belfast City Airport. Numerous accommodation facilities and restaurants abound in the nearby towns of Antrim and Ballymena. The clubs facilities are currently being upgraded and the new clubhouse was used for registration, stats and lunch!

Bob Dunkley leans out to engage the distant targets on this stage.

Just back from the German Spring Break Match in Berlin, John MacAdoo lines up a target on Stage 2.

The local and visiting range officers, match officials and a small number of competitors shot the “prematch” on the Friday, with the main bulk of the competitors taking part on the Saturday. Many club members donated a lot of their own time to design and build stages and organise everything else that is required to run a proper graded competition. There were seven courses of fire, three short, three medium and one long course for a total of 105 rounds, not allowing for any mistakes! The match was competed on the indoor and outdoor ranges with the competitors split into three squads, moving around the stages in chronological order. Once everyone had shot the indoor and outdoor stages, the targets and some props were moved around to construct the rest of the stages. Stages 3 and 7 where on the indoor range and stages 1, 2, 4, 5 and 6 were positioned on the outdoor range.

The stages consisted of a blend of free style, strong and weak handed only requirements with movement and reloads, combined with a high accuracy requirement. Stage 3 was the biggest, a 32 round field match. The clever positioning of the targets meant that three reloads and a lot of running around were required. Stage 7 was also shot indoors. Here the competitor had to retrieve an empty gun and all ammunition from a box then engage four targets, then run forward and climb a platform and engage another four targets. If you had the magazine capacity and where confident enough you saved time by only retrieving one magazine.

The outdoor stages used a lot of screen barriers that you had to shoot around or underneath and included a mixture of paper and steel pepper poppers. A high level of accuracy was required in this match as there were a lot of long range shots and close targets were either partial or obscured by no shoot targets.

Results
Open Division was closely contested with Bob Dunkley piping Geoff Mitchell, from the Isle of Man, by only 0.07 % at the finishing post! Local Open shooter Martyn McNicholl came in third place. In Production Class Stephen Greer came out on top with Nick Towndrow and Alex Ellis in second and third place. The bulk of the competitors were in Standard Division. David Thompson won with Paul Kirkpatrick 2.4 % behind him. Third and fourth places went to up and coming local shooters Shane Dinkin and Glen McGall respectively, with only 0.27 % between them!in all, it was an enjoyable competition with good weather. The assistance of the visiting UKPSA range officials and the work of the local RO’s, who had completed a range officer’s training course conducted by Martyn Spence, made the competition a smooth running event.

Melvin Redford leans out around the barrier to engage the last three targets on this stage.

For the Futurefollowing future developments will take place. A Level 3 UKPSA Championship Match, titled the United Kingdom Open Match, will be run on 26 – 28 June 2008. Another Graded Match is being organised to take place in September. Watch the web sites listed for the match details.

With more graded matches taking part in Northern Ireland and in the Republic of Ireland, now is the time for those who live on the Island and who interested in competing in organised IPSC competition to get involved in their respective IPSC Region. For further information take a look at the web page links below.

Isle of Man competitor Geoff Mitchell finished in second place with his STI Open Division gun.

Match Results

Open Division %
1. Bob Dunkley 100
2. Geoff Mitchell 99.03
3. Martyn McNicholl 70.32
4. Jim McEwan 34.92
5. Michael Cowan 29.99

Production Division %
1. Stephen Greer 100
2. Nick Towndrow 89.30
3. Alex Ellis 74.18
4. Graham Gill 73.78
5. Martyn Spence 62.50
6. Steve Charlton 57.36
7. Frank Cullen 52.12
8. Jim Gibney 46.72
9. David Price 37.44
10.Pat Lough 35.30

Standard Division %
1. David Thompson 100
2. Paul Kirkpatrick 97.61
3. Shane Dinkin 93.36
4. Glenn McGall 93.09
5. John Hunter 92.45
6. Cleland Rodgers 91.61
7. Andrew Pedlow 90.66
8. Pat Murphy 84.46
9. John Clare 83.45
10.Vernon Donnely 78.97