he Home Guard Club at Tiddington hosted three competitions on Jan 15. The Youth Cup, open to shooters aged 21 or under on the night of the competition; the Ladies Rose Bowl and the Senior Shield competition which is open to shooters aged 45 or over on the night of the competition. All three competitions required shooters to fire five pellets on the Home Guard target and five on a league target.

Only five entered the Youth Cup including Jack Shipton who only started shooting this season and Will Troth, last year's winner. After the first leg, Gareth Morris was in the lead with 23.1pts, followed by Carl Rapson 22.2, Will Troth 22 then Lisa Edwards and Jack Shipton. Gareth showed marginally less consistency in round two when he scored 22.1 to give him 45.2pts, Will Troth on the other hand did better with 23.2 but this gave him 45.2pts as well which was his score last year when he won the competition. Carl Rapson only missed the bull once to score 24.2 in the second leg which brought his total score to 46.6 to win the competition. Gareth and Will participated in a second place shoot off but it was getting late and clearly disappointed, Will fell back into third place scoring only 19 to Gareth's 24.4pts

After the first round of the ladies competition for the Suzanne Storm Rose Bowl, the scores were close with Michelle Dale last year's winner, in the lead with 23.1pts followed by Jo Everett and Kath Williams both on 22.1pts then Ruth Dampier on 21.2pts. Scores were on the whole better in the second leg of the tournament with more than double the number of clean bulls scoring 5.1 shot than in the first leg. Irene Parsons flushed with her personal success last week shot well to gain third place with 43.3pts. Alison McMillan did well to come from behind after the first leg, to score 24.3 in the second leg which gave her 44.3pts overall and a well earned second place. Michelle Dale won the competition for the third successive year with a total score of 47.5pts

The Senior Shield was less well supported than last year with only 14 entrants, three of whom withdrew after the first round. In this competition, entrants aged over 60 are awarded up to three bonus points on a sliding scale. Paul Clingan was first to shoot and scored a mini possible on the home target with 25.1pts with his five bulls. He then shot 23.2 on the league target to give him 48.3pts which was a benchmark for the rest of the competitors who had to take their turns shooting on both targets. Andy Morris, Fred Williams and Steve Ray were leading the contenders with scores of 24.4 and John Maycock who shot 22.1 but also qualified for 3 "veteran shooter" points. After the second leg, shot on one of the league targets, four shooters finished with a total of more than 42pts, Steve Ray fell out of contention with a total score of 46.2. Paul Clingan's 48.3 was not enough win the competition. Fred Williams who shot both accurately and very quickly was edged into second place with 48.5pts by Andy Morris who retains the shield with 48.6pts.

Matches this week: Avenue-RBL v Binton A, Binton B v MEB and Wilmcote v Home Guard. Guards have a bye. The second leg of the Avon Challenge will take place in Evesham on Mon 26 January.


Report by Juana Everett, to be published on 22nd January 2009