What can I say, the match went off without a hitch despite a few obstacles to overcome, I thoroughly enjoyed the competition from a director side of things and the competitors from a personal side. It was in a word, Fun !
This was the first year Sniper’s Hide held a match that was not in Texas. That was a long successful run, but it was time for a change, and sometimes change can be scary. This was the main reasons we only held one match in 2012, not the usual 2, as well this is what it put in June, although the weather wasn’t really that bad, we still needed jackets in the morning.
This part of the journey began last year with me contacting Zak Smith and Ray Sanchez along with Jeff Hamilton of Competition Dynamics . While well known in and around Colorado, they were not as well known across the country. Hopefully that changes very soon. They put on a heck of a show for the shooters. Zak has an attention to detail that the Cup never really embraced and it worked out extremely well. Ray on the other hand is just an animal when it comes to getting out in the field and setting the plan into motion. Because of the way they saw the SHC unfolding the match was able to move a large number of shooters through 15 stages in a record amount of time. Working in “complexes” I believe we can expand the Cup to be the largest Precision Rifle Match in the World.
Zak & Ray were responsible for finding the Willis Ranch through Justin Keeler. He deserves a ton of credit too, as he was our liaison between the family of the property and Competition Dynamics. Justin assisted at every level and clearly the property was a highlight of this match. It’s layout, let alone scenery, help create the seamless flow. Thank You Justin Keeler of Nomad Long Range.
To Travis and the Willis Ranch, we appreciate you letting us use the property as if it was our own. It’s a great piece of land suited to long range precision rifle shooting. It has a mix of everything we could want. Thank you sir !
The Range Officers
Thank you each and every RO we had on site. Especially thank you to the ones who traveled great distances to help out. Greg, Melody, Kyle, Ken, & Beth, you guys really really made the difference, along with the guys who scarified their competition experience to help out. We needed a minimum of 15 Range Officers to make this work, and initially we were a few short. As this was a new venue for us, having completed it, we can now adjust this to make it even better moving forward.
Ken & Beth from Khaybes Kahles USA saw were short and volunteered to drive down at the last minute and help us. They pushed the numbers over the edge.
Honestly all the Range Officers did a great job and I really appreciate their time and effort, you can’t have a match without them.
The Competitors
Thank you all that shot the match for a safe and enjoyable experience ! Everyone embraced the format, and we had no drama at all. In fact I saw more smiles over the 2 and half days than I have in the last few years. The level of competition was strong but the interaction between shooters can be summed up as generous, and cheerful.
Wade Stuteville was the Top Shot of the match with a score of 118.14 out of a possible 150. Right behind him was John Griswold with a score of 116.54. That is a difference of only 2 shots here. In 3rd was Hoser with a score of 104.98. Over all great shooting guys.
The Top 10 was rounded out by
4th Ron Fish
5th Eric Williams
6th Rob Ormand
7th Shane Coppinger
8th Francis Kuehl
9th Nick Gephardt
10th Bryan Yeung
It was really great to see so many old faces as well as the new faces. The amount of new shooters was outstanding and we hope to push that even further moving forward.
I tried to visit with as many shooters as possible both on the line and in the Tent Area, I was glad you made it out to Douglas to take part of the 2012 SHC.
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