East Midlands Intercounties ABT Championships.

HELD AT NOTTINGHAM & DISTRICT GUN CLUB

ON SUNDAY 2^ND OCTOBER

The usual display of county flags greeted some of the finest ABT shooters in the region who had turned out in support of their counties for this event.  As well as the challenge of winning the East Midlands glassware, the competition to score points for the much-coveted Director’s Trophy was gaining momentum so all eyes were on the scoreboard.

The weather pattern was fairly consistent throughout the day with periods of bright sunshine and overcast shadows which made visibility a little more difficult but, overall, each team experienced the same conditions.

First out on the ranges were the Notts team who put in some awesome scores with all 4 of their veteran’s team and 3 of their senior team putting in scores of 90+ giving them team totals of 191 and 364 respectively. (Best not to look at the scoreboard too early!!).  Score wise there was more to come with some superb individual scoring from Notts skeet shooter, Allen Warren (98), Cambridgeshire vet, Gary Thatcher (97), Lincolnshire’s duo of GB team members, Dave Sipling, and Jack Wilkinson (96) and Cambridgeshire’s Richard Morris also on 96 but at the top of pile was Norfolk junior, William Gilbert who scored a truly magnificent 99.  Not surprisingly William was shooting in the senior team and his score combined with his teammates of J Matthewson (91), S Owen (89), R Sutterby (89), R Flowers (94) and A Hilton (92) ensured that the Norfolk team romped home with a team score of 376.

Open Team Winners - Norfolk

The Nottinghamshire team of D Watkinson (90), D Brown (82), A Clark (90), B Hunt (84), K Warner (95) and R Denoon (89) hung on to their second place to claim the runners-up spot, beating Lincolnshire by just 1 target.

The Nottinghamshire veteran team of A Warren (98), A Cain (90), K Rimington (92) and R Hufton (93) proved to be unbeatable finishing 3 points clear of their nearest rivals, Lincolnshire, and Olivia Stevens completed a very satisfactory day for Team Nottingham as she took Junior High Gun with a score of 81.

Notts Vets - Ken Rimington, Allen Warren, Russ Hufton

Junior High Gun - Olivia Stevens

In the lady’s competition, GB team member Jackie Houghton (Lincs) put in a very solid 85 with Team Lincolnshire finishing on a final score of 164 but the Cambridgeshire ladies went one better with some very consistent scoring from Hazel Morris (84), Sarah Christensen (81) and Jane Bell (68).

Cambs Ladies - Jane Bell, Hazel Morris, Sarah Christensen

Congratulations to the winning teams and indeed to everyone who took part and helped to make this a very friendly and rewarding day, and special thanks to all the team managers who work so hard to make this happen, we couldn’t do it without you so take a well-deserved bow.

Finally, as always, we thank Carl, Linda, and Kieley and all the team at NDGC.  Always a pleasure to shoot there, well done.

Full scores can be seen on an independent report, CLICK HERE as can the current standings in the Director’s Trophy, CLICK HERE. It is still all to play for with any one of 6 counties still in the running.  With the All Round at Eriswell Lodge (9^th October) and the English Skeet at Northampton (23^rd October) next to come – you need to be there!