2023 FT Nationals Match ReportBy Jeff H
The 29th Annual Canadian Field Target Nationals are in the books. So, let’s dive in and see how it went!
Thank you and Acknowledgements!First, we’ll start with thank you to all those that helped make this possible. With deep gratitude, we would like to thank:
Hamilton Angling and Hunting Association (HAHA)! We very much appreciate the excellent facilities that were provided - from the club house to the kitchen facilities, to the pistol range for chrony testing, to the rifle range for the match. Thank you!
The organizing committee – Bob W, Brian W, Joel G, Rob W and Tim M. Without you the event would not have happened. We met every week starting in July to plan, coordinate and generally make sure things were ready. With special shout outs to:
1. Rob W who brought you the amazing course. His planning was incredible – taking pictures at matches during the season, researching other courses, building out a target inventory and bringing it all together in spreadsheet that calculated the Troyer factor. Outstanding job Rob. You continue to set the benchmark for course design. Thank you, Rob!
2. Joel G who designed the t-shirts, marshal patches and ran the Marshal course. As always, a stellar job. Thank you, Joel!
Prize table contributors – with out these businesses and individuals, we would not have had such an incredible prize table. Please consider them for your future air gun shooting needs. To all of you, a hearty thank you for over $5,000 worth of prizes:
Airgun Source
https://www.airgunsource.ca/us/ - AGS has been a long-time supporter of the community and source for many of the rigs that we shoot. This year was no exception! We had over $3,000 worth of prises including 3 rifles, a sleeve of sought after JSB 8.44g 4.52 pellets and Hawke Sidewinder ED 8-40 x 56 scope!!! Thank you, Travis and the team at Airgun Source!
Airgun Archery,
https://airgunarcheryfun.ca/ - Wes at Airgun Archery is another long-time field target supporter. Thank you, Wes and the team at Airgun Archery!
Canada Shooting Supply,
https://canadashootingsupply.ca/ - Raman has also been a great supporter of the Nationals and field target in general. Thank you, Raman and the team at Canada Shooting Supply!
Airgun Forum Store,
https://www.airgunforum.ca/store - Another long-time supporter, Sniper Dan provided a range of pellets. Thank you, Dan!
Mark’s,
https://www.marks.com/en.html - Through Peter E’s efforts we received four wallets worth $60 each. Thank you, Pete!
Individual contributions from Tim MacSweyn, Marc Shelleau, Rob Gastle, Rob Wright and Jeff Hemming included knock down targets, digital calipers, hard cases, multiple hats, T-shirts, jackets, field dressing kits, battery banks, undercabinet lighting for gun safes, wind flags, scope covers torque wrenches, knock down targets, paper targets and a pile more items.
Event VolunteersThese are the people that showed up on Friday to set up the course, those that changed the lanes on Saturday and all those that helped with tear down on Sunday. You made it go super smooth and we got packed up in record time – thank you!
Our own Pit Master – Rob GA shout out to Rob who smoked 24 lbs of pork and delivered a sumptuous feast on both days of pulled pork and sliced pork loin. We ate well – awesome job Rob!
Course OfficialsMatch Director: Jeff H
Chief Marshal: Joel G
Chrony Marshal: Geoff M
Line Marshals (both days): Richard T, John B, Geoff M
Now, on to the event!
FridayThings actually started up on Friday with the Marshal course and registration.
Registration opened at 2:00 PM and ran through to 5:00 PM. During which time registered participants were able to get some range time in.
Joel ran the Marshal course from 3:00 PM to 5:00 PM including giving out the new Marshal patches. More to follow on this when we list the up on the website.
Saturday – Day 1 ShootingSaturday came fast, with folks starting to arrive at 8:00 AM. The day was perfect – blue sky, no wind and cool temps. That quickly changed as the sun rose and we had ideal shooting conditions.
We ran registration at the HAHA Club House and went with printed name plates on lanyards this year. This helped distinguish everyone from the regular club members and made things super easy. Thanks to Rob W for printing up the name plates and to Tim M for running registration, handing out t-shirts and getting everyone through by 9:00 AM.
The chrony testing was done on the indoor pistol range starting at 9:00 AM. Geoff M managed the process for the second year and everything went as smooth as glass. Everyone passed. Thanks, Geoff!
The sight in line ran until 10:30 AM and was well attended. Everyone was keen to get the pre-match jitters sorted and do last-minute checks of their rigs.
We kicked off the shooters meeting off at 10:30 AM. We did a deep dive into safety, what the match was going to look like and the expectations for everyone on the course. We started with safety briefing and followed up with how to use times, kneeling position, etiquette, scoring and questions that came from the group.
Shooting started a bit after 11:00 AM. The course was 10 lanes with three targets per lane and two shots per target. We ran 3 squads of three shooters and seven squads of 2 shooters.
New this year, the Open class had separate targets on the positional lanes. This upped the difficulty for them, taking things up a couple of notches!
We were off the course by 2:45 PM. Score cards were collected and readied for tabulation that evening.
Afterwards, we went over to the picnic tables and tucked into Rob G’s BBQ. Everyone ate their fill and shared stories about the day’s event. Out of it rumours floated about Rob W’s new nickname – “Reducer Rob” … he is making a name for himself by putting reducers on targets that folks weren’t accustomed to… e.g., 25mm at 40 years and 10 mm at 15 yards. Yup… got us focused!
Sunday - Day 2 ShootingSunday dawned much the same as Saturday – sunny, a bit warmer and still no wind… not typical for HAHA!
Once again, everyone did a chronograph check on their rigs. And, once again, everyone passed without issue. Thanks, Geoff!
The shooters meeting started at 9:45 AM and finished by 10:00 AM. It was shorter for the second day, focusing on what Joel taught in the Marshal course, ‘Safe + Fair = Fun’.
The event volunteers had switched up the course the evening before and we faced some new “fun” targets! There was an owl up on a post, more of the bunkers that we saw on Saturday and, in general, more long shots!
The match got underway by 10:00 AM and ran smoothly for the duration. There was one cold line about an hour in that required a target beginning replaced. Otherwise, everything worked as expected.
The course was challenging with no one clearing it! Thought Richard S tried, only dropping three shots.
Everyone was off the course by 1:30 PM and the course pulled down by 2:30 PM. After that we tucked into more of Rob’s wonderful BBQ.
While folks were eating the scores were tallied and posted. Shout out to Brian W for having a printer onsite so that we could print the final results. Thank you, Brian!
There were no ties! So, we moved on with the awards and prize table. See the results sheet below for how everyone did.
For those that have not been to the Nationals, we do things a bit differently for prizes. Instead of the top shooters getting their pick, we pull names from a hat. That’s right, the prizes are random! It’s great fun and everyone is always keen to see their name pulled first. This year was a bonanza with over $5,000 worth of gear up for grabs!
We went three rounds deep in drawing names. Everyone walked away with multiple items, in many cases things that were worth far more than the match entry fee!
It was a fitting end to an awesome two days of shooting.
One last thank you to everyone involved, THANK YOU! We look forward to seeing you all again next year and at one of the remaining matches this year.
Remember, Safe + Fair = Fun
2023 FT Nationals Organizing Committee
Match Results
Division Day 1 Day 2 TotalHunter PCP Tony L 108 109 217
Tom K 107 108 215
Mike P 106 105 211
Larry Y 85 87 172
Springer Harold S 99 98 197
Richard T 99 94 193
Marc S 91 90 181
Rob W 78 91 169
Open PCP Richard S 59 57 116
Rob G 51 52 103
Denis Eden 52 46 98
Harry Holmes 48 41 89
Mady H 46 43 89
Geoffrey M 42 46 88
Peter E 24 29 53
Tony M 42 0 42
WFTF PCP Tom P 52 48 100
Brian W 49 46 95
Springer Joel G 50 49 99
Bob W 46 45 91
Tim M 43 47 90
Jeff H 43 34 77
John B 40 34 74
Login
Register
FAQ
Search
News 
Site map 
SitemapIndex 
RSS Feed 
