Lothian & Borders Target Shooting Association

The AGM was held last night. Earlier this week it was estimated that there might not be sufficient attendees to form a quorum (minimum of 12). The Chairman and Secretary had already given their apologies for not being able to attend and Tom Hodgson of Dumfries, the Vice-Chairman, had agreed to chair the meeting. However, it was thought prudent to advise Tom of this possibility and it was agreed that he would not take the chance of making the 4-hour round-trip just to find the meeting could not take place. Senior commmittee members agreed that if sufficent numbers attended,  those present would elect a chairman for the meeting and the meeting would proceed. This is allowed for in the constitution.

At 7.35 there were 13 in the room and Bill Hamilton was stitched up by his wife to chair the meeting. The minutes will be available in due course (taken by Anne Hamilton in lieu of the Secretary – we are still advertising for a dedicated Minutes Secretary: see the sidebar) but there were no controversial issues. The Accounts were approved. All current office-bearers and organisers were re-elected apart from the CYOH and Championships organiser, Bill Hamilton, who is stepping down from those roles. Tom Ralph (Edinburgh University) had previously volunteered to take on the CYOH and was duly elected but nobody at the meeting was prepared to run the Championships. Therefore, would anyone reading this who feel they might be able to take that on please get in touch with the Site Administrator in the first instance.

Bill Hamilton will continue as SIte Administrator and World Cup organiser for one more year but anyone who feels they might like to share either of these roles in the meantime with a view to taking them on full time next year is welcome to get in touch with the Site Administrator. See the Post below for further details.

Prizes were presented at the conclusion of the meeting. Thanks go to James Young for organising that, and also to Balerno & Currie RC for the use of their clubroom for the meeting.

The Final of the 2024-25 Individual Championship took place yesterday afterrnoon at Balerno & Currie’s range, once again making use of the club’s electronic targets. A full complement of 16 finalists attended, albeit including six reserves replacing original qualifiers who could not attend.

The winner, perhaps surprisingly for the first time, was Sinclair Bruce of Balerno & Currie, who beat clubmate Alasdair Horne in the final.

The full results can be seen here, but here’s a summary:

I won’t go into all the details of the first round, but the pick of the ties was undoubtedly Sinclair Bruce’s match against Nick Baker (Watsonians). Nick dropped his 20th and last shot to lose the match on the countback tie rule after both had recorded fine 198s.  Other notable scores in this round were 198s from Adam Dove and Robin Thomson (both Watsonians). Robin beat Tony Lin Baledent of George Watson’s who shot one of the five 100s recorded in round 1. Other winners were Amanda Puchalla (Edin Univ) on another countback tie-break, Adam Dove, Alasdair Horne, James Brown, Robin Thomson (both Watsonians), Josh Mitchell (Edin Univ) and Charlotte Kim (George Watson’s).

In round 2 there were wins for Adam over Amanda, Alasdair over James, Robin over Josh (but only on the 2nd tie-break rule where Robin had scored one 10.8 to Josh’s none) and Sinclair over Charlotte.

The first semi-final was a very high-scoring affair with Alasdair rolling back the years to edge out Adam by 200 to 199. Extremely good shooting from both. The standard was maintained in the other semi, with Sinclair scoring 199 to overcome Robin’s 194.

The final kept the standards up with Sinclair again shooting 199, but Alasdair couldn’t repeat his feat and scored ‘only’ 197 to take the runner-up spot.

I’d like to thank Balerno & Currie for allowing us to use their range, and also Mark Westwood of the home club for running the computer controlling the electronic targets. The event could not have taken place without him.

WFH

I have just received the prize list documents from the 1991-2 and 1992-3 seasons which were found among the late Dougie Duff’s effects. These are now available to view from the ‘Prizelists’ link under the ‘Competitions’ menu item.

There are still many gaps in this archive. If your club has any old LSSA prize list documents stored away in the back of a filing cabinet, please let me have them to record for posterity.

The Shoulder-to-Shoulder League has finished after a nail-biting conclusion. Hawick had the chance to overtake long-term leaders Watsonians if they could beat George Heriot’s at home in the last match of the season with a score of 29 off or less. They achieved the latter aim quite comfortably but failed in the former, as Heriot’s, perhaps surprisingly for the 4th-placed team in the league, took the two points for the match to keep the home club in 2nd place.

The Handicap league was won by Watsonians, a little more comfortably this time, over Hawick.

The Matchplay league was just as exciting as it ended in a tie between Watsonians and Hawick, both on 39 points. The tie-break rule was invoked for the first time ever (I think), and it resulted in a win for Hawick as they won more MP points than Watsonians in the matches involving those teams (7 to 5).

The top average award goes to Alan Anderson (Hawick).

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank Greg McMillan for running this league once again.

Some readers might have known, or known of, Ken Greenaway who passed away at the weekend.

Ken was well-known in Scottish and British shooting circles.  This writer knew him as members of Edinburgh University RC in the late 1960s. He subsequently dropped out of shooting for a few years to concentrate on his career which I believe culminated in a professorship of music at St Andrews University. He started shooting again a few years ago and became somewhat more proficient than he had been at University!  He won the Earl Haig Scottish Championship in 2016 and was a member of several GB Dewar teams, as well as regularly winning ‘X’ Class trophies at both Scottish and Bisley National meetings . He had been a member of several clubs in Fife, including Kirkaldy, Perth and St Andrews.

He had been battling cancer for two or three years. Our condolences go to his family and friends.

At a meeting of the Association’s Management Committee last night it was decided to alter the Regulations for our two CYOH competitions so that any card with fewer than ten counting shots on it will be disqualified.

These new rules take immediate effect, and can be seen via a link on the Competitions | CYOH page.

The final of the Team CYOH competition has taken place and Balerno & Currie beat Prestonpans A. Congratulations to them on winning the magnificent Burton Cup.

Take the Competitions / CYOH links above to see the full details, as well as the progress of the Individual CYOH whose Final is about to take place between P Smithard (The Sands) and R Thomson (Watsonians).

The results for the first four rounds of the Team Postal League are now available including the up to date averages reports. We apologise for the delay in publishing these.

Talke the Competitions / Team Postal League link above to see all the details.

The stickers for the Individual Championships have been posted out.  There are 30 enties in the Main Championship (more than for some years) 11 in the Ladies, 7 in the Veterans, 8 in the Junior, 10 each in both the Inexpert A and B and 13 in the Benchrest (a record number). The Association really needs to find a trophy for the BR.

All the entrants may be seen on the Championships page under the Competitions link above.

The last day for shooting these cards is 24th February 2025.

The Knock-out Final of the Main Championship for the 16 top qualifiers will be held at Balerno & Currie on Saturday 5th April 2025. All the others are decided on the postal stage.

*** There will be a memorial held for Dougie on Tuesday 19th November at 1pm at the Musselburgh & Fisherrrow Welfare Club, 253 N High St, Musselburgh EH21 6BQ.  All welcome ***

It’s just been revealed that Dougie Duff of Prestonpans RC died a few days ago on 18th October. Dougie was the club’s Secretary and Treasurer for many years.  He also took on the roles of Trophy Convenor and Competitions Secretary for the old LSSA, organising both the CYOH and Individual Championship competitions on its behalf for longer than this writer cares to think about.

He was well known in shooting circles in this area and our condolences go to his family and his clubmates.

There is currently no news of any funeral arrangements but if and when they are annnounced this post will be updated.

UPDATE: Dougie’s cremation has already taken place. He did not wish for a formal funeral.