Guyana’s rifle shooting team recaptured the Milex Long Range shooting title beating their closest rivals by eight points on the penultimate day of the West Indies Fullbore championships held at the Twickenham Rifle Range in Jamaica.
The Guyanese shooters left home with a promise to recapture the title after they were edged out by Trinidad and Tobago by an agonizing one point at last year’s regional championships held at the Timehri Rifle ranges and made good on that promise.
They stuck to their task on a day with overcast conditions and quickly switching winds to triumph over their competitors with a score of 748 and 54 V-bulls.
The visiting London Middlesex Rifle Association (LMRA) team of Great Britain secured the second position with 740 points with 64 V-bulls followed by host Jamaica, a distant third with 704 points and 42 V-bulls.
Barbados finished fourth with 697 points and 42 V-bulls while Trinidad and Tobago ended a disappointing fifth with 694 (46Vs).
Antigua/Barbuda at their second regional championships finished at the bottom of the table.
At the 900 range Guyana shot a score of 378 (28Vs) followed by LMRA Combined 376 (37Vs) Trinidad and Tobago 362 (27Vs) Jamaica, 361 (23Vs), Barbados 360 (20Vs) and Antigua and Barbuda with 309 (11Vs).
For Guyana Claude Duguid shot the only possible at that range with six V-bulls.
Other good scores came from Richard Fields, 49, with seven V-bulls and Mahendra Persaud, 48, with five V-bulls.
At the 1000-yard range, Guyana shot 370 (26Vs) followed by LMRA Combined with 364 (27Vs) Jamaica 343 (19Vs) Barbados 337 (21Vs) Trinidad 332(19Vs) and Antigua and Barbuda 292(11Vs0. For Guyana Ryan Sampson shot 48(3Vs) Dylan Fields 48(1V), Richard Fields and Dane Blair both had 47(4Vs).
The Chief Wind Coach was Assistant Commissioner of Police, Paul Slowe while the two other Wind Coaches were Persaud and Goodluck.
The team’s reserve shooters were Sigmund Douglas and Major Terrence Stuart while the team was cheered by a group of supporters led by Guyana’s Honorary Consul to Jamaica Indira Persaud.
The championships concluded yesterday with the final team shoot for the Short Range Championship over the 300, 500 and 600-yard ranges in which Guyana are the defending champions.
The Guyanese shooters also excelled on the first three days of the Individual championships with Ransford Goodluck emerging as the top West Indian shooter while three other shooters finished in the top ten.
