Virginia Thrasher, who will attend West Virginia in the fall, led the youth movement at the position matches by sweeping metric. After the first day she had a 30 point lead on the field and never looked back.
Around 75% of the position competitors were juniors.
In conventional position Thrasher started strong but could not overcome a steamroller performance by WVU team mate Elizabeth Gratz who overtook her to win the conventional title.
Jeff Doerschler and Bill Beard won Intermediate Senior and Senior honors in both events
While the weather was generally good a vicious rain storm played havoc on the final day prompting the comment that you can take the Nationals out of Perry but you can’t take the Perry weather out of the Nationals.
About Hap Rocketto
Hap Rocketto is a Distinguished Rifleman with service and smallbore rifle, member of The Presidents Hundred, and the National Guard’s Chief’s 50. He is a National Smallbore Record holder, a member of the 1600 Club and the Connecticut Shooters’ Hall Of Fame. He was the 2002 Intermediate Senior Three Position National Smallbore Rifle Champion, the 2012 Senior Three Position National Smallbore Rifle Champion a member of the 2007 and 2012 National Four Position Indoor Championship team, coach and captain of the US Drew Cup Team, and adjutant of the United States 2009 Roberts and 2013 Pershing Teams. Rocketto is very active in coaching juniors. He is, along with his brother Steve, a cofounder of the Corporal Digby Hand Schützenverein. A historian of the shooting sports, his work appears in Shooting Sports USA, the late Precision Shooting Magazine, The Outdoor Message, the American Rifleman, the Civilian Marksmanship Program’s website, and most recently, the apogee of his literary career, pronematch.com.
