The 100 yard line at Appleton, where the Brits shoot the Dewar.
Recent shooter spotlight Dennis Lindenbaum stumbled across what appears to be the 2010 British Dewar Team Results on an internet forum. If the results are official, it looks like the British beat us by nearly 50 points this year. Congratulations to the Brits for some great shooting! You can see larger versions of both the Great Britain and the U.S. results by clicking on the images below.
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.
I can say that I have very little respect for the UK scores. Time for them to man-up and actually shoot the match by the spirit of the rules….at Bisley and not on some protected range.
Either that, or we use one of the abandoned warehouses at Camp Perry and open up one window for “conditions”.
Kenny,
There is nothing in the Dewar rules that says, or even implies, that the Dewar must be shot at a nation’s national championship.
That being said there is a small group of old time Dewar rifleman who approached me at Bisley last year and apologized for what they saw was an unsporting manner in which the British do shoot the match.
We do it at Perry because it is simply the only way we can handle it logistically. There was some talk years ago of selecting about 40 shooters and have them come to Manassas, a notoriously quiet range, to shoot the match but it would require all involved to travel on their own dime and take at least three days to do so. The proposal died under those conditions.
There are historical precedents for shooting it between the warehouses at the old Erie Ordnance plant as it has been done in the past during the wars. I don’t know if it is practical now.
There has been some mumbling about bussing the team to Bristol- another quiet range, about 2-3 hours away from Perry, and having them shoot it there. The problem posed is getting folks back for the team matches
Best,
Hap
The Brits selection process and Dewar rules follow:
Selection process from the NSRA website:
“The Great Britain team currently shoots the match in June. The match is fired on a Saturday afternoon or Sunday, dependant on weather.
The team is selected from a shoulder-to–shoulder trial over a modified Double Dewar course, fired on the Saturday morning of the same weekend.
Although occasional adjustments may be made to the arrangements, qualifiers for the trial are normally:
• the leading 40 shooters in Classes X and A in the Bisley Rifle Meeting Championship Aggregate of the previous year;
• the leading three shooters in Classes X and A in the Scottish Meeting Championship Aggregate of the previous year, who did not enter the Bisley Championship Aggregate of that year;
• the leading scorers in a postal trial held in the spring of the same year over a Double Dewar course.
The leading scorer in the Great Britain team is awarded the Ron Wood Cup.
The match was inaugurated in 1909 and results to 2009 are United States of America 53 wins, Great Britain 36 wins, Australia and South Africa one win each.”
THE DEWAR TROPHY INTERNATIONAL MATCH
Organized by:
THE NATIONAL SMALL-BORE RIFLE ASSOCIATION OF GREAT BRITAIN
Lord Roberts Centre, Bisley Camp
Brookwood, Woking, Surrey GU24 0NP
1. To be competed for by teams of twenty shooters representing Australia, Canada, Great Britain, New Zealand, South Africa and the United States of America.
2. Teams will be selected by the responsible National Association in each country.
NOTE: Disabled shooters who are able to comply with the International Shooting Committee for the Disabled Rules under Category SH1, are eligible to take part in this competition.
3. The National Association of each country will make a certified return of all scores on the Certificate of Firing provided.
4. These forms to be completed fully and signed by the Official Witness before being returned to the N. S. R. A. of Great Britain. Shot targets should be kept until publication of the results.
5. All members of the team must shoot on the same day on the same range.
6. Course of Fire – 40 shots per member, 20 each at 50 yards and 100 yards on an outdoor range. Distance to be measured from the front edge of the firing line to the target. Backing cards must be placed behind each target. The distance between target and backer should be 300mm at 50 yards and 600mm at 100 yards.
7. Targets – N. S. R. A. British Match 1989 Series Targets (BM/89), single or three card system must be used. Alternatively N. R. A. of America A-51 and A- 33 targets may be substituted.
8. Number of shots per target – At 50 yards five shots to be fired at each aiming mark and at 100 yards ten shots at each aiming mark. Unlimited sighting shots may be fired before and during each 20 shot series at separate sighter targets which, in the case of the three card system, are printed above the match targets.
9. A time limit of 20 minutes is allowed for each series of 20 shots including sighting shots.
10. Scoring – N.S.R.A. Rules will apply.
11. Rifles – Any .22 calibre rifle may be used provided that it is only used as a single loader. Magazines may not be used. Butt plates and hooks may be used provided they comply with ISSF Rule 7.4.4.2.
12. Sights – Only open or aperture sights may be used. Telescope and other optical sights are not permitted. A lens may be used attached to, or forming part of the foresight in addition to prescribed spectacles, but not in addition to a lens or system of lenses attached to the rearsight.
13. Slings may be used. Sandbags or artificial rests of any description may not be used.
14. Position – Prone. Minimum angle formed by the sling arm to the horizontal to be 30o. Position, slings, gloves and padding must be in accordance with N.S.R.A. Rules.
15. Coaching and spotting is permitted.
16. Ties will be decided by (a) The better score at 100 yards (b) The total number of inner tens at 100 yards.
17. The competition may be fired any time after the 1st January provided that the certificate of firing, together with the witness certificate, is received by the N.S.R.A. of Great Britain not later than 31 October.
18. Unless otherwise stated N.S.R.A Rules will apply.
Gentlemen,
After shooting in this match and wanting to know how we did, I was told that the British were going to shoot their match in August. This match was shot in June.
Can someone clarify this?
Bill,
Early on in the movie classic Casablanca Captain Renault , Claude Rains, and Rick , Humphrey Bogart, are seated outside Rick’s Café Amercain when Renault asks Rick why he came to Casablanca. The following exchange occurs:
Captain Renault: “What in heaven’s name brought you to Casablanca?”
Rick: “My health. I came to Casablanca for the waters.”
Captain Renault: “The waters? What waters? We’re in the desert.”
Rick: “I was misinformed.”
Like Rick, both you and your source were misinformed.
This is the NSRA Dewar firing date, which has been in June for quite some time,and is taken from the NSRA website:
“The Great Britain team currently shoots the match in June. The match is fired on a Saturday afternoon or Sunday, dependant on weather.”
Regards,
Hap
After our matches, I started looking around for information about the British Dewar results.Very hard to find anything. Talked up some people on a British smallbore website who let me know that their scores were completed last June. Like the fool that I am, I explained that I was seeking information about the International Dewar Team Trophy match that’s been held for the past 100 years or so. They kindly responded that they knew full well what the Dewar match is, that it indeed was fired in June, and that he was on the team (he thought he shot a 395 or 396, wasn’t sure because it was some time ago). He later scouted up the results from some place and posted them online. As Hap said, we were misinformed.
Dennis
Gentlemen,
My apologies for dragging this up from the grave – but I thought I’d give the other side of the coin!
Ken:
As a regular shooter at the Appleton range (and Dewar Team member 2011+2013, reserve 2012), I can assure you that it’s not quite the indoor shoot that you’re imagining from the picture shown above! There can be dramatic light variances between firing points, and the layout of the quarry leads to swirling wind under most wind directions and strengths. The 100 yard targets are approximately 4 to 5 feet lower than the firing point (and the 50 yard targets), which requires compensating for.
The dates for the shoot are fixed (first weekend after the 21st June, longest days of the year) and we have to take whatever weather we get at the time. For example, see the 2012 scores… 😉
The Appleton range is used for logistical reasons – the same as Hap reports for the use of Camp Perry. Appleton is roughly in the middle of the country, North/South, in terms of population and has the best facilities in the area for handling the number of shooters required for the Trials.
Hap states that the American team didn’t want to shoot at Manassas because they would have to pay; over here we’re “on our own dime” all the time and want to minimise overall transport and accommodation costs as far as possible. The shoot could be held at Bisley in August, but that would entail a much larger amount of travelling for trialists from the North who otherwise weren’t going to Bisley.
And even shooting at Bisley it’s possible to pick and choose a time where the conditions are favourable. Such as 6.30am, alongside the Randle Match shooters! I assume that the US Dewar Team at Camp Perry doesn’t shoot in the afternoon when the sun and mirage are strongest…? 😉
Best Regards,
Nick.
fred huckle left me two medals that he won in 1947 when he shot in the enland international the other for the teamof 1947 great britain dewar plus many other cups im