The purpose of the “Shooter Spotlight” is to help shooters get to know their fellow competitors a little bit better. We cover a wide range of shooters from “Marksman to Master.” This is the 28th interview in the series.
Steve Rocketto. Photo by Hap Rocketto
Where do you call home?
My family escaped from Brooklyn when I was just a tad. I now reside at Casa Sinverguenza, Oakdale, Connecticut.
How long have you been shooting?
I started competitive shooting under Coach George Gregory at New London High School in 1961 so I am coming up on the half century mark.
How did you get involved in shooting competitively?
My father, Abe, and my Scoutmaster, Bill Smith, took me out for the first time.
What is a little known fact about yourself that your fellow competitors might not know?
I had a pilot’s license before I had a driver’s license.
What do you consider your finest shooting achievement.
I think that my career as a coach is that which I am most proud. I have run Boy Scout ranges, started the Quaker Hill Junior Rifle Club and three high school teams, am an instructor in the CMP/US Army Squad Designated Marksman progam and have instituted a state-wide training project for the Connecticut Wing of the Civil Air Patrol.
What is your favorite pre-match meal?
If I am shooting service rifle, a Moon Pie and a Doctor Pepper gets you primed to enter the pits at 06-dark. Smallbore requires a more delicate feeding program, perhaps a real onion roll with a schmear of Philadelphia.
What is your favorite post match drink?
A well iced Coke or iced tea with lemon is preferred.
Do you have a favorite shooting range?
My ideal range is described in one of the verses of the Western anthem, Home on the Range:
“Where the air is so pure. the zephyrs so free
The breezes so balmy and light,
That I would not exchange my home on the range
For all of the cities so bright.”
On the other hand, the ideal is just an idea, so to paraphrase a Western humorist, Will Rogers, I never met a range I didn’t like.
Do you have any short term and/or long term goals?
My long term goal is to keep shooting competitively. For the short term, I would like to get back my offhand position which I lost after a series of spinal operations and a long lay-off.
What shooting skill are currently focusing your energy on?
My primary interest is improving my prone iron sight scores.
Thanks Steve for sharing a little bit about yourself with the pronematch.com community!
