By Peter Haxell
While most people are looking forward to a long weekend at Easter, hunters are preparing for the Roar. However, for precision competition Benchrest shooters, Easter time is the culmination of testing bullets and barrels in preparation for the National Championships.
This year, the tournament was hosted by the Nelson Branch at Packers Creek. Benchrest veteran and stalwart Graeme Smith and his able assistants Greg Couper and Carina Jackson were on hand to ensure a well-run match, as always.
Unfortunately, this year saw a smaller field than typical, but did yield some new faces and some fierce competition nonetheless.
Good Friday was set aside as a day of rekindling old friendships, flag setting, load discussions, bullet and barrel choices and sometimes even some practice interspersed with a few more yarns.
This year the weather gods seemed to oblige and there were lovely blue skies and not too much wind with temperatures in the mid twenties. We only hoped that would stay the case for the whole weekend.
Benchrest is a sport where you shoot five, five shot groups at 100y and then 200y. Each set of five, five shot groups is called an aggregate and you add the 100 and 200y aggregates together and average them for a grand aggregate.
At the Nationals, Saturday morning is set aside to shoot Light Varmint 100y and after a short break for lunch we shoot Light Varmint 200y. The rifles we shoot are single shot bolt actions with barrels of around 21” typically chambered in 6PPC, epoxied into carbon fibre stocks with 3” wide fore-ends. Triggers are of the light to very light variety ranging in pull weight of less than a half ounce to three to four ounces. Scope magnification is unlimited but 40-48x is common.
Rules dictate that the LV rifle, including bolt and scope cannot weight more than 10.5lb all up.
Rifles are shot from the sitting position with the fore-end supported in a joystick style adjustable front rest and butt stock supported in a heavy sand bag. They are generally shot free recoil.
On Sunday, we shoot Heavy Varmint 100y and HV200. The only difference between this and the LV is that the HV rifle is permitted to weigh 13.5lb. All other dimensions remain the same. This means that longer or heavier contour barrels and heavier scopes with increased magnification can be used.
However, most people use their LV rifle to compete in the HV class and generally do not seem to be disadvantaged by less weight. It also means you only have to test one barrel at a time.
Unlimited sighters are permitted at any time during a match and but for a 10 minute time limit on match 1 of the day, a seven minute time limit is enforced for all other groups of an aggregate.
Competitors make up their ammunition between matches, twiddling powder charges and seating depths to “tune” their rifle as temperature and humidity change over the course of the day.
Having shot the LV and HV aggregates, you add the two grand aggregates together and average them. This yields what we all want to know. The “Two-Gun” or overall champion.
Monday is reserved for Rimfire Benchrest whereby three 25 bull targets are shot at 50m outdoors with a time limit of 30 minutes. The rifles are commonly single shot however some competitors believe they have an advantage by shooting repeating rifles. Anschutz or custom actions are the predominant force de jour but you do see a few Vudoos now and again. Again, unlimited sighters can be shot. The maximum score is 250.25 where hitting the dot in the very centre of the 10 ring scores you an X and an extra .1.
The Rimfire barrel is generally longer and of a lighter profile than a centrefire barrel and barrel tuners are commonplace. Stocks again have 3” wide fore-ends and triggers are light to very light. The maximum weight of the Rimfire rifle with scope of unlimited magnification is 14lb. They are again shot from the seated position from a front rest and rear bag.
The story of the tournament would undoubtedly be the good fortune we had to have three generations of the Kidson family shooting the match. Michael from Nelson, his son Charlie and grandson Olly visiting from Perth and shooting their first Benchrest matches. They were a welcome addition to the crew.
Saturday dawned fine with light winds. In match 1 of the LV100, Aucklander Peter Haxell started nicely with a .176” followed closely by Christchurch’s Tony Titheridge. In third place was Charlie Kidson with a .252” – that’s five shots in barely more than a quarter of an inch at 100y.
As the winds started to get up, Sue Gavin finished the aggregate with the small group of .211” followed closely by Peter Haxell with a .217” and Greg Couper with a .289”.
As lunchtime beckoned, the scores were tallied and in first place was Peter Haxell with a .2034” agg, in second was Sue Gavin with a .2516” and in third was Tony Titheridge with a .2818”. Overall small group for the agg went to Tony with a .159”.
After lunch conditions became a little more difficult with a fairly stout left to right breeze which were pushing bullets several inches at 200y despite their velocity typically being in the region of 3300-3400fps. Shots for some people were getting very close to the edge of the target, noting that any shots outside of the marked target area incurring a 2” penalty in addition to the group size. Some competitors chose to click their scopes into the wind to account for this. You just have to remember that if the wind changes direction you could be in trouble if you forget to adjust it back again.
The small group for match 1 of the LV200 went to Graeme Smith with a .712” followed by Greg Couper with a .767” and Peter Haxell with a .801”. Groups of an inch to an inch and a half were common throughout the aggregate. Carina Jackson shot a lovely little group of .288” in match 4 – yes, that’s five shots just a bit more than a quarter of an inch at 200y. It would be the small group for the aggregate also.
At the end of the aggregate and the scores tallied, it was again Peter Haxell on top with a .3049” agg, followed by Carina Jackson with a .3838” and Graeme Smith with a .4012”.
That meant that for the LV Grand Aggregate the top three places were Peter Haxell with a .2541”, Tony Titheridge with a .3495” and Greg Couper with a .3566”.
Sunday morning was the start of the Heavy Varmint 100. Winds were not as kind as they were to start the LV matches but no one told Greg Couper who put down a ripper .118” which would hold as small group at the end of the agg. As the agg went on, groups of around a half inch were not at all uncommon and there was a lot of head scratching and more than a few choice words heard along the firing line.
As the dust settled it was Peter Haxell showing the way again by winning the agg with a .2928” followed by Sue Gavin with a .3106” and Greg Couper with a .3170”.
By lunch Sunday, conditions were quite “sporting” and groups of two inches were not uncommon. Sue Gavin started well with a .426” group and that would only be bested for small group of the agg by Greg Couper with a .414” in match 3. By the end of the yardage, only three competitors had an aggregate less than a half inch which is quite rare indeed. Peter Haxell had his rifle well under control finishing with a .591”, second only to Greg with a .446”.
When the scores were totalled it was Peter Haxell winning the agg with a .3660” followed by Sue Gavin with a .4501” and Greg Couper with a .4937”.
And so, to the Two Gun. Having won all four yardages for the weekend, it was no surprise that it was Peter Haxell in first place with an agg of .2918”. Second was Sue Gavin with a .3734” and in third place it was Greg Couper with a .3810”.
Monday morning was time for the Rimfire nationals. This was a more leisurely start at 9am instead of 8am. We set up target frames for 50m and our rows of flags to gauge the wind which was once again fairly stiff. The Kidson clan returned for this portion of the nationals and this time we were also joined by Michael’s wife Anne-Marie.
Greg Couper shooting his Vudoo lead the way with a 243.10 with Graeme Smith right behind him with two less X’s and a 243.08. In third was Carina Jackson with a 241.12.
In match 2, conditions improved slightly, well for some of us they did. Carina was not at all troubled and put down a nice 245.10, chased all the way by Greg with a 244.07. Graeme Smith was only a couple of points adrift on 241.09.
Conditions really got tough closer to lunch time and in the final match, no one broke 240. Michael Kidson won the match with a 239.11 followed by Greg with one less X on 239.10 and then Carina on 239.05.
And so, when the scores were in, the winner was Greg Couper on 726.27. Only one point adrift was Carina Jackson on 725.27 and in third place it was Graeme Smith on 717.26. Charlie Kidson came in 7th and Olly in 9th place.
The culmination of the LV and HV Centrefire plus Rimfire classes yields the result for the Graeme Smith National 3 gun trophy. Ten points are awarded for each person you place ahead of in each of the LV and HV aggregates as well as in the Rimfire total aggregate.
Graeme had done some calculations after the centrefire classes and after a bit of mental arithmetic came up with the final scores. In first place was Peter Haxell with 220 points. In second place was Greg Couper with 210 points and in third place was Tony Titheridge with 160 points.
This was the first time a North Islander had claimed the title.
And, as a special reward to our only junior shooter, Graeme Smith awarded a gold medal to Olly Kidson who was tickled pink.
The group would like to extend their thanks to the Kidson clan for making the effort to join us all the way from Perth. We enjoyed your company and hope you enjoyed the experience. We look forward to seeing you again next year.
In fact, we would welcome anyone who wants to give Benchrest a go. It isn’t easy but it sure is fun with a good group of like-minded people.
