Up Against the Top Guns

Three shooters represented Taupo at the Wanganui Open Practical Shooting tournament on the weekend. Marion Polyblank, Christine Sheehan and Gregg Sheehan competed in a field of 48 shooters from all over New Zealand. The team braved the blustery, cold conditions in Wanganui putting on a creditable performance in spite of inexperience and ammunition problems. 

Polyblank finished second overall in the “D” grade Standard pistol class and first in the Women’s section. Christine Sheehan finished second in the Women’s Standard pistol. Christine’s husband Gregg was unplaced in the tournament but valued the experience of competing in an Open competition at this level. “I was basically unprepared and went with ammunition that was causing misfeeds. That lost me a lot of time but I’ll be better prepared for the next comp.,” said Mr Sheehan.

Marion Polyblank, President of Taupo Pistol Club, said, “It was an awesome competition in Wanganui. We are in the process of strengthening our local club and it was great to be able to take our new shooters away to compete with some of the top guns in the country. The next big shoot will be in Rotorua where we hope to get even more of our members to the closer venue.”

Christine Sheehan, shooting with a Glock .40 caliber, said, “It was a time for me to get used to the new gun, I’d only fired 20 rounds out of it before the competition. The gun worked fine - getting my muscles working in the chilly conditions was another story though…”

Competitors in the International Practical Shooting discipline are expected to apply strategy in order to score hits on targets in the shortest possible time. Targets are mostly paper with some being steel. Paper targets require at least two shots on each and the steel ones usually fall over with one shot. Targets are arranged in various scenarios which may involve shooting through windows, opening doors as well as hitting moving targets which have been activated by hitting another target. Points are awarded for accuracy on the targets but may be taken off for hitting “no shoot” zones. The points score is divided by the time taken to shoot the stage.

The guns used are usually semi-automatic pistols with calibers starting at 9mm going up to .45 inch. The various classes include Open, where the gun may be modified to a high degree with special scope sights, recoil compensators and grips, to Production class where there is no modification to the factory produced pistol.

Gregg Sheehan, Christine Sheehan and Marion Polyblank during their successful weekend at Wanganui

(Press release August 2003)