Ocmulgee, Tricky for Some, a Breeze for Others. 

The weather was bright and brisk for the latest SSC fun shoot at Ocmulgee River Gun Club on March 25, 2006. It would have been a perfect day for shooting, had it not been for the wind that somehow managed to cut through layers of clothing like a rusty razor blade. The stiff gusts also pushed the targets around like a playground bully, making an already tricky course even more challenging...for some of us, at least. The wind especially affected the targets up on the skeet fields where someone described station 11 as, "four true pairs...all different."

With the possible exception of station two with its green-on-green presentations, the targets were eminently visible. The target setter relied heavily on speed variations and subtle combinations of quartering angles to attempt to thwart our quest for a raffle ticket. Some notable stations that provided plenty of opportunity to mark zeros on our score cards were station three with its blazing right-to-left crosser followed by a Frisbee that floated in from the trees on the left and seemed to pause briefly in mid-flight before spilling off toward the shooting stand. The first target was technically challenging and called for quite a dollop of lead, whereas the second required an equal amount of restraint to keep from shooting under it. Station four featured a pair of quick quartering targets racing away from two traps placed about twenty yards to the shooter's right. This was the kind of station where, no matter how careful you were to plan which clay to shoot first, once the birds were in flight, your right eye wanted to follow one target and your left eye wanted to follow the other one. Once you got your eyes sorted out and finally broke the first target, the second target was approaching the forty yard mark and was beginning to curve and drop. Fortunately, on this station, a number of shooters were able, through blind luck, to break both targets with the first shot. Station nine was a very unusual true pair, both of which were rabbits. One of them quartered smartly away from a spot just to the shooter's right and the other rolled in from heaven-knows-where off in the woods. The first target had a nasty habit of bounding into the air right at the natural break point, causing many a shooter to harmlessly plow up some real estate right underneath the wascal. The second bunny was much farther away and begged for a little extra choke to make sure of a kill. There were times when this target appeared to be completely enveloped by the dust kicked up by the shot charge and yet managed to somehow emerge unbroken. And that brings us to Station Ten.

Ah, Station Ten! This station contained the easiest target on the course and, by far, the hardest. It started with a looping chandelle/teal that was launched from a visible trap placed about forty-five yards in front of the stand. This target was thrown at a slight angle away from its victim in a high arch from right to left. Not only was it a VERY LONG SHOT, but the lead and barrel placement necessary to break this target changed constantly throughout its entire flight. The second bird was thrown from just in front of the shooting stand and was basically a straight going-away shot. Over the two squads I watched attempt this pair, I actually saw a few of the chandelle/teal broken. It was one of those shots where you could seemingly count "one mis'ippi, two mis'ippi" from the report of the gun to the time the target finally broke. This target would have been considered a tough presentation in any FITASC tournament anywhere in the world and was generally beyond the skills of most SSC shooters. There was a comical sense of dread among the SSC members waiting their turn in the shooting stand like English schoolboys standing in line to receive a caning from a stern headmaster. Most of us left the stand with a resigned shrug of the shoulders and a shake of the head and at least four new zeros on our score card. I can't say that I would like to see a course made up of nothing but targets like this, but it is good to see one or two of them from time to time to remind us how much we still have to learn.

The only score in the nineties was chalked up by Vince McGreggor who ended up with an astonishing 93 for HOA. Our Shootmeister, Budweiser came very close to cracking the nineties mark himself with his excellent 89, which gave him the lead in division two by SIX TARGETS! Dave Padgett tends to be one of those shooters who is either very hot or very cold or he would not be in division three. In spite of the chill wind, he was very hot on this day at Ocmulgee and easily won his division with a score of 83. The Webmeister, Charles Deling was another one who was unaffected by the windy conditions. He put in a fine performance with an 81, which would have won him a ticket in every division except division one. Clifford Rollins' 73 was good enough for three raffle tickets in division five and Ron Stone won division six with the same score. And finally, three out of the four shooters in division seven won raffle tickets.

Lunch was the signature Ocmulgee grilled rib eye steak and helmet-sized backed potato.