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We couldn't have had better weather for a sporting clays outing than we had on October 14, 2006 at Cherokee Rose. It was sunny and cool with an occasional refreshing breeze. Cherokee Rose presented the Social Shooting Club with two drastically different, twelve-station courses dubbed Promatic (easy) and Beretta (hard) and they proved to be true to their billing, producing a nine-bird difference in par and a twelve-bird spread in average score.
 I was only able to shoot the hard course on this perfect Saturday, and I must say it kept my interest from start to finish. Not only were the targets on this course technically difficult, but the low sun filtered through the ever thinning leaf canopy presented a further challenge to shooters who chose to attempt this layout in the morning. The mottled light not only made it difficult to pick up the targets visually off the trap arms, but it caused some of the birds to seem to appear and disappear along their flights as they mockingly flashed orange then grey and then orange again. To me, it made some of the targets seem to be traveling faster than they actually were. This effect was especially striking on station two, which consisted of a teal that rose at a slight angle to the left (and veritably glowed in full sun) coupled with a flat quartering target thrown from a trap placed about twenty yards in front of the stand and to the shooters right. This quartering bird emerged from the trap in complete shade, flashed orange for an instant as it crossed the clearing directly in front of the shooter, and then began to flicker like the neon sign for a sleazy motel as it entered the partial shade of the sparse woods off to the left. The shooter's eye was strongly drawn to the glowing teal as it rose up right in front of the stand, and most of the shooters who I observed picked this as the target to shoot first. All but the very quickest shooters who approached the pair in this order were confronted with an inordinately difficult presentation on the second shot. The second bird, by then, was out about forty yards, was difficult to see, and was curling and dropping at same time. If, on the other hand you shot the quartering target first, it was a pretty straightforward presentation at about thirty yards. The teal, at this point, had just peaked and was beginning to fall. Admittedly, it was a long way away, but it was perfectly visible against the sky and was merely dropping straight down. Members of my squad attempted this pair both ways with varying degrees of success.
Station three was a technically difficult station, but target visibility was not an issue. It presented a report pair of two arching right-to-left crossers, one at forty yards and one at about thirty-five. The two targets were traveling at subtly different speeds and proved to be quite a test of smoothness and precision.
Station four was back in the woods and once again presented a visual challenge to the shooters. The first target was merely an outgoer launched from the shooter's left, but my goodness, was it difficult to see in the mottled sunlight! The second bird came knifing down from what seemed like the tree tops above the shooter's right shoulder. It too was a bit difficult to see given the lighting conditions, but my squad, at least, was pretty successful at killing it before it crashed into the woods on the left.
 Station seven offered another true pair where it was a toss-up as to which one to shoot first. It consisted of a rabbit that was thrown from a trap positioned on the far side of a ridge that stretched across the whole clearing perpendicular to the shooting stand. The rabbit bounded along the ridge for a while before finally losing some speed and making its way down the shooter's side of the slope and eventually into the tall weeds off to the right. The other target was a standard bird that, except for the fact that it was partially obscured by a tree branch during the early part of its flight, very closely resembled the high house target on station two of a skeet field. The squad before mine opted to shoot the bunny first and then take their chances with the outgoer when it was forty yards away and descending rapidly behind the far side of the ridge. They only produced rather limited success with this approach to the station. Luckily for us the last shooter on that squad, who happened to be shooting a 28 gauge, became frustrated and reversed the order on the very last pair. It immediately became obvious that that was the best order in which to shoot this station. Not only was the first bird simply a duplication of a skeet shot, but the rabbit was also an easier shot when taken second. If you didn't languish too much over the bird, there was plenty of time to kill the rabbit as it rolled lazily towards the briar patch.
Station ten was the ugliest station on the Beretta course. The stand was placed at the edge of a deep hollow stretching away from the shooter and crowded by hardwoods on all sides. The menu was four report pairs starting with an elongated chandelle thrown toward the shooter in a slightly angled arch from the far end of the clearing. The target came in low, never rising as high as the shooting stand. Frankly, this target didn't appear all that taxing considering the general level of difficulty on Beretta, but it was ultimately responsible for a lot of zeros on a lot of score cards (including mine). It is a pretty sad commentary on my own ability to think that I walked off this station feeling fairly satisfied with the fact that I remembered to make an adjustment whenever I missed this presentation, and hence, I missed all four of them in a different place. Whopee! The second target of the pair was a cockeyed trap target that had been sniffing a little too much crystal. The target was so fast and so far that there was a bit of speculation amongst the shooters as to whether this bird was a standard or a midi. Although this presentation appeared to be the more difficult of the two, it in fact, seemed to have a slightly higher mortality rate than the incomer. I observed a rare phenomenon on this particular station. I watched one of the consistently high scoring shooters in the club, a shooter who will remain nameless but who has registered numerous scores of ninety and above at SSC events, produce a clean zero on this station. It made my score of two seem like a triumph.
 Vince McGregor was predictably high gun on Beretta, but even he was unable to break his usual score in the nineties and had to settle for an ignominious 89! Barry Zuckerman was runner up with an 87. Division Two produced two scores in the eighties. Barry Jackson won the division with his 82 and Matt Morgan came in second two targets behind him. The now former Division three shooter, JP McCrary, left the rest of the division in the dust with an unbelievable 86, which also made him third overall. Doug Wunch's 76 was ten target shy of the lead in this division but was still good enough for second place.
Vance Gaffnea and Lois Morrissy fought it out for the top spot in division four. Vance's 73 nosed out Lois by a single target. Ron Leslein captured three tickets in division five with a very respectable 72 followed closely by Scott Ross who registered a 69. Plum Merrill dominated division six with her score of 54, her bitter nemeses, Carol Taylor, coming in second, two targets back. The Beretta course did not offer a "good day" to anyone in Division Seven brave enough to attempt it.
On the Promatic course, Barry Zuckerman picked up a 28 gauge and beat Ronnie Futo at his own game, registering an amazing 99. Ronnie came in second with his not-too-shabby 97. Division Two was three-deep in nineties with Matt Morgan taking the high gun honors with his 95 followed by Scott Carter and the Shootmeister who tied for second with their 92's. David Beardan and Jorge Valdes shared the lead in division three with scores of 92 followed by Russell Magbee with a 90. Ken Jones' 83 was good enough to win Division Four with Eloise Newton and Mike Rich sharing the number two positon with their 82's. My goodness, it must have been a long ride home for Percy that afternoon! Scott Ross shot an 84 which gave him the lead in division 5. Harvy Schwartz's was only good enough for second on Promatic. Gary Tucker and Carol Taylor finished one and two in Division Six while almost everybody in Division Seven shot well enough to win a ticket.
Upon studying the results from the October 14th SSC shoot, I discovered one very curious phenomenon. There was one shooter who shot the exact same score on both courses! Go figure.
Cherokee Rose departed from SSC tradition on this lovely Saturday and served a lunch that might have been endorsed by the American Cancer Society and The Heart Fund. It consisted of a grilled boneless, skinless chicken breast, pole beans, mashed potatoes and rolls. OK, the dessert was decadent, but all the brownies were gone by the time I got to the dessert table, so I was spared the agonizing choice of ruining a perfectly sensible meal by loading up on sweets.
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