Onchan was packed on Sunday as eighteen archers turned out to try their hand at a Portsmouth round. Among them was IoMAC alumnus Anne Rutland who put in a very welcome guest appearance. The Portsmouth round was shot as part of the Club’s handicap league. The scratch scores were adjusted by means of a set of mind-boggling tables to give the final result irrespective of age, gender or bow type.
Anne Rutland, who has enjoyed a splendid Outdoor season across, visited the island for a few days and showed the boys how to do it as she recorded the highest scratch Compound score of the day. Pressures of work had curtailed the practice time available to Dave and Rhys Moore and it showed on Sunday as both struggled to find the centre. It was left to the Club’s senior citizens Pete Mumford and Billy Lightfoot to fly the flag. Both men shrugged off the weight of their years to put in season’s best scores. Pete finished four points behind Anne and Billy only two points behind. If Mr Lightfoot could rid himself of the habit of going all Elvis about the hips at full draw he would win every week.
Marital relations were strained to braking point on the Recurve side as Dave Berry tried to stave off another humiliating defeat at the hands of wife Jane. Jane, who usually leaves it to other Club members to rub salt into Dave’s wounds, couldn’t help herself last Sunday as she let out an astonished exclamation of ‘have you managed to get them all in the centre?’ which resulted in guffaws from the shooting line. Mr Berry spent the next few minutes trying to take an imaginary knife out of his back.
In the absence of Danny Cowin, who was celebrating his birthday, Barbara Harris focused her sarcasm on Dave Moore, who good naturedly gave as good as he got. Barbara started well but faded towards the end and had to share the highest scratch Recurve honours with Toby Young who was beginning to get to grips with his new bow.
Unfortunately, after handicapping, they both finished in the bottom half of the table. Once again Ralf Mitchell found himself caught out by the vagaries of archery. Confused by the scoring system of the Worcester he shot two weeks previously, Ralf returned from holiday and promptly put six arrows into the target, while everyone else contented themselves with the usual three. Fortunately, he made his mistake during the sighters before the actual round began and so was not penalised. Ralf went on to add 22 points to his pb and took the win after handicapping. Lily Priestnal yawned her way through the afternoon session and in spite of saying she was tired every two minutes, managed to add 50 points to her pb for the round and secure second place after the handicap was applied. James Hill continued his run of form by adding 6 points to his pb on the way to third place. Peter Howland again made progress, adding 12 points to his pb, but he had to settle for fifth place overall.
Also shooting well on Sunday was Kristen Joughin. Kristen added an excellent 49 points to her pb in what was only her second shoot and needs to complete one more to be given a handicap.
Results Portsmouth Handicap – 1.R.Mitchell 1479 (59/463/8)pb, 2.L.Priestnal 1458 (58/457/10)pb, 3.J.Hill 1449 (60/519/15)pb, 4.B.Lightfoot 1445 (60/575/36), 5.P.Howland 1434 (60/473/12)pb, 6.R.Moore 1433 (60/567/27), 7.P.Mumford 1432 (60/573/33), 8.J.Berry 1431 (60/521/17), 9.C.Moore 1426 (60/557/18), 10.J.Gough 1422 (59/549/20), 11.D.Moore 1420 (60/558/21), 12.T.Young 1410 (60/524/20), 13.E.Lutes 1407 (60/457/9), =13.B.Harris 1407 (60/524/13), 15.D.Berry 1398 (60/496/14), 16.N.Kinrade 1356 (58/362/2).
Ladies Compound – A.Rutland 60/577/37. Ladies Recurve K.Joughin 58/372/4pb.
Isle of Man Archery Club 