Only ten archers turned up for the last competition of the Indoor Season. Seven Club members elected to shoot the round of the day – a Portsmouth 3 Spot, two juniors tried to improve on their Rhubarb scores, and Danny Cowin played catch up for the Scratch League Trophy.
It was the usual three way face-off between Pete Mumford and Rhys and Dave Moore in the Gents Compound division. All of them were tied after the first dozen, but Rhys managed to get his nose in front after the second dozen, while Pete Mumford slipped to third. Pete evened things up with Rhys at the end of the third dozen, and Dave found himself 1 point off the pace. A relatively poor fourth dozen from Dave Moore meant there was no way back for him, while Pete Mumford maintained his focus to go 3 points ahead of Rhys with 12 arrows to shoot. Rhys, suddenly buoyed up by the notion that these were the last arrows he would have to shoot indoors for sixth months, hit a string of 10’s to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. For once Pete Mumford’s ‘big finish’ wasn’t quite big enough and he had to settle for second.
Joy Gough was seriously under the weather but managed to control her cough well enough to shoot her second- best score of the season using her smaller Outdoor arrows. The hard work she has put in since changing her shooting style in February is paying off just in time for the Outdoor Season.
Danny Cowin shot a Vegas round to give himself a chance of winning the Gents Recurve Scratch League Trophy. Losing an hour’s sleep due to British Summertime clearly hadn’t done him any favours as he had a miss in the first dozen, but he finished strongly and was unlucky not to break 500. This left Dave Berry, Josh Trafford and Peter Howland to contest the round of the day. Peter Howland had switched to heavier limbs and was using new arrows which may have accounted for the misses he had. Whatever the cause, the misses put a dent his score and he had to settle for third place. Dave Berry kept all his arrows on target, but he did not score highly enough to challenge for the lead. Josh Trafford began to show signs of his old form as he recorded a season’s best total to take the win by a clear margin.
Colin Moore, wrist heavily strapped through injury, managed to finish the round but was nowhere near his best.
In the Ladies Recurve Barbara Harris finally looked like she knew what she was doing with the bow and was happy with her shooting for the first time this season. Better late than never.
Juniors James Hill and Tilly Ashton shot the second of their Rhubarb rounds. James was unable to improve upon his first attempt, but Tilly added a terrific 57 points to her pb for the round. Unfortunately, Tilly’s score was not good enough to overtake James Hill’s first round total and James retains his Junior Rhubarb title.
Results:Portsmouth 3/s- Gents Compound-1.R.Moore 60/570/30, 2.P.Mumford 60/568/28, 3.D.Moore 60/561/22. Ladies Compound-J.Gough 60/558/20. Gents Recurve-1.J.Trafford 60/549/25sb, 2.D.Berry 60/504/12, 3.P.Howland 55/449/9. Gents Barebow-C.Moore 60/468/9. Ladies Recurve-B.Harris 60/449/23. Vegas-D.Cowin 59/499/18. Junior Rhubarb – T.Ashton 53/278/0pb.
Isle of Man Archery Club 