Having barely started after the Christmas break, the Club’s activities were brought to a halt by the second Covid lockdown. Sunday’s relaunch of the Indoor season meant that most people were woefully out of practice and as such the Records Officer was ordered by the Club Chairman to be ‘nice’ and let everyone shoot a Portsmouth.
A field of four started the day in the Gents Compound division but, after a premature release sent an arrow belly-flopping off his launcher, Colin Moore decided not to continue recording his lacklustre performance. It therefore became the usual three way shoot off between Pete Mumford and Dave and Rhys Moore. Pete Mumford, who exists in a permanent state of archery readiness made the best start, but Rhys levelled things by the end of the second dozen, with Dave just 3 points behind. A poor half dozen after the interval put paid to Dave Moore’s chances of victory but things remained close between the other two; Rhys having a slight edge. Going into the last dozen Rhys had a 5 point lead but Pete came back at him with a string of 10’s just as his own form dipped. When the dust settled it transpired that Pete had lost by just a single point, and Rhys could count himself lucky to have the win.
Lone Lady Compound Joy Gough hit a couple of 8’s that she was not happy with but felt that the shoot had gone as well as could be expected under the circumstances.
The largest field of the day came in the Gents Recurve with Danny Cowin, Alex Allen-Snell, Simon Kenyon, Ralf Mitchell and Peter Holland on the shooting line. Simon made the early running before Alex settled down. Danny, whose appearances on the shooting line have been patchy to say the least, was surprisingly consistent. He soon overhauled Simon Kenyon and remained in touch with Alex but ultimately had to settle for second. Simon complained of fatigue, but his last dozen was his best of the day he finished safely in third. Peter Holland put in a solid round that secured him fourth place. Ralf Mitchell was using a new finger tab which seemed to be giving him trouble and which, he claimed, was responsible for the miss he had late on in the shoot.
Barbara Harris despite having injured herself on the way to the shoot and suffering an equipment failure during it, still manged to post the highest recurve score of the day. Anna Scheepers, shooting in the afternoon session, completed her third round and can now be awarded a handicap.
Juniors James Hill and Nathan Kinrade were also in action. In the u18’s James Hill showed good form and his score, which was decent anyway, might have been even better if he had not had limbs on upside-down throughout the shoot. Nathan Kinrade also showed what he could do in the u16’s with a 500+ score.
Results Portsmouth: Gents Compound- 1.R.Moore 60/567/27, 2.P.Mumford 60/566/27, 3.D.Moore 60/557/20. Ladies Compound- J.Gough 60/557/19. Gents Recurve-1.A.Allen-Snell 60/536/21, 2.D.Cowin 60/527/15, 3.S.Kenyon 59/516/16, 4.P.Holland 60/475/7, 5.R.Mitchell 59/444/4. Ladies Recurve- 1.B.Harris 60/549/17, 2.A.Scheepers 60/407/4.
Isle of Man Archery Club 