It was the turn of the adults to show their paces on Sunday as Onchan held the Senior Indoor Championships. At least that was the idea, but a couple of the juniors decided to throw their hats into the ring too. The round of the day was a 3-spot WA18 for all entrants except those shooting in the Trad and Barebow divisions who used the larger single face version.
The proceedings got off to a frosty start when the Club Chairman made the call for the first line sighters to start, the Records Officer whose job this is, objected to people assuming power they do not have and held things up while she got ready. However, realizing that some of the older members had already levered themselves upright she relented, telling them to ‘crack on and she would catch them up’.
Last minute entrant David Craine, who turned up not knowing the Championships were being held found himself in a face-off with Peter Howland in the 50+ Gents Recurve category and got off to a great start. David held a comfortable lead over the first three dozen and looked to be heading for an easy victory. Peter who struggled initially, suddenly got his eye in and overturned the deficit taking a 1 point advantage into the final dozen. David then put 4 arrows wide of the target, while Peter put in his best dozen of the morning to take the title.
The Ladies Recurve had the largest field it has seen for some time, Catherine Irving-Potter, Carolyn Hirst and Barbara Harris were joined on the shooting line by juniors Lula Brown and Erin Hainge. Catherine, a relatively inexperienced archer, found the 3-spot target a challenge and was exasperated by the number of misses she had. Barbara, a good archer who doesn’t practice enough/at all, took most of the morning to find a rhythm but her scores improved dramatically once she did. Barbara left the range confident that the winner would be among those shooting in the afternoon session. Form suggested that this would be Erin Hainge. As it turned out Barbara was wrong. Erin did not shoot to her usual standard, recorded a number of misses and had to settle for second place. Lula, likewise, had a few errant arrows but comfortably came third. Catherine slotted into fourth and Carolyn Hirst fifth. This left Barbara stunned to discover that she had regained the Ladies title.
Shooting positions being drawn by lot for the Championships, Rhys Moore was less than happy to find himself in the darkest corner on boss 6. It took him both ends of sighters to find his range but once he did, retaining his title was a foregone conclusion. Steve Brew recorded a season’s best score to take second ahead of Ethan Moore, making a home visit, in third. Dave Moore, still getting used to his new bow came fourth with Pete Mumford fifth.
Colin Moore and Chris Crompton had a nail-biting tussle for the trophy in the Gents Barebow. Colin took an early lead, but it looked as though Chris would square things over the second dozen until he had a miss out of nowhere. Chris regrouped and began to close down on Colin again. Even with another miss Chris was taking points out of Colin’s lead with every end. It went right down to the wire, but Colin did just enough to stay ahead and claim the win.
Colin had an easier time of it in the afternoon session when he switched bosses and bows to take on Peter Howland in the Tradbow. Here Colin was never under pressure and took the trophy by a considerable margin to make it two out of two.
Junior Ethan Corran joined dad Les, newbie Tom Rogers, Richard Hainge and Johnathan Gordon for a go at the Gents Recurve title. As was expected the title race was really between Johnathan and Richard but Ethan did well enough to finish fourth, just behind Les. Tom, shooting on the 3-spot for the first time found it a hard ask and had to settle for last place. Johnathan shoot did not exactly flow, staying up too long on the shot began to tire him and the miss he had at the very end of the shoot came as no surprise. Unfortunately for Richard, he too had a miss and Johnathan having done enough in the earlier ends took the title.
Results: Senior Club Championships- Gents 50+ Recurve-1.P.Howland 49/385/4, 2.D.Craine 45/351/5. Ladies Recurve- 1.B.Harris 58/470/7, 2.E.Hainge 53/448/12, 3.L.Brown 53/428/5, 4.C.Irving-Potter 49/357/2, 5.C.Hirst 24/172/1. Gents Compound- 1.R.Moore 60/582/42, 2.S.Brew 60/574/34, 3.E.Moore 60/568/29, 4.D.Moore 60/535/9, 5.P.Mumford 60/528/11. Gents Barebow- 1.C.Moore 60/445/8, 2.C.Crompton 58/442/2. Gents Tradbow-1.C.Moore 49/291/4, 2.P.Howland 40/171/0. Gents Recurve- 1.J.Gordon 59/525/18, 2.R.Hainge 59/516/19, 3.L.Corran 52/415/5, 4.E.Corran 52/401/5, 5.T.Rogers 36/276/5.
Isle of Man Archery Club 