Markham Newsletter 2024 May

Volume 14 Issue 05 May 2024

Volume 14 Issue 05

2024 STATE CHAMPIONS Jake Hooper

Markham Park Gun Club

Youth Program Mondays 6-9

NSSA Skeet Saturday, June 8th

ATA Trap Sunday, May 26th

NSCA Sporting Clays March 19th

SATURDAY, MAY 18TH

Dax Demena

Reanna Frauens

Next General Meeting

ON REQUEST FROM SECRETARY

ClubNews

Lunch will be provided by FLAVOR HOUSE GRILL for the Sporting Clays event this month. I haven’t shot a registered event for some time since I got my shoulders done last year. I think I’ll be attending this shoot. I may not shoot well but I know I’ll eat well.

month with only 3 shooters and 250 targets.

Attendance on Mondays continues to be excellent. Most nights we have 15-16 shooters. We could use more coaches now and if attendance keeps up we could use more in the future. If you are interested in Youth coaching or just getting experience as a coach, come and see us on a Monday night and get the paperwork started.

As you can see by the cover, some of our Markham shooters did well at the latest state shoots. Jake Hooper walked away with the Sub-Junior State Championship trophies in Handicap, Doubles, and HAA at the Florida State Trapshoot. Dax Demena is again our Florida State Singles Champion. Reanna Frauens took home the Ladies Championship in the Main Event and was the overall Champion in 5-Stand. Great shooting!

Trap was well attended by 23 shooters who shot 3,375 targets. The skeet shoot was still disappointing this

If you know someone who would like the newsletter, forward them a copy and tell them to email me so I can add them to the list.

Joe Loitz 954-857-5278

jloit@bellsouth.net

CLAY

Probably the most profound problem with shooting a shotgun is not looking at it. Your shotgun is the equivalent of a tennis racket, golf club, baseball bat, etcetera. You look at the ball in all those examples and more importantly, you don’t check where your racket, club, or bat is by looking at it!

Albert Scooter approaches this idea in this month’s article when he advises us on his technique for shooting skeet High 1. He suggests looking 45 inches above his barrel when you call for the target. This takes the barrel/bead out of play, letting the target be the first thing you see. Taking the barrel/bead out of play doesn’t receive enough emphasis in shotgunning articles. My belief is: your eyes should be gazing at

the look point when you mount the gun not looking down the barrel. Some great shooters mount the gun looking down the barrel, then shift to the look point. Can’t deny their success, but I have always done my best shooting when I’ve focused solely on the look point as I mount. When hunting, shooting FITASC, or International Skeet you are not premounting the shotgun and you are totally focused on the bird in the air whether it has feathers or is made of pitch and clay. There isn’t time to look down the barrel. You’re swinging with the target, bringing your gun to your face, and shooting in a perfect rhythm. In a pre-mounted

One of the fundamentals of all shotgunning is keeping the target above your barrels as it appears. In skeet this means setting a hold point below the target line and looking above the gun into the target line. “Spoiling the line” is no doubt the biggest error in shotgunning where your barrels run over the top of the target line and the target is lost visually. The almost immediate result is a stopped swing and trigger pull, placing your shot over and behind the target. To sum up Albert’s article, look above your barrels as you mount the gun, so your focus is on the target, not your gun. Don’t call for the tar-

get until you are mentally focused on seeing the target and all other thoughts have left the building. He does say to point your barrels higher also. Not a fan of that idea. Hold points are very personal. Try it, see how it feels. It might work. To me that idea plays with how I see the sight picture creation as I move to the target. Don’t think that would help me. This is why missing is expected in practice. If it feels comfortable, do it, otherwise just try mounting to your hold point while keeping your

Clayton Rue reminds us to stick to our shot plan this month. See the target, execute your shot plan, shoot the target. Your shot plan is basically three parts, hold point, look point, break point. You could throw in correct stance, swing method, and shot visualization, but I think you get the point. Decide on a plan and stick to it. Thinking is something you do before you go to your look point and call for the target. Once you’ve cleared your mind and are totally focused on seeing your target, stop thinking. Call for the target, see the target, execute your swing method, and shoot at the break point. See the target and shoot, no thinking about leads, the second target, or hitting the first target. Call and watch the target break in the words of John Shima.

Speaking of John Shima, his article fits in with the first two. He talks about the “Cadence of Focus” where we visualize before we step into the station, go through our pre-shot routine, and finally settle our eyes into expanded, soft focus at the look point. Done correctly this allows us to “adopt a state of patient awareness” in anticipation of seeing the target. How do you know you’ve done all this correctly? If your move to the target is a smooth swing, bringing your lead and the target into a relaxed merging of all elements into the perfect sight picture, you know you’ve succeeded.

John always says “Watch the target break.” What makes this statement so

true is that feeling/knowledge you’ve merged into the perfect sight picture as you pull the trigger.

Subconsciously you know when it’s perfect and remembering and repeating that feeling is the essence of the highest level of shotgunning. Watching the target break means everything has gone right with the shot. I cannot tell you how many of my students rarely see the target break as they shoot. I know I’m on my game when I see every target break and I know exactly where I was on the target as I released the trigger.

This isn’t your conscious mind interfering with the shot. It’s your conscious mind doing what it is supposed to, watching the target throughout the whole implementation of the shot. Don’t be confused, if you see that perfect merging of the shot at the break point, you are probably in perfect rhythm and harmony with your gun, your vision, and mind. If you didn’t see it, what exactly were you looking at? Not the target and the shot execution. You probably lifted your head to see the result not the execution or you looked at your barrel to check the lead. I hope that makes sense. John talks about his student Denny from Honolulu who stated, “I would rather center my shots on 24 targets and miss one due to a lapse in concentration than chip and hack 25 targets to complete a straight.” The joy in shooting, as Denny suggests, is where the gun and target are merged in the perfect execution of a shot. The joy of the perfect execution of 24 shots will always trump 25 lucky breaks and in the long run will lead to 25 perfect breaks.

What I’m getting at is purposeful, focused practice teaches you to execute a shot where you know the target is going to break. It isn’t a hope, it is a purposefully executed shot. Until you can repeat a shot over and over again, because you know absolutely how to execute the shot, you will never be consistent. You need to step onto a station knowing what needs to happen to break the target. Execution by rote practice and a memorized lead never works in

In the long run. Watching the target break, seeing the execution of the shot as it happens is the only way to improve your shooting permanently. Every target is unique regardless of the station. Every Low 1 is unique and requires the same concentration as a Low 4. Low 1 may be the easiest target for a right-handed shooter, but each one flies its own unique path as it approaches you. Don’t just break it, break it on purpose to perfection. Learn the easy targets to perfection, then the more difficult targets will be easier to see and break. Watch the target break!

ROYAL SPORTING ARMS

located in Davie, FL right on I-595 and 5 Minutes From Markham Park Trap Skeet and Sporting Clays Club. We are open year round to serve you at our FL Location.

Here at Royal Sporting Arms we are excited to help you with your next gun purchase.

We

Saturday,June8th

50targets12gauge

50targets20gauge

50targets28gauge

50targets.410gauge

50targetsDoubles

$22each50targets

Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat

Tourney

Trap Youth Skeet

Trap Sporting

Registered Shooting and Events in South Florida

Gun Shows

Miramar National Guard Armory May 25-26th

Skeet

Trail Glades May 27th

Markham June 8th

Trap

PBS Complex May 11th

Trail Glades May 18th

Markham May 26th

Sporting Clays accomplished with

Bradford May 11th

Sarasota May 11th

OK Corral May 12th

Quail Creek May 18th

Markham May 19th

Polk May 19th

Amelia May 25th

Bermont May 25th

Quail Creek May 26th

Blackjack May 27th

2024 Schedule NSCA

Sporting Clay Tournaments

Date Tournament

Saturday Jan. 27th Snow Bird Open

February No Shoot in February

Saturday Mar. 30th St. Patrick’s Day Open

Sunday April 14th Gerry Stumm Memorial

Sunday May 19th Memorial Day Open

Saturday June 22nd 23rd Annual Sunshine State Classic

Saturday July 13th Super Sizzle Open

Saturday Aug. 10th Summers End Open

Saturday Sept. 14th Markham Fall Fest Open

Sunday Oct. 20th Pumpkin Blast

Sunday Nov. 3rd Richard Merritt Memorial

Sunday - Dec 22nd Bud Wolfe Classic

Registration: Opens 8:30 a.m. and will close at 10:00 a.m.

All scorecards must be turned in by 1:00 p.m. in order to be posted. Entry Fee: $80

No Scorers or Trappers will be provided.

Shooters will be asked to squad themselves into groups of at least 3 and designate a field judge to verify scores for the squad. Tiebreaker station rankings will be posted during registration.

COURSERULES:Allshootersandspectatorsarerequiredtowearear andeyeprotectiononthecourse. MAXIMUM LOADS PERMITTED: 12GA, 3 DR EQ, 1 1/8

Price per 50 targets includes $5/100 NSSA/FSA Fee

.410 gauge 50 Targets $22.00

28 gauge 50 Targets $22.00

20 gauge 50 Targets $22.00

12 gauge 50 Targets $22.00

Doubles 50 Targets $22.00

Shoots usually held the first Saturday of every month. Gauges may be shot out of sequence with the permission of management. More than one 50 target program may be shot in the same gauge as a preliminary event.

AWARDS

Break a 50, 75, or 100 Straight and get one of these guaranteed awards!

50 Straight Kennedy Half Dollar

75 Straight Eisenhower Dollar

100 Straight Morgan Silver Dollar

50 Straight Doubles Liberty Silver Half

Skeet Results

Markham Skeet, Trap, & Sporting Clays

“Perfection is what you are striving for, but perfection is an impossibility. However, striving for perfection is not an impossibility. Do the best you can under the conditions that exist. That is what counts.”

― John Wooden

Trap Program Trap Program:

SPECIALNOTICE

Trap Tournaments are usually the fourth Sunday of the month.

100 target 16 Yd, Hdcp and Doubles events.

First 100 targets.

SCHEDULE 2024

January28th

February25th

March17th

April28th

May26th

June23rd

July28th

August25th

September22nd

October27th

November24th

December22nd

$42.00

(Includes ATA and FTA daily fees)

Additional 100 target events. $36.00

See Joe Loitz for details: 954-857-5278

WEDNESDAY NIGHT SHOOTING IS STILL POPULAR WITH THE SHOOTERS. SIGN UP WITH THE REST OF THE REGULARS AND TRY YOUR SKILL AND LUCK AT ALL THE GAMES.

Come out and join the fun!

MarkhamSkeet,Trap, andSportingClays

Handicap

Doubles