Wiklinstown, October 14 2001 --
Air Rifle Season opens with a bang

DURC sent a team of four to this year's WTSC Open, the first
competition of the Air Rifle season. Attendance was low due
to difficulties with transport and lack of training time for
new club members. The upcoming UCD Open should see a much
higher attendance from DURC. 

The new WTSC mobile range was used: this range is currently
the largest in the country with 15 firing points. It
currently hosts the National Squad training sessions as well
as other large competitions. Previously, only the UCD range
could cope with these events. 

The DURC contingent arrived in WTSC early on Sunday morning,
despite having attended the Olympic Council of Ireland's
seminar on coaching in the University of Limerick the day
before. Mark Dennehy, Peter Byrne and Benjamin Jones shot
on the first detail, Steven Watterson shooting on the second. 

Steven and Mark both set personal bests of 571 and 544
respectively and both went through to the ten-shot final,
where Steven had the best final score of the match. Mark was
shooting with his new air rifle and other gear - and despite
some silly technical errors that lost him up to 15 points,
shot a PB. Proving that the right equipment can make a
serious difference to performance. For reference, 565 is the
Minimum Qualifying Score, or MQS, for the Olympics; 537 is
the qualifying score for the National Developmental Squad;
and 559 is the qualifying score for the National Squad.

Peter Byrne and Ben Jones had dissappointing scores given
their recent averages - Ben has competed in the finals of the
Centenary Bisley postal in air rifle (an international match
where he placed fourth out of hundreds), and Peter is
currently one of the top three junior shooters in Ireland.

Steven took third place overall and also third in class A,
Mark took second place in class B and Peter took first place
in class C. Hopefully the UCD Open will see even better
results!