GB Selection for Hemingway

Rugeley Rifle Club member Richard Hemingway was selected to shoot for Great Britain on Saturday after an outstanding performance in the Dewar Match Trials held at Appleton Rifle Club.

Scoring 789/800, he finished top of his squad to qualify for the team. The top five from each of four squads made up the team of twenty. This was Richard’s second GB cap after also making the team in 2018. Richard qualified for the Trials in 2023 but narrowly missed selection, finishing seventh in his squad.

The Dewar Match is an International Postal against the United States, with South Africa and Australia also entering in some years. Following the Trials, the team shot their cards – the scores of which are embargoed until the other teams have shot their end of the match.

In the match itself, Richard placed mid-table with the tenth highest score. Significantly, in finishing in the top 15 he qualifies for the Roberts Match Trials in October. The Roberts Match is a shoulder-to-shoulder match held every 8 years when the United States comes to Bisley to compete at the August National Meeting. The Roberts Squad wll be selected from the October trials.

Friend of the club Liam Webster also qualified for the trials, but missed selection from his squad after a difficult shoot at 100yards.

Ryan selected for Paralympics

Congratulations to Rugeley member Ryan Cockbill who has been selected to represent TeamGB at the 2024 Paralympic Games in Paris.

Ryan’s Paralympic debut came in 2012, shooting in the R4 and R5 air rifle events. In Tokyo he qualified for the final in the R9 Mixed 50m Air Rifle, finishing eighth.

At the 2022 World Para Sport Shooting Championships he won a Bronze medal in the R4 Mixed 10m Air Rifle event.

Best of luck to Ryan!

Four Paralympic athletes pose for a photo in a garden. Three are using wheelchairs whilst one stands.
(L-R) Issy Bailey, Ryan Cockbill, Tim Jeffery and Matt Skelhon will represent GB Shooting at the 2024 Paralympic Games.

Richard defends Welsh title in Tondu

Rugeley shooter Richard Hemingway defended his 2023 title at the Welsh 50M Championship this weekend. Shooting at Tondu Target Shooting Club near Bridgend, Rich again saw off strong competition from GB & Commonwealth shooters.

Qualifying at the top of the table on Saturday in good conditions with a robust 618.9, Sunday saw a drizzly, flat outlook and steady start for Richard, but outdone by the stronge start of Sian Corish. A blustery middle section saw Richard close the gap, and he held his nerve in the last 15 shots to overtake Sian and retain his Welsh Championship title with a score of 617.5. Sian Corish was runner up on 615.0, and Liam Webster – formerly of Rugeley and friend of the club – narrowly placed third with 614.1.

Full Results

Funeral Arrangements for Tom Glover

Tom Glover‘s funeral will be held at 2.30pm on Tuesday 4th June at Cannock Chase Crematorium, Norton Road, Heath Hayes, WS12 3HJ.

A wake will be held afterwards at Hednesford Town FC, Keys Park.

The family have requested no flowers, but any donations received will be passed on to causes at County Hospital Stafford.

Tom Glover

It is with great sadness that we report the passing of our Club President, Mr Tom Glover.

Tom joined Rugeley Rifle Club in 1977 when he brought his young son Dave along to learn to shoot. In that time he has served various roles on the committee and his service to the club over almost 50 years is truly admired and respected.

Tom has been one of the most generous people the club has had as a member, time is the most precious commodity we have and Tom always gave his time to members willingly and without hesitation.

He leaves behind his wife Beryl, son Dave, two grandsons and three great grandchildren and will be surely missed.

To quote Tom “Thanks for coming”.

Tom’s funeral will be held at 2.30pm on Tuesday 4th June at Cannock Chase Crematorium, Norton Road, Heath Hayes, WS12 3HJ. Full details.

Rugeley members support British Shooting Target Sprint Series

Rugeley Rifle Club members supported the West Midlands leg of British Shooting’s Target Sprint Series today. Martyn, Mick and Michelle were on hand as stewards and range officers. The event took place on the outdoor ranges at the NSRA’s Aldersley Shooting Centre at the Aldersley Leisure Village.

Rugeley have been a huge supporter of British Shooting events in the Midlands, with members also volunteering at the British Schools Championship Finals.

Richard finishes second in Torfaen Open

Rugeley shooter Richard Hemingway won his squad, and finished second in X-Class this weekend at the Torfaen Open Championship.

Contested at Long Ashton District Rifle Club near Bristol, the match is a 60-shot course of fire on Megalink electronic targets. Shooting on the second squad of the day, Richard’s score of 616.2 bested top shooters including Simon Green. Overall, he was left behind Alan Bain, who had managed an excellent 621.0 on the first detail.

Rugeley awarded Performance Club status by NSRA

Rugeley Rifle Club is delighted to have been registered as an NSRA Performance Club.

Scan of a certificate showing that Rugeley Rifle Club is registered as an NSRA Performance Club

NSRA Performance Clubs are those with an ethos of competition and athlete development. Achieving recognition as a Performance Club is testament to the hard work by the club committee and members in developing the facilities to allow quality training activities – particularly the new club room, training building and availability of electronic targets at 10m and 50m. It also recognises the effort by the club’s volunteer instructors and coaches, not only in developing athletes, but also providing support and continued development for instructors and coaches.

A cone depicts a performance pathway, with clubs feeding into performance clubs. These lead to Regional and National squads, culminating at a World Class Programme.

Rugeley RC joins the Fediverse

We’re delighted to announce our newest social channel – the Fediverse! Using the ActivityPub plugin for WordPress, this site is now also an ActivityPub instance. All news posts from this site will be accessible, and users can follow our feed from their accounts on any federated server. Find us at “rugeleyrifleclub@www.rugeleyrifleclub.org.uk”.

ActivityPub is the foundation underlying a new type of social media, where users can run their own servers or join other public servers, which can all communicate with one another – think of it like email. You can send an email from an Outlook account to a Yahoo account. You are not limited to sending email only between Outlook addresses.

No single company controls the “fediverse” – the community of “federated” ActivityPub servers. Anyone can create or join a server – large or small – and follow their friends and interests on that server and other servers. There are a variety of different types of instance. Pixelfed is oriented towards image sharing, much like instagram. You may have heard of Mastodon in the news – which is more like Twitter. If you’re interested, the easiest route is to visit joinmastodon.org, pick a server (it really doesn’t matter which) and have an explore. mastodonapp.uk is a UK-oriented server, which may be a good place to start, but you can access accounts on any server from any other server and you can move your account later on if you want to.