2008 New Zealand Service Rifle Championships

The SSAA Australian Combined Services Team for NZ 2008 was Robert Irving (Southern Highlands), Craig Mahoney (Sydney), Nick Abrahall and Peter Brown (Grafton).

This year the team decided to take up the kind offers from New Zealand shooters to borrow scoped, semi-auto service rifles, leaving their Swedes in the gun safe at home. The structure of the matches today is such that bolt actions are just not competitive in the rapid courses of fire and even have difficulty in the snap events, which have less than 5 seconds between exposures.

The challenge for the team was to become familiar with the rifles during the competition since there was no opportunity for a day of practice beforehand. So with five sighting shots fired in 45 seconds, immediately before events began, the Aussie team had to be ready.

The rifles the team used were all AR15 H-Bar flat tops fitted with ELCAN or ACOG telescopic sights as issued to Canadian and US Forces. These rifles must, according to the rules, have “as issued” triggers and are consequently spongy, long and heavy to squeeze off. Compared with our beloved Swedes or Enfield’s the triggers were hard to master.

Three of the rifles proved to be well sighted but Peter Brown’s rifle was off target in the first two matches and a new “upper” section with different sights was fitted, enabling Peter to hit the figure 12 targets at 200m. This problem cost the team dearly as the results were to show.

Glorious sunshine prevailed at Clevedon range for the whole Easter long weekend. The first day, with seven courses of fire constituted the Auckland Service Rifle Association Championships.

Forty four competitors began the event with most shooting AR 15’s, or SIG 550’s though there was one SLR, one M1 Garand and one M14, plus two intrepid Kiwi’s using bolt actions.

The first match was the 200m Sustained Fire, with ten shots on a figure 12 target in 90 seconds, position sitting without slings. Nick Abrahall top scored for the team, coming sixth with a score of 47. Craig Mahoney was eighth on 46 points and Rob Irving fifteenth on 43 points.

The 200m snap, saw Rob Irving top score for the team with 44 points and fourth position, with Nick Abrahall fourteenth on 35 points and Craig Mahoney 26^th on 23 points.

The third match, a rapid fire of thirty seconds from a standing start, was the team’s first attempt at fast shooting with AR 15 agricultural triggers. The result was Craig Mahoney in sixth position with 41 points, Rob Irving ninth on 40 and Nick Abrahall twelfth on 38 points.

Moving to 300m on figure 11 targets and the luxury of being prone with slings, Nick managed the team’s first medal, being placed third in the sustained fire on 45 points. Peter Brown, with his new upper receiver and scope came in 13^th with 41 points and Rob Irving 19^th with 38 points.

In the 300m snap Nick again won the bronze with 46 points and Rob was 6^th on 43 with six centres closely followed by Craig on 43 with three centres. The team was getting used to the AR’s.

In the 300m rapid fire Craig scored his first medal coming third on 43 points. The rest of the team forgot what they were there for and crashed to 18^th, 19^th and 20^th.

The final match of the Auckland Championships was the 300m “Mixed Grill” where a figure 12 target appeared for ten seconds then a figure 11 popped up for fifteen seconds. Nick came in 6^th on 45 points with Rob 7^th on 44. Craig was 20^th on 31 points.

Despite feeling that we had performed badly, the team were delighted when the results were published with Nick third overall with 283 points and Rob fourth on 281 only nine points behind the winner of the Auckland Championships.

Better still, despite Peter Brown’s rifle problems, the Aussie team was second, out of eight teams entered. The event was won by the “SAS” team.

We had the Kiwis worried!

The National Championships began with a three position event at 100m on a figure 12 target. As with all the NZ matches at 100m and 200m, slings were not allowed, placing extra demands on trigger control. Nick Abrahall once again top scored for the team with 73 points out of 75 and 7th place. Craig Mahoney scored 71 points for 11^th and Rob Irving 68 for 14^th.

Action M saw Craig top score for the Aussies on 47 points for 6^th place, Nick on 45 for 11^th and Peter Brown 43 points for 15^th.

The 100m Turn Tap & Rattle is a peculiarly NZ event. An unloaded rifle, bolt closed is placed on the mat. Two magazines, one loaded with 5 rds. one with 10rds, are beside it. The course of fire starts with the shooter standing behind the mat facing away from the figure 12 targets.

 The shooter then has 30 seconds to get down load five shoot then load and fire a further ten. Incredibly a young NZ competitor scored the maximum 75 points with eight centres. The Aus. Team top scorer was Peter Brown with 68 points for 11^th position.

In the 200m Sustained Fire, Nick Abrahall won a further silver with a score of 48. The top Aussie scorer in the 200m Double tap Snap was Rob Irving with 47 for 7^th place.

Then in the 200m to 100m Rundown, and it is a rundown not a walk, Nick won gold with a score of 49.

At 300m in the Sustained Fire, Peter Brown top scored for the team on 45 for 6^th position. Rob Irving won silver in the Rapid Fire event, one point behind Peter Miles whose rifle he used (best not to beat the guy who lends).

Then it was back to 500m for the final two courses of fire. In the Sustained Fire, Craig Mahoney scored 45 points for bronze, with Nick and Rob on 43 and 42 points for 9^th and 10^th.

In the 500m “Sgt. Nicholas VC” event Rob Irving won gold on 47 points with Craig 6^th on 45 points and Nick 11^th scoring 44. Then it was over. Three days of great competition and enjoyment shooting rifles our own government will not trust us to own.

At the end of the National championships Jamie Falconer (Wellington) had won the prestigious New Zealand Rifleman’s Belt. To the delight of the Aussies Nick Abrahall took out overall second place, an excellent result having picked up the rifle for the first time three days before.

The team would like to record their thanks to the SSAA National and NSW bodies for the opportunity and sponsorship. Also to the organisers, NZ Service Rifle Association and especially to those shooters, Gerry Veugelaers from Wellington and Peter Miles from Auckland who provided our rifles.