Thankyou from the Aussie Team

[Outback Mick]

Hello All,
From the Aussie Team we have several major thankyous to send out. Firstly to the staff and crew at Whittington Center, thankyou for the wonderful facilities and allowing us to camp in such palatial accomodations. As Cowboy Silhouette shooters I was expecting to have to camp on the ground with one eye open for Bears. However this turned out not to be the case. An excellent facility, for a shooter literally paradise.
To the NRA folk; Greg, John and Pat, thankyou for putting up with our stupid questions and poor attempts at Long Runs. (I believe Dave now holds several NRA "short run" records.) Our next visit will see us better prepared and with a much better knowledge of how you run things. Just a small suggestion, how about making the trophies out of plastic, that granite is pure hell on airline baggage scales.....
To the many volunteers who are the backbone of any event, thankyou from the three of us. From the paperwork to target setting your work was never ending.

However without the support of our shooting body, the "Sporting Shooters Association of Australia" none of this would have been possible so our biggest vote of thanks must go to the SSAA. From the three of us thankyou to the Board, head office in Adelaide and our Discipline Chairman.

As usual the hospitality and goodwill of the other competitors was overwhelming. Which is a little strange for us as normally we suffer torrents of abuse while at a major Australian shoot. Perhaps next time the Americans will lower the boom gates a little and start sledging a bit more.
Ran into quite a few of the Steel Chicken crew while at Whittington. It was good to finally put some ugly faces to names we have been seeing on the internet. Good to meet you all and hope to talk to you more through this forum.
Thankyou George & Tony for a very good feed of Bison on the final evening of the shoot. We had a very good evening even if John didn't like the photos we took for his album.

I apologise if I have forgotten to thank anyone, feel free to give me a raz when you next have the time.

For those interested, in Smallbore I picked up AAA grade with a 68/80, both Rifle and Pistol were disappointing for me, no excuses I just didn't do the job properly. As a team we picked up a couple of gongs, 2nd in the overall Pistol Cal teams and another team gong in the Smallbore, just now I can't remember what it was though.
I'm sure I have bored you enough by now so I'll sign off. Probably won't get back on here until October when my other "work" has finished.

Cheers for now,
Outback Mick

[the ex pom]

Hi all, Outback seems to have forgotten a few vital pieces of information(maybe due to his old age or just purely and simply because of his inability to hit a target smaller than a full grown bull camel)
Yes i failed to make an impact on the US long run records but outback failed to make an impact on the targets as most of his shots resulted in a large lingering cloud of dust.
Describing the Whittington centre as a shooters paradise is an understatement, with lots of wild game just roaming the facility it may be more accurately described as a eutopia for shooter. Thanks to all the individuals who made the shoot come together in such a fine manor.
There is one thing i will say about bears shooting, if there was a 100m bank there would of been 2 very large clouds of dust just in one bank of five when i was spotting for him.
To all the US shooters who want a ball of shame, well there is a process to be followed to get one and it involves you coming down under. I'm sure the Chairman can fill you in on the finer details.
We learnt a valuble lesson today on our short trip from Las Vegas to LAX.......... Don't travel in the US on a major holiday weekend, the drive was extended by several hours because of traffic (seriously cutting into drinking time in the Qantas club)
Anyway there has been enough BS dribbled so i will talk to you all when i get back to Adelaide

[TXCharlie]

Thanks to you for coming over, it was great to see "The Land Down Under" well represented...The shirts looked great. Next time, do not miss a free meal. The Massey cabin chow hall dinners are always great food and better stories.
Glad y'all got home safe, come again next year.
C-Ya,
Charlie

[Outback Mick]

Charlie,
Make sure to remind us next year about the Massey feed. Count us in.

Looks like there may be more of us in 2010. I'll just point out that the team you saw was the most polite and politically correct team we could field in 2009. Next year you will not be so lucky, we will have "Tasmanians" with us.............

Outback Mick

[Cowgirl]

Hello Mick, I have some pictures of you guys I have been trying to send to David, but they keep bouncing back to me. If you'll send me your email, I'll send them to you. It was fun staying with you guys. Cowgirl6508@aol.com

[the ex pom]

Cowgirl, it definately was alot of fun. I have emailed you with my email address so you can send those photos through

Dave