Mark Winser won the very first CPSA registered 100 Sporting competition at the newly opened EJ Churchill ground at Swinton Estate near Masham in North Yorkshire on Thursday 30 July.
Mark’s winning score of 95 ex-100 was even more remarkable, as it was only his second shoot after a five-month lay-off following a serious shoulder injury that required extensive surgery to repair broken bones and ligaments.
“I had a nasty fall and smashed my collarbone into six pieces, detached a few ligaments and ripped some muscles as well,” Mark says. “The surgeon said it could have ended my shooting career, but luckily he’s a shooter himself, and understood what I needed – and he got it 100 per cent right. I’ve got seven screws in my shoulder now, and some artificial ligaments keeping it all in place. It’s been a torrid five months.”
It was only the second time Mark had shot since the accident in April, but he has completely bounced back on form. “I think that muscle memory and 23 years of experience helps you,” he said.
“It doesn’t feel as natural as it should be because of the time I’ve had off, but genuinely I’m just happy that I could fire a gun with no issues. That was my main thing, and winning is just a bonus!”
Mark was also full of praise for the targets, as well as the facilities at Swinton. “The balance of targets was bang on. There was about 75 per cent where you’d expect to be killing all of them, and then there were three, maybe four stands that could really make you slip up.
“So I think they’ve got it right, and that shows in the scores. They’ve done a lot of work here over the past few weeks, and it’s all been done very, very well. We don’t have a lot of good grounds in the North, so it’s really nice to have this, and with the quality that EJ Churchill bring to everything they do.
“They’ve invested a lot of money here and it shows, and I think shooters in the North are really grateful.”
EJ Churchill are running CPSA registered Sporting competitions at Swinton on the second and fourth Thursday of every month.
For details see www.ejchurchill.com/home/swinton-estate/. We’ll have a full report from the shoot coming soon.
Leave a Reply