GP3 Tondu

The first half of the double header was basically on one side of a valley. Tondu is an old quarry and has quite a long and steep in places road down to it.

And what must be typical Welsh weather it decided that it would be nice to rain, not just one of those short showers but just that constant light rain that just got everywhere. For those that shot in the morning it was probably worse for them as they were in it for all of their shooting.

The course had been set in a circle in 2 halves. The first 10 lanes were on the top of the mound some 30ft or so about the car parking area. The targets had been placed low down across some water and high up on the side of the quarry bank. With the wind was blowing to about 25mph meaning that plenty of aiming off required.

5 lanes were on the top of this bank with at least 6 of the 10 targets over 45yds away and between 10 feet beneath you or 25 feet above you. The next 5 lanes started down the mound with a mixture of reducers and a kneeling lane to finish with, the 2nd target of that lane being a 25mm as well. With the misty rain coming in waves rangefinding became challenging as some shooters found it difficult to range exactly on the targets.

After carrying on down the mound you then came across a standing lane with the targets now in the opposite direction to the first 10 lanes. The remaining 15 lanes ran along the track that brought the cars to parking area. In the first 2 lanes were in the undergrowth of the wooded area and some over open water.

The remaining lanes were in the wooded area, whilst it looked windless it was most definitely there and all the undergrowth was directing it in different directions to what you might of expected.

Those shooting in the afternoon carried on with the weather that had plagued the morning shooters. However, a few hours in it finally stopped and by the time the shooters were on their last 4 or 5 lanes the sun came out and then they started to steam in the wet clothes.

So what about the scores for the day, well I finished on a 30 again, Mr Consistent I suppose. Highest score in the morning I understand to be a 42, but that is probably subject to the soggy scorecard checks. The afternoon had a score of 44, not much of a difference but with some of the top shooters doing the morning session it could mix things up a little bit.

Tomorrow we will be heading to the other side of the valley roughly where the arrow is. I have never been there before so with the forecast 30mph gusts it could be interesting again.