Last Sunday, I was fortunate enough to be part of the Darfield High School Clay Target Shooting Team that attended the first Canterbury Secondary Schools Clay Target Interschool shoot, which was held at the Ellesmere Gun Club in Leeston.

The day dawned a little grey and cold, but as the morning went on, the sun appeared, and the temperature gradually started rising.

The team comprised of Aden Goodfellow, Ryan Partington, Zac Walker, and myself. Sadly Anna Mangels and Jake Cleland were unable to attend this shoot.

The shoot was attended by eleven schools from around Canterbury, with over 80 individual shooters competing. Darfield was one of the smallest teams on the day, but I think we held our own, considering it was our first time on the competition circuit.

The shoot comprised three rounds totalling 50 clay targets for the day. Unfortunately, there were some technical issues with the clay target-throwing equipment, which led to delays throughout the day’s event, but everyone still enjoyed the experience of our first competition shoot of 2023.

We would like to acknowledge that this wouldn’t be possible without Mr Jackson being so enthusiastic and passionate about this sport and the support of Mr Murry Robertson, our coach, and the Darfield Gun Club.

We are all looking forward to representing the school in upcoming shoots, and we would like to thank the students for supporting our sausage sizzles over the last two weeks at the recent 1st XV Rugby games.