A Little History - November 2007 to Today

Even though the Toledo VFW Gun Club is home, our trapshooting story does not begin there. It truly begins when a friend invited us to go trapshooting at the Portland Gun Club in Portland, OR the weekend following Thanksgiving 2007. He explained the mechanics of what trapshooting was and we figured we had an old 20 gauge Mossberg pump that would suffice. All it had to do was shoot, right? The next weekend he and Tony drove up to Portland. Since we had none of the standard gear, they set 2 boxes of ammunition on the ground - putting five shells at a time in their pockets - and shot a round. The first time out Tony broke 21 out of 25 and figured there was nothing to this, he'd be breaking 'em all in no time. After the round of trap they moved over to the sporting clays. Before the end of the day they were hooked and both decided to go purchase brand new 12 gauge Mossbergs. (Of course we promptly found out those are not trap guns but they seemed like a good choice at the time). So the very next weekend both of us, our son, and our friend and his wife drove the 2-1/2 hour drive (one way) back to Portland. The following Monday our friend, a retired law enforcement officer, told us he discovered from some cronies there was a trap range a lot closer to home at the Toledo VFW and they were open for practice on Wednesday. We drove over to the VFW and have not missed a week since. We don't always shoot at the same club nowadays but a week has not gone by that we haven't practiced somewhere.

The gentlemen in the picture (plus many who are missing) formally introduced us to trapshooting as a serious sport and I have to say I feel that I owe much of what I have accomplished to them (and some Frank Little videotapes). On New Years Day 2008 we shot our first PITA registered targets with field guns at the Toledo Club - the aforementioned Mossberg and a CZ Redhead. We didn't really know what PITA was and our scores were terrible, bad enough to keep me in D class until I met the 1000 target requirement, but from that point on it has been quite a ride. We now have a small collection of pins, belt buckles, various trophies, and a few titles. This coming year looks promising...

-- Heather