Friendly birthday competition
Phil Duffy
Northern News Services
Yellowknife (May 25/01) - The 59th anniversary of the Canadian Rangers was celebrated Wednesday, May 23, and to enjoy themselves on their birthday, 16 ranger instructors from the 1st division participated in a marksmanship contest.
"What we were trying to do was get a bunch of our instructors together and have some fun amongst ourselves out on the firing range rather than just go to a bar or something," said Maj. Conrad Laroche.
"With all the travelling our instructors are constantly doing, it's actually amazing to see this many of them gathered together in one place."
The shooting competition was divided into three categories. The first included firing five rounds from a 303 British Lee Enfield rifle at a red disc set 200 yards away.
The second phase was to fire nine rounds from a 9-mm pistol at steel ducks from a range of 50 feet.
The final stage involved skeet shooting at customary clay pidgeons with shotguns.
"This is the first anniversary-day shooting contest that we have held and I would very much like to see it turn into an annual event," said Laroche.
The rangers made it appear a simple matter to hit those steel targets making them ring out with the slug's impact.
You could tell the boys were having a good time at their birthday party. Sgt. Jim Martin was about to join the starting round of the contest and offered this speculation on who was favoured to win: "Why, me of course! Everybody you ask is probably going to say the same thing," he replied with a grin.
"We're all combat arms senior officers with plenty of weapons experience so it should be a really close competition."
The results of the competition were close. The only thing the judges could definitely agree upon, until the final results were tallied, was that everybody there was having a blast.
"The whole shootin' match was more like a form of cordite therapy rather than a seriously heated competition," said Capt. Rick Regan.
When the contest was over the rangers went back to area headquarters to meet up with their spouses and enjoy an anniversary barbecue.
