14 Wing top-shot contest tests the essentials
From February’s simulated shooting competition to the May in-the-field final, 14 Wing Greenwood aimed to amp up interest in firearms skills strength.
Wing Chief Warrant Officer Justin Harper spear-headed the February 14 Wing top-shot simulator challenge through February, with the top five finishers invited to a live fire competition on the Granville range May 28. Making it out of that Birchall Centre basement trainer were Harper, Corporal Quinton Fraser-Oickle, Corporal Michael Vance, Master Corporal Robert Green and Second Lieutenant Matthew Sidebottom.
With work and schedule commitments, Fraser-Oickle and Sidebottom were replaced at the range event with Sergeant Thomas Bertrand and Corporal Kyle Bennett.
Master Corporal Zach Syganiec, an instructor with Readiness Training Flight, says the C7A2 live range competition was set to be a test.
“You could be the best shot, but this was so different than normal. The way it was set up, you had to give it your best all the way through. The scorers in the butts were just going off shooter one to five to keep things fair and, throughout, none of the shooters knew their placing ‘til the very end. We set the scoring up to be not super easy/ not super hard, but….”
Shooters worked their way through five challenges, combining various distances, stances and target exposures. The “rundown” challenge wrapped it all up: the weapon was ready on a table at 50 m, where competitors collected it, then ran to the 300 m point, adopted the prone position and took five shots at five clays on the range backboard. Every miss added 10 points to their score.
In the end, Bertrand scored 174 out of a possible 225 points (smoking his boss, Harper). Green placed second at 135, followed by Bennett at 117, Harper at 93 and Vance at 91.
Syganiec says the competition was a good way to bring the essentials of military firearms training top-of mind.
“One hundred per cent of all of this is essential, but doing it as a competition puts a different spin on it – this was all for fun, and everyone had lots of fun. Everyone said, ‘do it again.’”
