Shenfield 2011

Hooray, it stopped raining. We had a run of luck with the weather that ran for years. This year our luck changed and we have frozen, been blasted by the remnants of hurricanes, been rained on and had to deal with flying shelters. Were we down hearted? No. We are the BFCC and we always end the day with a smile, even if it is through gritted teeth.

Shenfield has it’s limitations, like a newly sown wicket where we would have liked to cast but the opportunities the pavilion provided more than made up for it. Jan and Jenny providing tea, coffee, a sandwich and a smile was a really nice touch. Thanks girls your efforts were really appreciated.

The gusty sou westerly made deciding which way to set the casting area up a bit of a problem but we got it right at the second attempt. The computer computed a random casting order and everyone swung into action.

Matt Tonkin made the six hour drive up from Devon and walked off with the five weight with a great cast of 121′ 10” 

James Evans had his revenge in the seven weight with a nice 127′ 10”

I was called 122′ in the nine which left me baffled as I had got the whole of the Snowbee XS out of the rod. It was then I discovered that Mike Marshall had not cut 15′ off of two tapes (so that the shooting line on the T38 and T 120 didn’t tangle in it) he had only done it on one and we were reading 15′ short on the nine weight lane! Don’t panic, we have added the missing 15′  to all the nine weights and also to Alex Titov who cast the seven from that lane. Anyway, add the 15′ to the 122′ and we have 137′ 6”. My turn to win something. Tracy Thomas added another Laurel to an already successful year by claiming the women’s 9 weight record with 105′ 10”

Alan Bath had the highest aggregate score (5 + 7) in the B100 of 203′ having hit a fantastic 110′ with his seven. You are getting close to elite Alan, stop practicing.

Before the real tournament gear was thrown Mike Marshall gave a master class because some had never cast them before. God knows what he told them (I was the other end of the field waiting to mark the casts) but when they did start I was having to extend the tapes to get the measurements! In the T38 John Reynolds just fell short of 200′ he is desperate to reach with a winning cast of 192′ 7” . Matt Tonkins first ever cast with the T38 was a massive 185′ 8” and Andrew Bagshaw a very creditable 166′ 5”.

Matt then threw an astonishing 213′  having never cast the T120 before. What distances he could cast if he knew what he was doing is frightening to consider.

We then all moved up to the accuracy area to finish the day with a laugh. The styles varied from hit ’em fast and hard to a more concidered approach to some very idiosyncratic styles. John Reynolds machine gun tactics won the day.

The overall championship was tied between James Evans and Matt Tonkin. Well done guys.

Congratulations to Alan Bath for getting his 35 yrd badge, Wendy Bath for her 25 yrd badge, John Graham for his 30yrd badge and Matt Tonkin for his 55 yrd badge and a very rare and well deserved 70 yrd badge. Turned into an expensive day eh Matt?

Many thanks to Roger Miles, Mark Surtees and Mike Marshall for their continuous all day instructing. Thanks to Tracy and Hannah for keeping the score. Thanks to Wendy for taking everyone’s money so graciously And a big thank you to every one who helped.

We now have someone who understands how to upload pics to the gallery ( David Fisher) and they should be up soon.

See you all next year,

Mike Heritage

This entry was posted on Monday, October 10th, 2011 at 9:57 pm and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.