Alaska Territorial

Muzzle Loading Match

Record Book

 by Keith Bayha

2008 ( 11th Edition)

Alaska State Muzzle Loading Association

Introduction:

 The Territorial muzzleloader matches are intended to provide shooters across the Nation the opportunity to compete in the same matches, under the same rules, even though we can't assure comparable shooting conditions. The medal winners qualify to compete in the National Territorial Championships at Friendship Indiana.. With the 2008 Territorials, all participants may compete at Friendship.

Alaska's Territorial matches began in 1980 with only 5 aggregates. In 2005 there were no trap and skeet aggregates offered, but a cartridge gun aggregate was added for the first time, making a total of 19 aggregates available for participants in a three day shoot. Unfortunately, several aggs. again attracted no competitors. In 2006 another aggregate was added --
Light Bench.

The other significant change in 2005 was the site of the matches. They were held at the Upper Susitna Shooters Association Range at mile 94 Parks Highway. Many of the participants contributed labor in building firing line covers on the 100 yard range just prior to the Territorials. In 2006, using a grant from the Friends of the NRA, 21 volunteers built 30 shooting benches and gravel was placed on the firing lines at the USSA range. 2008 is the fourth consecutive Terriotorials at this site.

The 2005 Territorials were dedicated to the memory and past contributions of long time participant and supporter, Gerald Hawman of Fairbanks, who passed away just a few weeks before our matches this year. His son Kevin was present and a participant.

This Records Book

About 1995 the idea for producing this records book grew out of questions in recent years like "What was the record anyway?" "When was the first Alaska Territorial?" "Who won the cross sticks in 19__?" While several had opinions, our recollections didn't agree. We finally decided we really were not too sure and "someone ought to look it up." We called the NMLRA and learned they don't keep such records beyond three years!

Pat Reed, Tim Crawford, and I knew we had some of the records documentation but no one thought they had them all. We decided to pool our paper work and see how close we could come to a full set. Tim had the oldest records, which included some newspaper accounts of match results not only for the early Territorials but for the State Shoots too. (Wouldn't it be nice if the newspapers today would publish results of shooting events)! Pat had Territorial results from additional years, as well as some of the same years, as did I. When done, we found we still needed records for a few years and put out the call for help. John Corning, Gerald Hawman, and Connie Adkins helped fill gaps. Also searching through old club newsletters revealed that in 1989 we somehow failed to get our paperwork to the right person at NMLRA on time. It might have had something to do with Joe Hazelwood running the T/V Exxon Valdez aground and ruining the spring and summer for many of us. Anyway I have concluded there were no results for 1989 because there was no Territorial.

In the first edition printed in 1995, we were only missing the results for 1986, the year it was held in Juneau, and the match scores for 1990. Subsequently, Richard Schutt found the1986 results among packed boxes and these were included in the second edition published in 1998.
We are still hoping that someone may have the match scores for 1990. Unless those results turn up, we will just have to consider the records are within the scores for the years for which we do have data.

The third edition [1999] also featured some color photographs from 1985, provided by Gerald Hawman. The fourth edition in 2001 was printed in very limited quantity and dropped the scores of the state shoots since there was no state shoot that year. The fifth edition in 2002 included correction of some errors discovered in previous editions and explained them in an italicized paragraph. The sixth edition was prepared after the 2003 Territorial and put on the ASMLA website and only a few copies printed. An additional aggregate for women was added in 2003 and the targets for another were changed this year [See tables 1 and 2].

The seventh and eighth editions were also printed in fewer copies and posted to the ASMLA website. The ninth edition updates the text and adds one more year of Territorial data and likewise was posted to the website. This tenth edition adds 2007 results plus correct some errors found in Table 3 and will replace previous editions on the website. Similarly, this 11th edition adds the 2008 results and will be posted on the ASMLA website
www.akmuzzleloaders.org.

The Results

There are three tables presented.

Table 1. presents the Aggregate champions each year and their aggregate score, where we have the data. Reigning champions are shown in bold faced type. This table also identifies where the Territorial was held each year, the Match Director, and the number of shooters and aggregates shot (to the limit of our data).

Participation in the Alaska Territorials has varied from 11 in 1997 to 36 in 1983. The Territorials have been hosted or co-hosted by the McKinley Mountainmen Muzzle Loading Rifle Club (12 years), Midnight Sun Muzzle Loading Rifle Club at Fairbanks or Anderson (6 years), the Juneau-based Muskeg Muzzle Loaders (1 year), the Alaska State Muzzle Loaders Association (12 years) and the Upper Susitna Shooters Association (4 years).

Table 2. describes the individual match targets, the competitors holding the individual match and aggregate records, their scores, and the year each record was set. Reigning champions are shown in bold faced type. "Records are made to be broken." And Alaskan shooters keep breaking them. [See section on records broken in 2008 later in this report]. These include one record set in 1980: Stan Jackson's 48xx for the 25 yard, 6-bull offhand match (only percussion rifles allowed in the offhand at that time). That record was tied in 2005 by long time shooter, Bob Benson. Note there have been changes in the targets for some aggregates, so record scores for the early configurations are "frozen" and both target sets are shown. The "frozen scores" were shown in smaller font to help avoid confusion.

Table 3. lists the number of Alaska Territorial championships won by individual competitors since they began in 1980. Pat Reed leads with 67 championships, followed Bob Engelbach with 25 and Keith Bayha with 24.

Summary of records broken in 2008

Chad Cleland from Ohio broke our oldest record, match A-1, the offhand 25 yard target with a 49x. The old mark of 48x was first set in 1983 by Stan Jackson and then tied in 2005 by Bob Benson.

Chad Cleland also tied the Flintlock B-5 match record of 48 set in 1983 by Dave Nester.

Shawn Kelly nearly rewrote the record book for the Juniors aggregate. His aggregate score of 168xx broke John Hawk's 2007 record of 134. Shawn had a 48xx in match H-29 besting Hawk's 46 in 2007. Then his 46 in match H-30 tied the old record set by Angus Augustine in 2003. Shawn's 39 in match H-31 broke his old mark of 22 from 2006. That is three new Alaska Territorial match records and the aggregate record for the current reigning National Junior Pistol Champion!

Mike Kelly finally succeeded in setting a new Alaska Territorial pistol aggregate record, posting a 275 with six x'es, wiping out John Corning's 1993 record of 273 6x.

Tyler Kelly rewrote all the Sub-Junior records! He had match targets of 48 and 46x for an aggregate score of 94x. The old records were 44 by Ethan Reinert in 2005 and Tyler's 45x from last year, and Shawn Kelly's aggregate record of 86 from 2005.

Ed Wick scored 44 on the huge 200-yard target at 100 yards in the fourth match of the Smoothbore aggregate. This broke the old record of 36 held jointly by Pat Reed and Bob Engelbach.

Mary Ann Campbell-Wick tied Pam Schachle's record of 31 on the crow target in the ladies Hunters aggregate.

Bob Englebach and Pat Reed together rewrote the records for the Light Bench aggregate.
Pat's 47x in match W-94 beat Bob's 43x from 2006.
Bob's 46x in match W-95 beat Pat's 46 from 2006.
Bob's 45x in match W-96 beat pat's 44 from 2006.
Pat's 48 in match W-97 beat Bob's 44x from 2006.
Then when all the match scores were tallied, Pat's 286x aggregate score broke his own 169 from 2006.

Thus, there are 11 new match records and 4 new Aggregate records set at the 2008 Territorials, plus two tied match records.

We extended the Territorials this year by adding a half day on the front end thinking this would give our hard core shooters a chance to participate in another aggregate or two. But for the most part it resulted in more practice targets being shot instead. We also had the 75th NMLRA anniversary target that everyone had a chance to shoot. Only about half of them did or at least only half turned in their targets. The top three targets by Chad Cleland, Pate Reed and Keith Bayha were sent to Friendship for final scoring and comparison with those from other Territorials.

Plans for Future Publication:

As with the previous editions, this Eleventh Edition is published by the Alaska State Muzzle Loaders Association. With the emergence of the Internet as a major communication and information retrieval system, we will to make it available on our web site:

www.akmuzzleloaders.org

I plan to update the data at this site soon after each event is concluded. Reprinting hard copy of the record book every few years may be merited if there are sufficient changes. If you need a hard copy you may down load it from the web site or request one from the author.
 

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