“A great year for the team,” Dennis Menning said.
And it was.
The Northern Kentucky Top Guns, a youth trap shooting team, grabbed six first-place medals at the state Scholastic Clay Target Program (SCTP) tournament June 15-16 in Wilmore.
Menning, the team’s coach since it was founded in 2000, said last month’s tournament was the best in program history.
“We’ve had kids from grade school all the way up to college,” Menning said. “We try to work with each shooter individually and coach each shooter individually.”
Toby Schry of Independence possibly had the best showing – he hit 91 of 100 in the Singles event, which gave NKTG both the Collegiate Individual and Team titles.
“Not my best day, but I’ll take the first place,” Schry said.
You could also make a case for Campbell County alumnus Colin Roomes. He won the Senior Varsity Individual with a 98 and joined fellow Camels, Ethan Wildeboer (94), Kolton Decker (93), Ben Ramsey (92) and Boone County sophomore Nathan Strong (92) to place first in the Senior Varsity Team event.
It would be an egregious error to forget Lena Day, who just graduated from Great Crossing High School in Georgetown. Her 96 was good enough to take the individual Senior Varsity Doubles (in which two clays are launched simultaneously) division and the team crown with Ramsey (92), Roomes (91), Strong (83) and Simon Kenton junior TJ Burnett (81).
“She was high overall and high lady in this category,” Menning said.
Schry’s, Roomes’ and Day’s wins were only the beginning.
The list: Eighth-grader Lane Souther of Grant County, third place, Individual Singles; Boone County freshman Jillian Cottrell and Campbell County junior Joel Bremke-Broering, second place, Senior JV team; and Lane Souther, Cameron Phillips, Luke Wheeler and Max Schultz, third place in Intermediate Entry.
‘Like everybody else’
Menning said you don’t need any experience to join the team; a firearms safety class is given before anyone touches a 12-gauge shotgun.
The reasons team members shoot at 4-inch diameter clay targets vary.
“I’ve had kids that have never shot a shotgun before,” Menning said. “I have one shooter in particular, whose mother found out about the program and brought her son out. She said, ‘I’d like for him to be involved in this.’”
Schry is finishing his third season with the Top Guns. He has health issues, and shooting seems to help him cope.
“I come from a football family, but I was never able to play,” he said. “Finding this, when I’m shooting, I’m just like everybody else out there. It gives me something to do.”
Schry has fired pistols at stationary targets before; he prefers a 12-gauge and clays.
“The clays move,” Schry said. “It’s faster-paced, there’s more to do is the best way to explain it.”
Day actually has two diplomas – from Great Crossing and Morehead State University’s Craft Academy for Excellence in Science and Mathematics, a two-year program in which she lived expenses paid on MSU’s campus and earned at least 60 college credit hours.
There are three events in trap shooting: singles, in which one target is released at a time from about 16 yards away; doubles, where two clays are released simultaneously; and “handicapped,” where the targets are at least 21 yards out.
Trap shooting is one of three disciplines. The other two: skeet, in which targets are released from two houses crossing in front of the shooter; and sporting clays, a more complex course with multiple launch points.
“I like it all,” Day said.
Roomes is finishing his fourth year with the Top Guns; he plans to study construction management at NKU. He and his dad, Brian Roomes, would go into the woods and fire away.
“I was always a pretty good shot,” Colin Roomes said. “And then, around eighth grade, a couple of my buddies introduced (trap shooting) to me, saying they’re on a team … I went out to shoot with them, and I fell in love with it.”
Eyes open
Shooters traverse different stations during each round. There are two “houses” where the targets are launched. “There’s a high house on the left-hand side, and there’s a low house on the right-hand side,” Menning said.
Menning said while many fire with one eye closed, the best way to hit targets is with both eyes open. “You lose your depth perception shooting with one eye,” he said.
Ocular dominance describes how people prefer input from one eye over the other. It usually coincides with hand preference, but cross-eye dominance, when a left-handed person is right-eye dominant and vice versa, can pose problems with aiming and accuracy.
But don’t worry; according to bushnell.com, “It’s true, cross-eyed dominance is a minor limitation.
However, don’t let it get in the way. Fact is, some of the best shooters in the world are cross-eyed dominant.”
The Top Guns have one more tournament – the SCTP nationals beginning Monday at Cardinal Center in Marengo, Ohio, about 35 miles north-northeast of Columbus. Colin Roomes is a little nervous.
“But then again, a lot of us just do it for fun,” Roomes said. “Winning’s just a bonus. Just being with each other the whole week is my favorite part.”