Handgun competitors take aim at first prize

Wanganui's Tony Skews competes at the IPSC Handgun Championships at the Wanganui Pistol Club yesterday.PHOTO/STUART MUNRO 141113WCSMPISTOL1

More than 135 shooters are clearing their holsters and opening up over at the Wanganui Pistol Club after the IPSC Handgun Championships began yesterday.

The championships finish tomorrow afternoon, after three days of shooting at targets, moving and stationary, through layouts which the club members have been diligently designing and preparing in recent weeks.

"There's targets that face away from you and as you hit it, it turns," said club president Wally Cole.

"We have 18 stages and every one of them is different. We can't make it too easy for them."

There is a large international contingent with 20 shooters from Australia and six from New Caledonia joining New Zealand competitors coming from North Cape down to Dunedin.

Within the red line boundaries, shooters have free rein in which direction they move to hit their targets as quickly as possible.

They will be judged on speed, accuracy, and power of their weapon as each shooter's bullets are scrutinised and tested to make sure there is a level playing field.

"That way no one can come in with soft ammunition and get an advantage. It's all about the gun," said Cole.

Categories include open-class gun, which can be modified weaponry, as well as standard class gun, which restricts the modifications to a gun which can fit inside a box.

Other more traditional categories are production guns, which are how they leave the factory, and the classic division of weapons going back to the World War I era. Interim results will be posted on Saturday afternoon, which, after a one-hour time limit to make protests, will become finalised.

There will be national and international winners in various categories, as well as IPSC President's medals up for grabs.