5th Annual Canning County Shoot Out

On the weekend of the August 22 and 23, the Canning Club hosted the 5th Annual Canning County Shoot Out – is one of the biggest events in the Canning Club calendar. The theme of this year’s competition was ‘At the Movies’, with stages taken from some of the most iconic westerns, including The Magnificent Seven, High Noon, Rooster Cogburn and 3:10 to Yuma.

The SSAA’s Single Action discipline allow shooter's to take on a new persona, anything from a riverboat gambler, bounty hunter to a standard cowhand. Shooters compete using an alias of their choice, giving them the opportunity to ‘play cowboys and Indians’ as they did in their childhood, but this time using live ammunition and under strict competition rules and supervision. The competition is both exiting and dynamic, and the characters and costumes help give it even more realism. The weekends competition was open to all Single Action shooters and was attended by William Dickson the WA State Delegate for Single Action.

This year’s competition consisted of 10 stages of varying difficulty, including movement courses. The shooters negotiate these stages using two revolvers, a lever-action rifle and a side-by-side shotgun. There were also three speed events for speed Rifle, Shotgun and Revolver.

Despite the lack of sun and constant threat of rain on the Saturday, it did not bring a halt to the event, as the Canning Vaqueros are a hardy bunch and apparently waterproof. On Sunday, the sun decided to show its face and the event ran without a hitch. Seventeen shooters attended the match and of the total 145 stages shot, 95 were clean rounds. There were also three complete clean match pins awarded.

The overall event winner was Kevin Casteldini (KC Woody) who also took first place Cowboy. First place Gunfighter went to Sarah Purcell (Sister Sarah Carnegie), and first place Classic Cowboy was won by Gary Donaldson (Jess Wade). First place Elder Statesman was Robert Boys (Frenchie), Lady Senior was Cheryl Donaldson (Rattlesnake Ruby) and Buckarette went to Katie Purcell (KT).