1000 yard Benchrest Shooting competitions began in Australia at the Canberra Rifle Club in 1998. The Canberra Rifle Club is a Full Bore shooting club which began in 1916. In 1997 the club president Clem Payne and some other members approached Stuart and Annie Elliott and other bench rest shooters about establishing some form of competition at 1,000yds. This was the maximum distance that could be obtained on that range facility. After some investigations around the world about which types of events already existed the one chosen was the IBS (International Benchrest Shooters).
Benches were built and targets obtained. Formal matches commenced in early 1998. These generated much interest and slowly the sport has progressed with at least 3 ranges in Australia now holding regular formal competitions and annual calendars. Those others being at Townsville and Brisbane in Queensland. Many members have since travelled overseas and shot matches in the USA and the UK. Slowly a set of rules for competition was developed for Australia to reflect the situations in Australia and these were officially adopted by the NRAA (National Rifle Association of Australia) in late 2007.
Match facilities vary at ranges around Australia but most will be held on regular Full Bore NRAA ranges which have a target butts system, similar to a military system. This allows targets to be held on a frame which can be raised and lowered into a pit by the target crew during the firing of a match. This system is very different to most of the facilities used in the USA. Canberra has 6 covered concrete benches as does Brisbane and Townsville has 2 benches. It is expected that many other clubs will now start holding matches since the NRAA has officially adopted a set of rules into its' SSRs. Solid portable benches are often used to start with and targets can be obtained from any of the 3 current clubs or overseas. Windflags are placed all along the range so shooters can 'read' the wind.
There are 2 classes of rifles used. Light Gun is up to 17lb and Heavy Gun has no weight limit. HG shooters fire 10 shots at each target whereas the LG shooters fire 5. Results are for both score and for group which are recorded separately. Matches usually consist of at least 2 targets for each class. Some ranges have a paid dedicated target crew and others use competitors to do target marking. Like the 500m Fly everyone has their own pet calibre and a review of any equipment list attests to this. Long Range Benchrest caters for those who wish to just come and have fun to those who are extremely serious about their accurate rifles.
