The latest leg of my tour saw me land at Dartford Clay Shooting Club on a cold and misty Friday 13th April. A date considered unlucky for some, but not by me as I had the pleasure of meeting Gail Flanagan who runs Dartford CSC and was made very welcome indeed.Tea in hand we sat down in their large and very comfortable clubhouse to chat about the Club and the extensive facilities they offer
Dartford CSC is a CPSA Premier Ground owned by Peter Duffield who took ownership approximately 14 years ago. The Club is open Thursday to Sunday from 8.45am for breakfast (shooting starts at 10am) to 5pm and from May to September they offer twilight shooting on Thursday evening until 8pm. They are also open on Bank Holidays but do check their website for closing times on these days!
The club uses the LongRANGE key system which enables a shooter to shoot solo with a delayed launch and they have an excellent range of targets and disciplines to try out. There is a 100 bird Sporting Layout, 4 English Skeet layouts (with a fifth close to being completed), 2 DTL layouts, a Universal Trench and an Automatic Ball Trap aswell as Compak and Super Compak Layouts so really something for just about everyone.
They have approximately 200 members and membership costs £80 per year which gets you the usual discounts at the desk but also entitles you to 100 free targets during the month of your birthday!
Another very interesting initiative is Frantic Friday where you can shoot 200 targets of your choice plus a full English Breakfast & Tea/Coffee for £50 which is a saving of £12 for non-members and therefore great value.
The Club run registered Skeet fixtures every weekend as this is their most popular discipline but being a sporting shooter I had to try out their Sporting layout purely for research purposes of course....
Gail asked Louis Mondesir to trap for me (left in the photo) and it wasn't until part way round I found out I was in the presence of a Junior England Skeet shot so no pressure then...!!
I couldn't resist asking him to shoot a round of Skeet with me to show me how it's done and he says it was only because he was using my gun that I nearly beat him 22 to his 23/25...anyway, thanks Louis for the tips etc, it was much appreciated.
Finally, I would like to thank Gail once again for her hospitality during my visit and would definately recommend a trip to Dartford CSC to anyone. Take a look at their website for more information www.dartfordclayshootingclub.com or e-mail them at dartfordcsc@aol.com
No comments:
Post a Comment