...most of these shoots are held in secret. Not that there's big money walking around ...
When each "Pull" costs $7.00 and up, it's easy to spend $600 or more for a day's "targets" and ammo, without miss-and-outs, bets and side bets. I have been with the "good ol' boys" who have one or two rings and I've been in the presence of greatness...7 rings, country club-like, gratis food for the epicure and an open bar, card playing rooms, and a calcatta Friday nite, taking into account Thursday's and Friday's scores plus the reputation of the shooters, where first choice can cost upwards of $16,500 and, according to my guesstimate, they raised a quarter mil, cash, 85% to the winning bidder, and 15% to his choice shooter.
When you consider that the greater mass of trap/skeet shooters reload their own shells and pay a relative pittance for a 25-clay round, I'd say that $7.00 per flyer is on a whole different level, so much so that a great many shooters use 1 1/4-oz Hevi-shot loads at $2.00 each, which computes to $11.00 for every released bird. This is the sport of kings, and King Juan Carlos of Spain is the patron of the sport. I am 67 years old so I slide by the mandatory betting as a senior, and being blind in my right eye (after a lifetime of right-eye-dominant right-handed shooting), I am not competitive as a lefty. Nevertheless, I pay the price once or twice a year just to match myself against some of the greatest wing shots in the world. There's a picture in my new book of Howard Miller (now deceased, of Miller SST fame) drawing a bead at Hegins PA, with my Parker GH pigeon gun (Miller SST, of course). Howard was a great shot in his day.
This is not a "secret" sport but a very
private sport. One must be invited. I love it. I wish I had discovered "flyers" when I was young and in possession of all my hand-to-eye coordination. Now my "winnings" are simply to be in the presence of some of the best latter-day knights of the trigger.
Money can magnify importance. Think of the drooling idiots on that TV program where,with great drama, they simply open suitcases. Suppose the top-dollar suitcase held $100; would anyone watch? Now suppose a top gun steps to the mark with real money on the line; a whole different sort of tension than for some handicap shooter who chances to be "right at the right time" at the Grand American Handicap lottery. EDM
