Sisters Stephanie and Caley McNair gain international smallbore experience at Oceania Championships

The New Zealand Oceania team.

Sisters Stephanie and Caley McNair came away from the Smallbore Rifle Discipline at the Oceania Championships in Brisbane with more than just placings.

Stephanie and Caley were part of 16 New Zealand shooters competing in the Smallbore Rifle Discipline at the Oceania Championships in the Brisbane International Shooting Centre (BISC) earlier this month.

Stephanie shooting air rifle (note she looks the opposite way as a left handed shooter).

Caley shooting prone.

To qualify to shoot at this competition they had to compete at a number of designated matches and through this they were placed on a ranking list. Stephanie qualified to shoot three disciplines, 50m 3P (three position, kneeling, prone and standing), 10m air rifle which is shot standing and 50m prone. Caley qualified for the 50m prone event.

Robbie McNair was appointed the official team manager and was responsible for all the paperwork around rifle permits in and out of the two countries (not a simple task!) and for helping with the team practices and performances during the competition.

Stephanie - silver in women prone team.

Stephanie came away with two silver and one bronze medal - silver for women’s prone team and the 3P women’s team and the bronze was for the women’s air rifle team event. Caley placed a very creditable 10th in the Open grade shooting just below her personal best score.

It was difficult timing for the competition with Stephanie having to complete two university exams while in Australia and Caley arriving back in New Zealand just in time to sit her NCEA Level 3 exams.

Caley also missed her final prizegiving where she was awarded the top Dannevirke High School Sportsperson of the Year Award.

It was a fantastic opportunity to compete at the Brisbane range, which was used for the 2018 Commonwealth Games. It had the latest technology, using electronic targets displaying the shots on TV screens in real-time as the shooters were shooting. Because of this equipment, the finals were shown live through the International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) website.

It was an incredible experience for all involved.