Maltese Target Shooters, members of the local Malta Air-Rifle & Pistol Shooting Club were invited to take part for the first time in the annual Eley/NSRA (National Smallbore Rifle Association) Postal Shooting Competition of the UK.

The competition consisted of three phases and some 6000 competitors from all over Britain took part. Seven local shooters participated in this event. Five of these shooters managed to qualify for the second stage but only two shooters made it to the finals.

After the second Stage, Malta won two Gold and three Silver medals. The winning shooters were Eleanor Bezzina (Silver) and Stephen Vassallo (Silver) in Air-Pistol, Romeo Zuber (Silver) and Lawrence Darmanin (Gold) in Prone Rifle and Alison Vella (Gold) in Air-Rifle.

The Grand Finale for the two Maltese finalists will now be held at the National Shooting Centre in Bisley, England. Lawrence Darmanin will be competing with 22 other shooters in the prone rifle final on 12 August whilst Alison Vella will be competing with six other shooters in the air-rifle final with six other shooters. This will decide the final overall champions in the various classes of the different shooting disciplines of this competition.

To celebrate this success by Maltese shooters, a medal presentation party was held by Malta Air-Rifle & Pistol Shooting Club at the MSSF National Shooting Ranges in Bidnija last Saturday. Mr Bernard Vassallo - Chairman of the Kunsill Malti Ghall-iSport, was guest of honour for this event and after his speech about the benefits that sport offers to the Maltese, he distributed the medals to the winners amid great cheers from the other club members, their families and friends who attended this event.