Sportsmen, master shooters compete at Desert Lake Classic

By Sean Ammerman

Thursday, Oct. 23, 2008 | midnight

About 150 of the top local and national sporting clay shooters tested their aim at the Desert Lake Classic Oct. 16 to 19 at Desert Lake Shooting Club.

The annual competition was billed as the premier sporting clay event in the Southwest United States by club owner Jared Smith, and lived up to its billing as some of the top-ranked National Sporting Clays Association marksmen competed. The club is located on U.S. Highway 95 between Boulder City and Henderson.

Former national champion Jon Kruger of Indiana won the main event by shooting 183 out of 200 clay birds. Justin Fox of California took second with 178.

"It was a great shoot," Smith said. "We were really proud of that and the way it all went and the reception we got from everyone."

Sporting clays is a form of shotgun clay pigeon shooting which differs from trap and skeet shooting in that targets are thrown in a variety of angles and speeds.

The competition's main event had shooters take aim at 100 birds. The main event offered a unique first-place trophy, a set of historically recreated glass shooting balls.

"These were the kinds of targets Buffalo Bill and Annie Oakley used to shoot," Smith said. "We wanted to come up with a unique concept that got our shooters back to their roots out west."

In his second year running the tournament, Smith focused on improving the event's presentation.

Registration was down about 10 percent, mostly due to the economy, but several competitors were happy with the result.

"The tournaments here have been consistently good," Boulder City resident Ron Suoma said. "Every time they set the course up there's always some kind of improvement."

The competition field was a mixture of shooting hobbyists and master-ranked marksmen.

Lared Whipple of Boulder City shoots sporting clays as a way to pad his hunting skills.

"I'm a much better bird shooter than a clay shooter, but this tunes you up for bird hunting," Whipple said.

The classic also featured small-guage and side tournaments for various skill levels.

Theron Howard, ranked master by the National Sporting Clays Association, warmed up in the small-guage events before shooting in the main event.

Howard, who lives in the Spring Valley area of Las Vegas, competes in sporting clays competitions across the country to maintain his master status.

"There's a lot of people who never get to master class and if you do it, you have to work to get there," Howard said. "I just like to shoot, and the first day I tried it I knew I wanted to be serious about it."

Las Vegas resident Neal Johnson said sporting clays tends to be more social than clay sports such as trap or skeet, which are more popular.

"This is a much more social game," Johnson said. "A new shooter and compete with an experienced shooter and not get them out of rhythm like in trap."

Sean Ammerman can be reached at 990-2661 or [email protected].