Burnett makes final!

Half-cocked

Derek Burnett has made the final of the European Championship:

http://www.icpsa.ie/highperformance/1637-Burnett-makes-ESC-European-Championships-Final-280610.html

Fingers crossed he makes a medal position. Is there a quota place up for grabs at this event?

target

Final is on at 3:30 Irish time. Live updates of the scoreboard will be available here

target

Final moved up. It's on now

target

Derek did it, bronze medal :D:D:D

Half-cocked

Great result, well done Derek:D:D:D:D

It wasn't me!

Fantastic result. Not entirely sure quota places are available yet. Certainly for rifle and pistol, the first event is the World Championships in Munich this year (Wake up there FLOYDSTER!).

FLOYDSTER

Great Result!!:D

rrpc

It appears from the list of quota places for 2012 that Derek has got himself qualified for the Olympics :cool:

According to the table, the first five places in the ECH get a quota place for their country.

For the WCH, the top 5 in 50m Prone (are you listening FLOYDSTER? ), Trap and Skeet, the top 6 in Air Pistol and Air Rifle, the top 4 in 50m Pistol and the top 3 in Double Trap also get quota places.

Half-cocked

rrpc wrote: »

It appears from the list of quota places for 2012 that Derek has got himself qualified for the Olympics :cool:

That needs clarification - everyone I asked was under the impression that there were no quota places available until Munich. If Derek has won a quota place, both he and the ICPSA don't know about it

target

The first quotas for 2012 come on line at the World Championships in Munich for all shooting events.

For olympic Trap the qualifications/quota allocations can be seen here

Irish Springer

Not sure, if you look at the list it says 5 for the Europeans but that is spread over 2010, 2011, 2012.

target

target wrote: »

I'm sure , that document came from the www.issfnews.com website which was deprecated over a year ago and has not been used since the ISSF switched to www.issf-sports.org as their one and only website.

Forget what I said about the above document, the ISSF still use the old server for downloads.

Still no quotas available at the Europeans for shotgun until 2011.

Sparks

It's a shame, but still a fantastic result - and one which will hopefully provide carding funds for Derek so he can train towards a 2011 quota place!

Half-cocked

In non-ISSF events, other ICPSA shooters are making a big splash at international level at the moment: Bronze for the veterans team at the FITASC World Championships and Ireland win the DTL Home International. And an Irish junior wins the British Open DTL! And I'll bet none of this gets a mention in any of the media:mad:

target

A great summer for the ICPSA and it's members. I suspect the airwaves will be silent and the papers devoid of ink, but at least we can celebrate it here

sporting shot

Hi All,

Dont forget the world English Sporting was on 10 days ago and ICPSA members did well there too and featured in the pre-lim.

target

sporting shot wrote: »

Hi All,

Dont forget the world English Sporting was on 10 days ago and ICPSA members did well there too and featured in the pre-lim.

Didn't know that, just as well we have boards here or I certainly wouldn't have known. Congrats to the guys and gals.

sporting shot

Hi Target,

Yeah I dont know how many people know about the worlds just gone. But find the results below:

Pre-lim : http://www.lctc.co.uk/365.html

World Sportrap: http://www.lctc.co.uk/366.html

World Sporting: http://www.lctc.co.uk/368.html

Unfortunately, no Team results to post!

SARZY

Clay Shooting in Ireland suffers because of the spread of disciplines and the consequent confusion about International teams among the general public and on into the media.

In my locality, some years ago, 1 local shooter represented Ireland at DTL in July and another local man represented Ireland in ABT in September. Both fine achievements were publicised in the local weekly paper. NARGC men were confused, never mind the general public.

Add in Olympic Trap, Olympic Skeet,Double Trap,English Skeet,English Sporting,FITASC Sporting,Universal Trap, I think it unlikely that Press interest or National media interest can be attracted.
The Italians concentrate their Clay shooting effort in the 3 Olympic disciplines, achieve things and celebrate.
Derek Burnett's recent achievement is so far ahead of any DTL, ABT or Skeet or Sporting, but why wont the ICPSA promote that.

That is the question.

It wasn't me!

Because the best publicity for your sport and your organisation is to succeed. Making noise and denigrating other people's sports and associations is a terrible way to get noticed and will earn you no good whatsoever.

jwshooter

SARZY wrote: »

Clay Shooting in Ireland suffers because of the spread of disciplines and the consequent confusion about International teams among the general public and on into the media.

In my locality, some years ago, 1 local shooter represented Ireland at DTL in July and another local man represented Ireland in ABT in September. Both fine achievements were publicised in the local weekly paper. NARGC men were confused, never mind the general public.

Add in Olympic Trap, Olympic Skeet,Double Trap,English Skeet,English Sporting,FITASC Sporting,Universal Trap, I think it unlikely that Press interest or National media interest can be attracted.
The Italians concentrate their Clay shooting effort in the 3 Olympic disciplines, achieve things and celebrate.
Derek Burnett's recent achievement is so far ahead of any DTL, ABT or Skeet or Sporting, but why wont the ICPSA promote that.

That is the question.

sporting in italy is big especially FITASC .

only last week did our vets billy kearns ,pat fox , john dignam win bronze in the world championships there and well done to these men .

i would not have liked to pay the bar bill that nite .

clay shooting is a sport for all form the guy at the back of his house to world and olympic standard .some never go to a clay shoot but go to a competition .

its a way to relax for some and a way of life for others .the icpsa is made up of all these people .

to win high guns it takes the three Ts .talent .temperament , technique ,sadly the vast majority done possess all 3 .

if the icpsa were to put money into issf shooting the vast majority would suffer

Sparks

jwshooter wrote: »

if the icpsa were to put money into issf shooting the vast majority would suffer

And yet at the same time, the ISSF shooters in the ICPSA have pulled more then their weight over the years with all the media coverage and funding they've secured for the ICPSA.
There's got to be a healthy balance.

jwshooter

Sparks wrote: »

And yet at the same time, the ISSF shooters in the ICPSA have pulled more then their weight over the years with all the media coverage and funding they've secured for the ICPSA.
There's got to be a healthy balance.

they have had some out standing results , in no small way to the back ground people ,these are often over looked .one man in particular .

Sparks

jwshooter wrote: »

in no small way to the back ground people ,these are often over looked .one man in particular .

Very true.

SARZY

Please understand that I have no axe to grind with ICPSA or anybody in it. Like all organisations it has and will have in the future, issues to be dealt with and their stance will not suit everybody, but I just cant understand why they make no effort to publicise achievements such as Derek Burnett's in that European.

The Press in general will publish ANY feelgood story. An Irishman wins a bronze medal at a European Championship in an Olympic discipline and not as much as a line in any paper.

That is, to me, unbelieveable.

Sparks

SARZY wrote: »

That is, to me, unbelieveable.

Possibly because you've never spoken to the people who run those newspapers? I've had the sports editor in the Irish Times simply tell me that "we're the Times. The Irish Times doesn't do guns." and hang up.
It really is not that unusual

Half-cocked

SARZY wrote: »

The Press in general will publish ANY feelgood story. An Irishman wins a bronze medal at a European Championship in an Olympic discipline and not as much as a line in any paper.

That is, to me, unbelieveable.

In the media, ANY feelgood story doesn't include anything to do with guns. When it comes to guns, the media only want bad news. The ICPSA, along with many other Irish shooting associations has spent a lot of time and effort trying to counter the negative image of shooting sports in the media, but to no avail. It's the exact same in the UK, talk to anyone in the English CPSA etc and they'll tell you they have the same problem.

Shooting associations generally have limited means and manpower, and this has to be used for the benefit of the sport, not brown nosing the media and hiring PR guru's in the hope that it might, just might, result in a bit of positive press ie;- a small paragraph on the back page of a sports supplement, somewhere below the results of an international baton twirling competition.

dCorbus

not brown nosing the media

Unfortunately, and knowing a couple of the ol' media whores themselves, that's exactly what is often required!:(

SARZY

At the World ISSF in Munich this week, in Shotgun (TRAP) Junior event, the Italians had the Gold medalist, the Bronze medalist and a 5th place.

Our most promising Junior is shooting DTL, very successfully- British Open winner, but my point simply are these,

(a) did Derek ever take part in a World junior event, He was showing outstanding ability as a young lad but went through the DTL, Ball trap route. Would he have benefitted from such an oportunity.
(b) will our outstanding current British DTL champ be given all the support he deserves to progress now to such World trap events.

And on publicity for the game, An Irish Junior shotgun shooter wins the Senior British Open DTL at his first attempt and NOT a word in national media.
I simply dont believe an effort is being made.

Rovi

SARZY wrote: »

nd on publicity for the game, An Irish Junior shotgun shooter wins the Senior British Open DTL at his first attempt and NOT a word in national media.
I simply dont believe an effort is being made.

It made the local paper, which I suppose is progress in and of itself:
GOOD news in a local paper...

Sparks

SARZY wrote: »

I simply dont believe an effort is being made.

You're simply incorrect. The problem is that the print media don't think that running stories on our sports will sell advertising space because we're not a very vocal lot most of the time.

rrpc

Sparks wrote: »

You're simply incorrect. The problem is that the print media don't think that running stories on our sports will sell advertising space because we're not a very vocal lot most of the time.

The factors that make up getting a story into the National newspapers are many and varied.

First there has to be a story, it has to be a success story and usually has to be an international success story.

Secondly it has to be hot, in other words almost instantaneous with the story; once it goes past a couple of days it's not a story anymore.

Thirdly it has to compete with all the normal sports categories that get the lion's share of the coverage, and if they all have stories, and the space is filled you're out of luck.

Fourthly you have to have personal contacts and a relationship with journalists, editors etc. in order to have a fighting chance of overcoming the other obstacles. Frankly that isn't helped by some of the characterisations of the media expressed on this thread and elsewhere in this forum both currently and in the past. I know of at least one journalist who won't give us the time of day because of some of the comments on here.

The only loser there is us. Journalists don't have an obligation to print our stories or promote our sport. There are always plenty of other stories...

Sparks

There's also the factor that there are editors who are ideologically opposed to firearms in any form in their section of the newspaper (Malachy Logan in the Times comes to mind fairly fast). And that factor is often compounded by the belief that not many people will buy the paper to read about "minority sports" (even though those sports have more actual participants than four out of the Big Five).

I do wonder quite a bit if we'd see that change if we took a page from ICABS' manual and wrote to our local papers quite a lot more often as individuals. I don't think the NGBs can turn it around on their own; it's too much work for too few people. You really do need to have three or four people doing nothing but PR on the national level to keep up, because while one person could handle the work on a slow day midweek, when you have a match on the weekends or with an international match, you have too many places to contact at the same time. Everyone's deadline lands at the same time, everyone wants their own unique copy, and half the time everyone wants someone on their radio show at the same time. Not to mention that someone has to go take photos and get the results because few, if any, clubs have their own local PRO to help out (at best, it's usually something along the lines of "erra, sure Jimmy can manage that, along with his usual job of being chief range officer and secretary"). And somehow you have to get those photos back from the wilds in a usable form, which normally meant having a laptop and a 3G dongle onsite with the PRO, who had to know how to frame a photo, download it to the laptop and do minor editing in photoshop or gimp or whatever, and then email or ftp it over to the paper in their preferred format and resolution (and that was usually a very high resolution for print, which at the time used to mean reasonably expensive equipment).

Bananaman

But you can try ...........

Just because people tell you you're a bollix doesn't mean you have to believe them.

If a paper does not print your story that is their prerogative, however, if you do not send them the story because 'last time they treated me with disdain' you have no excuse.

The best approach is to send them a newsbite+photo every time there is a newsbite.

On a slow day they may use it - most likely they will not but if it is not sitting there in front of them on said slow day - it will never get covered.

Same with the Digest - like it or not it is the Irish shooting publication - I am sure any sports editor worth his salt will take a nosey at it to see if it is covering the 'very important sport' in question that he has just received a newsbite on and a email from his editor asking him if he can do anything to get this feckin monkey off his back.

If it is not in the digest then he may ask himself "if the shooters themselves must not think it's worth a hill of beans who the hell will read it in my paper?".

You may think that the Olympic disciplines carry enough pedigree to warrant coverage in the National Broadhseets but I may have missed out on the synchronized swimming and shot putt league results in Last Sundays Sports Section. The Olympics only carries any weight while they are happening and if we are actually competeing in them.

It's not good enough to be picky or to "not play with that ball". if you want press coverage you need to start at grass roots specialist publications and work your way out. Otherwise you have little or no chance of getting in the mainstream stuff.

Unless of course you happen to be on the top of a pile on a slow day....

B'Man

Sparks

Bananaman wrote: »

But you can try ...........

And we did, after the dismissal we got. And we were making progress the last time I looked. But we were still getting the half-inch of column space that needed filling every so often. The editor's influence isn't easily sidestepped.

If a paper does not print your story that is their prerogative, however, if you do not send them the story because 'last time they treated me with disdain' you have no excuse.

We never, ever, did that. We sent them everywhere we could - but most of the time, editors went with covering Tiger Woods' latest club head warmers or something of that nature.

The best approach is to send them a newsbite+photo every time there is a newsbite.

Which is what we did, consistently, for several years (and I think we're still doing it, I'm just not the one doing it anymore).

Same with the Digest - like it or not it is the Irish shooting publication - I am sure any sports editor worth his salt will take a nosey at it to see if it is covering the 'very important sport' in question that he has just received a newsbite on and a email from his editor asking him if he can do anything to get this feckin monkey off his back.

And that's a problem for us a lot of the time. It's hard enough getting past an uninformed editor's preconceptions of a sport he or she knows nothing about; it's far far harder when they've seen something particularly dodgy-looking like some of the Digest's articles over the years. There's good stuff in there occasionally (Joe Keane's articles were often good reads for example), but trying to get someone to cover an air rifle international match when their mental image of your sport is of bayonet collecting is enormously difficult to do.

You may think that the Olympic disciplines carry enough pedigree to warrant coverage in the National Broadhseets

I do, because of the coverage and interaction we've had at all the previous Olympic games. The challange is extending that outside of those timeframes.

I know there's prejudice against it in some quarters of our community, but the simple fact is, the Olympic nametag carries a lot of weight outside of our community and our ignoring that tool in the toolbox is the worst case of cutting off our nose to spite our face you could think of.

you need to start at grass roots specialist publications and work your way out.

No, you need to start at grass roots generalist publications like your local paper. Local papers have little in the way of content and resources, so they're happy to publish local stories. If local clubs were pushing that resource continually, we'd start feeding into the larger newspapers a lot more because those newspapers do monitor the local papers in order to figure out who'll buy what (ad revenue is an enormous commercial pressure, but it's not like we can never use it to our advantage).