Bartholome (F-Open) and Rodgers (F-TR) Win F-Class Nationals

The dust has settled and all the scores have been tabulated at the 2013 U.S. F-Class Nationals. This was a hugely successful event with 350 shooters on the firing line. After three days of individual matches, concluding with blustery conditions on Thursday, we have two new USA F-Class Champions, Larry Bartholome (F-Open) and Derek Rodgers (F-TR). Both men shot great matches from start to finish — we congratulate both on their well-deserved victories.

Derek Rodgers (Team Sinclair) is the 2013 U.S. National F-TR Champion. Posting a 1270-44X final score, Derek edged runner-up Lige Harris (1268-44X) by two (2) points, both men finishing with identical X-counts. John Chilton was third with 1264-35X, with Trudie Fay (1263-33X) and James Crofts (1261-33X) rounding out the top five. Lige finished as High Senior, while Trudie was the High Lady.

Fellow F-TR shooter (and past National F-TR Champion) Brad Sauve praised Rodgers:

“Derek is the only person that has won both the F-TR and F-Open U.S. National Championships. Derek just dominated those Raton winds in every match and must have ice in his veins to go into that last match knowing he was tied for first and [still] pull out another great performance.”

In F-Open class, Larry Bartholome won the 2013 National Championship, besting an extremely strong field packed with talent. Larry shot great on all three days, holding on to his lead even in extremely challenging conditions on Thursday. Larry took the F-Open title with a 1283-59X score. The next three positions were decided on X-Count, with three shooters, second-place Kenny Adams (1281-66X), third-place Freddy Haltom (1281-52X), and fourth-place William Wittman (1281-50X) all finishing with 1281 point totals. Kenny’s impressive 66X was the high X-count for the match. Steven Blair finished fifth with a 1280-52X score.

Here’s One of the Next Generation of Champions…

Stormy Conditions on Thursday
On Thursday, the wind started out calm for the first couple of relays. Conditions started to get a little switchy by the 3rd through the 6th relays and then with a storm front coming in, the 7th and 8th relays got a bit wild. Our reporter at Raton, Jeff Williams, reports: “We had dust devils dancing between the line and the targets. Rain held back until after all shooters had finished.”