In the dying days of the third heatwave of the summer the 2025 Target Rifle (TR) Imperial Meeting began. The first two days, the Thursday and the Friday were hot and sunny, but thereafter the weather turned to that more common in British summertime, mild with cloudy skies and with intermittent periods of sunshine and rain. A lucky few manged to have timings that allowed them to stay dry throughout, but most caught some rain at least once. The winds were tricky at times, but manageable for most, resulting in very high winning scores across all the competitions. A debate continues on the merits of getting wet on the outside due to rain or on the inside due to very hot conditions – and of course whether or not either set of conditions really affects the top shooters who nonetheless still seem to manage both sets. Of course, one would have thought that moderate conditions with some rain would be perfect for the Scots but, overall, the numbers featuring in the top 25 of the prize lists were probably fewer than in previous years.
Despite 2025 not being a year with extra major team matches, the number and quality of the international competitors was very high. There were strong teams from the USA, Canada, Kenya, Australia, Jersey and Guernsey and individuals from South Africa, the West Indies, Germany, New Zealand and Japan. However, there were a few notable Scottish performances with Lewis Reid winning the Duke of Cambridge after a tie shoot and Lindsey McKerrell finishing 19th in the King’s Prize final without any having shot for over a year. Sandy Walker shot well all the way through the meeting and was unlucky not to win the 1st Stage of the King’s prize with a 105 and 19 v’s, a score that most other years would have won it outright. Angus McLeod also shot very steadily and was placed in several prize lists and finished 11th in the King’s Prize final.
In the two major multi-stage competitions, the St George’s and the King’s Prize, there were many Scottish qualifiers and the progression for both was for 300 shooting in the 2nd stage and 100 in the third. The St George’s 1st stage saw 18 Scots qualify for the 2nd stage of which 7 shot in the 3rd stage. In the King’s Prize 1st Stage, there were 21 Scottish qualifiers out of the 300 that progressed to the next stage, of which 4 qualified from the 2nd stage to the 3rd.
More detailed results follow and apologies to anyone missed by the compiler.
