Narrabri pistol shooter Jason Anderson welcomes world championships teammates to his home range

Narrabri pistol shooter Jason Anderson will compete on the world stage again later this year when he travels over to South Africa for the International Metallic Silhouette Shooting Union’s 2024 World Championships event.

Anderson, who was recently named the Narrabri Shire’s senior sportsperson of the year at the annual Australia Day awards, has been selected on the big bore silhouette, field pistol and standing teams with Manilla shooter Tim Davey and Inverell shooter Glen Anderson.

The trio travelled to Hungary last year to take part in the IMSSU World Cup, and they won gold medals in the big bore event together. They were selected onto three teams for this year’s world championships based on scores that they produced at events in 2023.

Anderson told The Courier that he and his two teammates had formed a strong bond and were all determined to bring back more gold from South Africa in June.

“It’s good to be a part of the team. It’s very humbling,” Anderson said.

“We brought home the gold last year, so we’re going to try and do that again.

“We’re very good friends and I think that helps a lot. We’re all there for the one common goal, and that’s gold for Australia.”

While the trio will be competing as a team in the three divisions, there are individual honours on offer for the shooters who compete at the event as well.

Glen Anderson and Tim Davey both shoot with the Inverell club but they travelled to Narrabri on Saturday for a training day at the Narrabri Pistol Club range. The Narrabri club uses black targets, however, the event in South Africa will use white targets, so they painted some of the targets white to practise in the most effective way possible.

“The white makes quite a bit of a difference in your sight picture and there’s a bit of glare,” Anderson said.

“There’s quite a few things we’re not accustomed to, so we wanted to have a bit of practice before we get to South Africa shooting white targets.

“It’s a bit more challenging in the middle of the day but I think that we went quite well.”

The three Australian team members will be in action at the Inverell club’s 200-metre Big Bore open this week. It will run across three days from Friday to Sunday.

Narrabri Pistol Club will host a prestigious event next month as an expected 50 shooters roll into town for the 200-metre Big Bore NSW State Championships from Friday, March 15 to Sunday, March 17.

Those are two of six events that the local champion shooter will compete at before he departs for Bloemfontein, South Africa, for the World Champs event which begins on June 3.

Anderson encouraged anyone who is thinking about taking up shooting to get along to Narrabri Pistol Club and have a go. With international-calibre shooters involved with the club like Anderson, president David Dewsbury and Tim Anderson, the ideal level of expertise and experience are available to guide newcomers in the enjoyable sport.