Vintage Cup 2008
The Vintage Cup will return to Pintail Point, on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, September 25 to 28—with several improvements planned for this second year in one of the country’s most storied gunning areas. Foremost among double-gun events in the US, this will be the 12th Annual Vintage Cup World Side-by-Side Championships, Double Rifle Championships and Exhibition, and Vintagers President Ray Poudrier promises that all will be bigger and better than ever.
Less than an hour from Washington, D.C., and Baltimore, Pintail Point offers beautiful shooting grounds as part of the larger River Plantation, on the Wye River. Last year, the first at Pintail Point, attendees enjoyed easy access to a wide range of hotel accommodations and dining.
Shooters in Sunday’s World Side by Side Championship will see new targets appropriate for the Vintagers’ casually competitive approach to sporting clays. All of the usual side competitions will return, including those specific to sub-gauges, hammerguns and blackpowder guns. This year, however, shooting in sub-gauge competitions also will be allowed on the opening day, Thursday.
Among the improvements Poudrier said are in the works for this year:
- More grass has been left in the cornfield, where last year vehicle traffic and parking adjacent to the exhibition area led to airborne dust inside the tents. Water trucks also will aid in dust control.
- The range facility for stopping rifles has been moved and reworked for greater safety.
- Changes have been made to ensure a better banquet on the grounds Saturday night.
- Incentives have been added for better Sunday attendance, including half-price admittance in the morning and free admittance after noon, plus an official break-down time for vendors of 3 pm.
Sponsors include Shooting Sportsman, The Classic Upland Supply Co., SYC Sporting Adventures, Hlathini Safaris, RST Classic Shotshell Co., B&P USA, True-Life Taxidermy, and Bruce & Joan Samuels.
Shooters from the Parker Gun Collectors Assoc. on the course last year.
As a founding sponsor, SSM has never missed the event, and we will be offering $20 subscription specials to help mark our 20th anniversary. B&P USA will sponsor the 28-gauge event and will provide each of that competition’s entrants with two boxes of 28-gauge shells. As they did last year, Hlathini Safaris and True-Life Taxidermy will award an African Cape buffalo hunt and appropriate taxidermy, with a drawing from among all rifle competition entrants.
Rifle shooters may attend in greater numbers this year to compete with the so-called Australian Rifle Team, a double-rifle club from Down Under that a few years ago cleaned up in the competition at Sandanona. Rifle events include those for stopping and stalking double rifles, single-shots, Drillings and Cape guns.
For more information on the Vintage Cup, contact Ray Poudrier, 413-339-5347; www.vintagers.org.
A Gathering of Clans
The Vintage Cup long has been a draw for collectors’ groups, and that attraction is growing. For collectors joined by their affinity and fascination for particular double-gun makers or countries of origin, this gathering is an ideal way to shoot and socialize with fellow members and share in the guns that bind them. It is also a way to exhibit fine or historic selections of guns and ephemera to the broader double-gun community.
The A.H. Fox Collectors awarded the first Bo-Whoop Cup this past spring and will hold the Ansley H. Fox Championship at Pintail Point.
The German Gun Collectors Assoc. is unique in many ways, but particularly because it is oriented around a country of origin rather than a specific maker. Every year at the Vintage Cup the GGCA offers up a wonderful exhibit of German guns and an exuberant gathering of members. To learn more and to see the organization’s excellent newsletter, Der Waffenschmied, visit www.germanguns.com.
The Parker Gun Collectors Assoc. is among the largest and most active affinity groups and will hold its annual meeting in conjunction with the Vintage Cup again this year. For members, including those who join at the Cup, this means the annual PGCA banquet, raffle and silent-auction fundraiser Saturday night. Raffle prizes include a Turnbull-restored 20-gauge Parker GH and a leather gun case featuring the group’s logo from J.W. Hulme.
The PGCA also will have a headquarters tent on the exhibition grounds as it did last year. Here members will have club information and their newsletter, Parker Pages, as well as guns for display and for sale. For more information, visit www.parkergun.org.
The L.C. Smith Collectors Assoc. has gathered and exhibited at the Vintage Cup several times and will again this year. “The Gun That Speaks for Itself” has some able spokesmen among the LCSCA faithful, who consistently shoot well and show some stunning high-grade examples. For more information, visit www.lcsmith.org.
Two years ago the initial conversations that launched the A.H. Fox Gun Collectors Assoc. took place at the Vintage Cup in Sandanona, so for those who fancy “The Finest Gun in the World,” this year’s exhibit at the Vintage Cup is a sort of homecoming. The group’s leading organizer, Craig Larter, started with a Web-based gathering place, and the group congealed around www.foxcollectors.com. Now nearly 100 strong, members will offer Fox shooters the chance to join in a side competition for the Ansley H. Fox Championship, to be shot concurrent with the American Classics course. See the Fox Website for more information.
—Ed Carroll
- By: Ed Carroll
