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TSAA 2007 State Field Championship

Despite being bit on Friday by a red wasp that dropped into my shirt, getting poison oak/ivy on my arms/legs, accidentally standing too long on an ant mound, minor sun burn, some wind burn and a few mosquito bites, the 25th annual TSAA State Field Championship went off with only a minor glitch or two. And all the above happened to me! The temperature was held in check by a wind that played havoc on the archers but this hardy bunch of TSAA folks managed to shoot and have fun. You never know what is going to happen at the State Field when it is staged at the Blaschke Deer Farm. After many, many hours of preparation setting up the field, three days before the event, a torrential downpour dropped 6-8 inches of water in the area and the course had to be changed at the last minute. Fortunately this only involved 6 or 7 targets. There was a good-side bad-side to this rain. The bad side was it blocked the only two roads/trails from target 24 that leads back to the staging area. The good side was the shuttle ride took the archers through the high fence area where John and Victor supplied the kids with corn to through alongside the road. This brought some of the exotic deer as close as 20 feet for some spectacular photos of Axis, Fallow, Sika, Elk, Elan and others. Tom Barker provided a trailer with custom 2x6 benches that made the shuttle runs a classy operation. Photos to follow on the Barker Bodacious Bench Bus.

Many thanks go to proprietor Nolan Blaschke for hosting us the last six years and to my co-director John. Thanks goes to the volunteers and helpers who come out on the work days to help set stuff up. These work days are not all work so make it a point to come out next year and have some fun mixed in. Adam Guggisberg, Kelly Kennedy, Mike Hojnacki, Ron Harder, Tom Barker, made up the work crew and of course John spends as many countless days out there as I do. Greg gets the gold star this year as he spent three whole days working. I even coerced a co-worker, Jerry Steward, to help me a full day as he will ride his motorcycle anywhere on a nice day. He was amazed as what is involved in a field shoot.

The family prize and the longest distance traveled goes to the Trafford family. Don Morgan survived quite well at 69 yrs 8 months. The youngsters were Heather Barthels at 9 years and little Hardy Trafford at 7 years and Miriam Trafford at 8. So, this event is for the young and young at heart. Join us next year.

Rick Stonebraker, TSAA President

and from co-organizer and squire of the land upon which this event is staged:

For All,

Many thanks to all the smiling faces that made it out again this year. I am very thankful for all of the new people that I had an opportunity to make friends with and the reuniting of all my old friends. I have a hypothesis that I'm promoting to a theory, there is no such thing as a bad archer; every year this is proven true because you all are such wonderful individuals. I am anxiously looking forward to next year. I would like to extend a personal invitation to everyone to please come back again, and I would hope to see some more new people and hopefully a few more returning for those unfortunate enough who could not return this year.

Unfortunately for the reality in life, for everything good, there is also the bad. In Field Archery we have the winners and we have losers. I think it is safe to say that everybody that attended can call themselves a winner. For the deer that didn't have a trailer driving by every 15 minutes and those throwing out bushels of corn, those poor fellas (deer) are definitely losers today. In spite of that, don't you know they were feeling happy last night with a belly full of corn?

Thanks everybody!

John Blaschke

PS from Rick: