Over the weekend, twelve junior shotgun athletes aged between 17 and 20, travelled from around Australia to attend a Junior Shotgun Camp at the Sydney International Shooting Centre.
This camp offered attendees the unique opportunity to come together with junior athletes at similar stages and to develop their shooting skills and techniques with the assistance of Shooting Australia’s coaching staff, including, Junior Shotgun Coaching Lead, Suzy Balogh, and Assistant Shotgun Coach, Jeff Richardson.
Speaking to the influence and impact the coaching team had during the camp, Shotgun Program Manager, Adam Hosking, explained “Both coaches were highly engaging and interacted very well with each athlete throughout the camp. Coaching at this level is incredibly valuable and surrounding athletes with skilled and experienced coaches is the cornerstone to improvement for junior athletes.”
In-addition to training sessions and competition opportunities, the three-day camp was also packed with a range of activities designed to grow the attending athletes’ understandings of what it takes to be successful as a high-performance shooting athlete.
As Hosking emphasised “These activities included education sessions about training program design, skill acquisition concepts and athlete recovery, as well a visit from VIS Dietitian, Elaine Bo, to teach athletes the importance of nutrition pre, during and post competition.”
Australian Senior Shotgun Athlete, Thomas Grice, who just returned from the ISSF Shotgun World Championships in Greece, where he finished 7th in the Men’s Trap event, also attended the camp to provide mentoring for the junior athletes. Hosking, reflected on the positive impact that Grice had on the junior athletes, explaining “He gave an incredibly insightful talk to the junior athletes on his journey as an athlete, shooting specific cues and competition mindset.”
This Junior Shotgun Camp was Shooting Australia’s first step to support the preparation of the Shotgun (Trap) athletes eligible to represent Australia at the, 2026 Junior World Championships, which will be held in Suhl, Germany in June next year.
