Shooting sports is a group of competitive and recreational sporting activities involving proficiency tests of accuracy, precision and speed in shooting — the art of using ranged weapons, mainly small arms and bows/crossbows.
The National Rifle Association of America (NRA) is a gun rights advocacy group based in the United States. Founded in 1871 to advance rifle marksmanship, the modern NRA has become a prominent gun rights lobbying organization while continuing to teach firearm safety and competency. The organization also publishes several magazines and sponsors competitive marksmanship events. According to the NRA, it had nearly 5 million members as of December 2018, though that figure has not been independently confirmed.
In the United States (U.S.), a marksmanship badge is a U.S. military badge or a civilian badge which is awarded to personnel upon successful completion of a weapons qualification course or high achievement in an official marksmanship competition. The U.S. Army and the U.S. Marine Corps are the only military services that award marksmanship qualification badges. However, marksmanship medals and/or marksmanship ribbons are awarded by the U.S. Navy, U.S. Coast Guard, and U.S. Air Force for weapons qualifications. For non-military personnel, different U.S. law enforcement organizations and the National Rifle Association (NRA) award marksmanship qualification badges to those involved in law enforcement. Additionally, the Civilian Marksmanship Program (CMP) and the NRA award marksmanship qualification badges to U.S. civilians. Most of these organizations and the U.S. National Guard award marksmanship competition badges to the people they support who succeed in official competitions.
Camp Perry is a National Guard training facility located on the shore of Lake Erie in northern Ohio near Port Clinton. In addition to its regular mission as a military training base, Camp Perry also boasts the second largest outdoor rifle range in the world after the NRA Whittington Center in Raton, New Mexico. The firing is done in the direction of the open water of the lake, that lies just beyond an earthen berm and the targets.
Springfield Armory, Inc., is an American commercial firearms manufacturer and importer based in Geneseo, Illinois. Founded in 1974 by Bob Reese and family, the company produces rifles such as the M1A and imports handguns such as the XD series and Hellcat. The company is unrelated to the like-named former manufacturer of US military firearms in Massachusetts, Springfield Armory.
The National Rifle Association (NRA) is the governing body for full bore rifle and pistol shooting sports in the United Kingdom. The Association was founded in 1859 with the founding aim of raising funds for an annual national rifle meeting to improve standards of marksmanship. Today the NRA continues this objective as well as organising civilian target shooting and selecting British teams to contest the ICFRA World Championships. The National Shooting Centre at Bisley is a wholly owned subsidiary of the association.
The Wimbledon Cup is a marksmanship trophy that was established in the 1870s.
Fullbore Target Rifle (TR) is a precision rifle shooting sport discipline governed by the International Confederation of Fullbore Rifle Associations (ICFRA). The sport evolved as a distinct British and Commonwealth of Nations discipline from Service rifle (SR) shooting in the late 1960s. Its development was heavily influenced by the British National Rifle Association (NRA). Due to this history, it is usually contested amongst the shooting events at the Commonwealth Games, although not at the Olympics. World Championships are held on a four-year cycle. The annual NRA Imperial Meeting at Bisley in the UK is globally recognised as an historic annual meeting for the discipline.
The National Small-bore Rifle Association (NSRA) is the national governing body for all small-bore rifle and pistol target shooting in the United Kingdom, including airgun and match crossbow shooting.
George Wood Wingate was an American lawyer, soldier, civil servant and organizer of rifle practice. During the Civil War he served in the New York National Guard which later encouraged him to promote marksmanship skills for American citizens. He was the co-founder, and later president, of the National Rifle Association of America.
The ANZAC Rifle Range is a rifle range located on the Malabar Headland, Malabar, in the City of Randwick local government area of New South Wales, Australia. It is headquarters to the New South Wales Rifle Association, and hosts the annual NSW Queen's Prize shooting competitions. The range is located on land owned by the Commonwealth of Australia.
William D. F. Leushner was a competitive rifle shooter.
Charles Blish Winder, Jr. was an American sport shooter, who competed in the 1908 Summer Olympics. He was a colonel in the Ohio Army National Guard.
The Bianchi Cup is a major action pistol tournament in the United States, held in May at the Green Valley Rifle & Pistol Club in Missouri. The Bianchi Cup is the only major shooting tournament that has retained its original course of fire since its inception.
Lieutenant Colonel Arthur Charles Jackson was an American competitive sport shooter. In his international career, he won numerous medals across three Summer Olympic Games, three ISSF World Shooting Championships, and two editions of the Pan American Games. He began shooting in the seventh grade and joined the rifle team at Brooklyn Technical High School in 1934. He competed in local and regional tournaments prior to World War II, during which he worked at the Sperry Corporation and later served as a bombardier in the Pacific Theater of Operations. His first international tournament was the 1948 Summer Olympics and his last was the 1956 edition, at which point he began a career in public service with the Central Intelligence Agency in Europe, Asia, and Latin America. He stopped competing at the international level in 1957 and retired from the CIA at the end of 1974. After several years as an instructor and coach, he continued participating in smaller tournaments through the 1990s.
Creedmoor Rifle Range was sited on Long Island in what is now Queens Village, Queens, New York.
Lieutenant-Colonel Richard Martyn Parsons was a British Army marksman who played an important role developing and testing small arms and ammunition during the Second World War, and whose performance in post-war rifle competitions established him as one of the finest rifle marksmen in Britain.
The sport of rifle shooting at Cambridge University has been practised since at least the early 19th century. Beginning as part of the military training of the Cambridge University Rifle Volunteers, it has since been conducted by a number of student clubs, and is currently carried out predominantly by the Cambridge University Rifle Association and Cambridge University Small Bore Club, with some participation by the Cambridge University Revolver and Pistol Club for the discipline of gallery rifle.
Colonel John Bodine (USA)