CAMP PERRY, Ohio (July 30, 2015)--The Army's Service Rifle Team won the National Trophy Team (NTT) Rifle Match July 20 for the ninth consecutive year with a total score of 2938-100X during the 2015 Civilian Marksmanship Program National Trophy Rifle Matches July 17-22 at Camp Perry, Ohio.
The NTT match was first fired in 1903 when competitors in the first National Matches competed for the "National (Dogs of War) Trophy" that was commissioned pursuant to an appropriation by the U. S. Congress. The NTT is a six-person team match with a requirement that at least one firing member be a new shooter.
"The National Trophy Team Match is the match we prepare for all year," said Sgt. 1st Class Emil Praslick III, U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit coach and Brewster, N.Y., native. "That is our most important match that we shoot during the year, and it is the one that has the most prestige up here. It's the oldest national match."
This year's winning team consisted of Sgt. 1st Class Brandon Green, Staff Sgt. Amanda Elsenboss, Staff Sgt. Daniel Crody, Cotopaxi, Colo., Sgt. David Bahten, Sonora, Calif., Sgt. Joseph Hall, Carrollton, Ga., and Pfc. Ben Cleland, Swanton, Ohio. The team captain was Sgt. 1st Class Robert Shoup, St. Michael, Minn.
"I'm very happy with how we performed in all of the team matches, and our focus when we come up here is the team competitions," Praslick said.
The team of Green and Hall won the Hearst Doubles Team Match with a score of 591-18X. In this two-person team match, which is fairly new and was first introduced in 2006, both team members shoot a 30-shot President's 100 Rifle Match course of fire with service rifles. The course of fire includes standing slow-fire, prone from standing rapid fire and prone slow-fire, each fired from various distances. The first part of all scores is the overall, and the "X" in the second part of the scores denotes hitting an X ring inside the bull's-eye of a target; X scores are used to break ties.
Army shooters were in the top five in all of the individual matches, often nipping at the heels of the top finishers.
Elsenboss won the Women's Rifle Trophy for the National Trophy Individual Rifle Match with a total score of 490-19X, four points from first place. She also was first for Women's Top 20 President's Match with a total score of 296-9X. She was 17th overall, with a total score of 388-11X, after the finals for the President's 100 Top 20.
Bahten finished second in the President's 100 Rifle Trophy Match with a total score of 393-14X after the finals. Also finishing in the top 20 were Cleland, sixth overall (392-12X), and Hall, 13th overall (390-15x).
Other Army Rifle Team members who qualified for the prestigious President's 100 Rifle Match included Green, Staff Sgt. Kevin Trickett, Boston, Mass., Crody, Staff Sgt. Franky Galloway, Montgomery, Ala., Spc. Trent Thomas, Penn, Penn., Pfc. Garth Stone, Longview, Wash., Spc. Larissa Robertson, Colorado Springs, Colo., and Pvt. Lane Ichord, Waterford, Calif.
The Rifle National Match course of fire, used for both individual and team matches, is shot in four stages that include standing slow-fire, kneeling or sitting from standing rapid-fire, prone from standing rapid-fire and prone slow-fire.
Editor's note: The U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit's mission is winning national and international shooting competitions and advancing small-arms lethality to demonstrate the Army's marksmanship capability and enhance marksmanship effectiveness in combat. The USAMU is part of the US Army Accessions Support Brigade and the Army Marketing and Research Group.
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