When it came to presenting the gold medal to the 14-year-old winner at the BC Airgun Championships, Tracy Reid had to fight her emotions.
After all, the shoulders taking the weight of the medal were that of her son, Bobby, who had just won his category, Sub Junior Male U16, with a personal best score of 299 out of a possible 400.
And the competition he was competing in was the inaugural running of last weekend’s Paul Alexander Memorial BC Airgun Championships, named after Reid’s late father, and hosted by the Richmond Rod & Gun Club, of which Alexander was a founding member and past president.
All in all, it was almost a little too much for Reid, who is the club’s airgun match director and whose father passed away in November 2015.
“It was very moving when I presented (Bobby) with the medal; I was holding back the tears,” Reid told the Richmond News.
“Bobby was turning 10 (around the time of his grandfather passing); he didn’t know much about what was going on or the sport. But last year, he started to express an interest and, one day, when he was at the club, a retired RCMP member spotted him shooting and said he had potential.
“Now, of course, he wants to be in the RCMP. He does play other sports, as well, such as soccer.”
Reid said her father was the “builder of the sport in Richmond” and was placed onto the Richmond Sports Wall of Fame at the Olympic Oval in 2016.
“He brought a lot of the sport to Richmond, including when the BC Summer Games were held here and the Fire & Police Games.
“He worked with and sat on the sports council for many years and was also an official with the Shooting Federation of Canada.”
Reid said it was very gratifying to see her son, a Grade 9 student at JN Burnett secondary, do so well, considering he’s only been shooting for a year or so.
Bobby was one of 35 shooters competing at the club’s River Road facility – on the middle arm dyke – over the weekend, with categories ranging from U16 to open adult, for age 20 and over, which fall into marksman up to master classes.
He will now be heading to the provincials in Kamloops in May for the first time.
