A Tsawwassen skeet shooter hit the mark winning a number of divisions at the recent western championships in Prince Albert. Sask.
Born and raised in South African, Hilton Robinson immigrated to Canada in 1993 — first in Winnipeg and now in South Delta for the past 15 years.
“When I was growing up, my dad used to shoot international skeet in South Africa. I used to help load the machines. I grew up around skeet shooting,” he said. “About three years ago I hurt my back and was looking for a sport where it wouldn’t effect my back, so I tried skeet and was hooked.”
About a year into it he decided that he would get into the sport seriously, training in his spare time and attending major competitions.
“I have been seriously competing for about two years now,” he said. “The competition in Prince Albert was the Western Canadian championships. The top shooters from B.C., Alberta and Saskatchewan were on hand. The way skeet shooting works is that you are in a class system, from A through to E, so you can compete in any one of those classes. That’s what makes it really nice is that everyone can go and you compete in your class and everyone can compete for the top prize.”
The championships went well for Robinson. The event consisted of five events: doubles, 12-guage, 20-guage, 28-guage and 410-guage. There was a top gun for each event as well as high all-around. Robinson won the 12, 20 and 410 top guns and won the high overall and high all-around.
“I was pleasantly surprised for sure. It went really well,” he said. “I shot in the Canadian championships a few weeks ago in Ontario and then in October I go to San Antonio, Texas for the World Championships. That is a massive competition. There will be 900 competitors, so I’ll be training hard.”
Robinson said there are three clubs available to train at including the Vancouver Gun Club, Langley Gun Club and Lyndon Shot Gun Club in Washington State.
“It’s going to be a lot of training, but I’m looking forward to the challenge. Certainly I want to try and repeat what I did at the Western Canadians for sure,” he said.
