Monday evening.

It was another warm but relatively clear day, with a breeze from the right. Things went rather more smoothly than yesterday. There were suspicions that some of the target troubles have been due to electrical voltage surges and intermittent power cuts. A little late perhaps, but now most of the sensitive gadgets have been hooked up to non-interruptible power supplies, and the whole range run on an independent generator. In some organisations, white smoke is the desirable sign of success - here, we are reassured when thick black smoke emerges just to the right of the range.

Our traffic adventures continue. Last night the first car, with three passengers in the back, hit a good bump pretty so that all three rose to the roof of the car with Peter Turner's head turning on the interior light.
This morning, with our police escort leading, the road around one of the many "diversions" between Sohna and Gurgaon had been partially blocked off to prevent traffic crossing it during road surfacing. That did not both the police who simply three aside the barriers and we carried, followed by a large swarm of, no doubt, grateful tuk-tuks, motor cycles, large trucks and cars. Tonight, Phil and I did not have our bren gun toting police escort, but we were not ambushed and go back to the hotel late but safely.

A further quick word on traffic - sorry, but when you are experiencing the chaos twice a day, it becomes important. There are many speed humps, called "speed breakers", more correct would be "suspension breakers". Most of these are obviously put in by the municipality, but others seem to be privately installed by home-owners on their own bit of road. In place of a hump, many place large rocks in the road around which traffic has to crawl, and of course there are the myriad potholes and broken up road surfaces all the way. Car repair places must do a roaring trade, but I don't think many cars can last very long. The roads are also littered with broken down trucks, often without a wheel or two, with the axles precariously propped up on rocks. . The dual carriageways, divided highways, are interesting. Mostly the traffic, which drives on the left here, follows the correct road lanes. But if things get a bit busy, people simply move into the opposing lane and by the blowing of horns and flashing of lights bull their way through. Our police like doing this, giving them a chance to use their sirens and blue lights. There seems to be few rules of the road for motorcycles or bullock carts, while trucks loaded with rocks are not to be trifled with.

There was also shooting today, all at 600 yards!

First the Pairs, with the standings after 600 yards:. 1. Canada 299.31; 2 .Scotland 299.27; 3. Wales 297.34; 4. New Zealand 297.36; 5. South Africa 297.30; 6 Australia 296.37

Then two 600 yard shoots for the Individual. The leaders are: 1. Gaz Morris, Wales, 255.30; 2. James Corbett, Australia, 254.30; 3. Robert Oxford, Wales, 254.28; 4. Petrus Haasbroek, South Africa, 254.25; 5. David Calvert, Northern Ireland, 253.29; 6. Angus McLeod, Scotland, 253.25; 7. Mike Collings, New Zealand, 253.24; 8. Daniel Richardson, Jersey, 252.27; 9. Jim Paton, Canada, 252.26; 10. Ross McQuillan, Northern Ireland, 252.24. Des Vamplew is in 29th place with 245.26. His 'lost' shot yesterday was established as a cross-fire, a very expensive miss.

Tomorrow is at 900 yards - Pairs 2 & 15 in the morning, Individual the same in the afternoon. Then there will just be the final 1000 yard day on Wednesday. It is said that there will be live TV coverage, so do badger your local TV stations to get it on.

Des' notes from Monday:
"Monday was an interesting day on the range. We were exposed to about the same conditions as yesterday with the wind being more of a factor. The flags were blowing most of the day with strength and angle changes occurring on a regular basis. The scores were lower today reflecting the trickier conditions. The winds also helped to make for another clear day so the visibility of the aiming mark was a bonus. Jim and I both went clean again in the 600 yard Pairs match so we are down 1 point after the three short ranges. Scotland also had perfect scores so we are still tied with them with a 4 point lead in the V count. There is now a 2 point separation between us and the next couple of teams that are down 3 points. In the individual matches Jim dropped 3 points today, shooting a 34 and 48. As mentioned, the conditions were trickier today so those scores pretty well reflect the averages on the range. I had the same scores. I received the results of the jury's decision on the protest Sandy put in yesterday regarding one of my shots not registering. It looks like I did cross fire and have lost 5 points. Ouch. That result puts me way down the short range aggregate so will try and make it up during the next couple of days when we shoot at the longer ranges. The aggregate will be completely different after tomorrow night if the winds continue to play a factor as they did today. Jim and I discussed the missed shot last night and realized it was picked up on the target we had just finished shooting the pairs match on, so it makes sense how I could line up on that target after listwning to Jim telling me to "shoot on target 10" for 15 minutes. Not a good excuse but there have been more than a few cross fires during the last couple of days. The targets are closer together on this range compared to the spacing between targets back home and the number boards are below the targets rather than above as found on traditional CF ranges. Depending on where you are positioned on the firing point the number boards may not line up with your target so you are constantly double checking that your lined up on your target. Signing off until tomorrow."