Representing Australia as an athlete is not a "career". I am not paid a wage to train, travel or compete. I do so for the love of the sport and the satisfaction of bettering myself.

Competition shooting requires well maintained equipment to be competitive. I have spent tens of thousands of dollars on maintaining my equipment and on training and competing.  Juggling work with shooting is a must in order to be able to train and compete. With  more support i have the chance to become more competitive internationally. There is a lot more resources i would be able to use if the finance was available. An example of this would be being able to participate in national training camps. I currently take a weeks leave without pay at a time to do such camps when i can. It is unfortunate but there is many camps that i simply cannot afford to attend.

In 2006, I was able to train full time for a period of 3 months leading up to the Commonwealth Games. Training full time was possible thanks to a Direct Athlete

Support Grant provided by the Australian Sports Commission. Full time training consisted of hands-on shooting training 7 hours a day, followed by 1.5 hours of gym and recovery. This schedule was repeated 6 or 7 days a week over a 3 month period.

Unfortunately the cost of shooting doesn't allow me to train full time. There are many costs associated with representing Australia.

In January 2008 I updated my Small-bore rifle. Due to the tolerances and precision of the rifle I am only able to train with the top line of ammunition. Only the top line is within my rifle's tolerances. In July on a training camp I used 3000 rounds over a period of 14 days, trying to be conservative.

Since January this year I have bought the following items.

Bleiker Rifle
Shooting Jacket and Pants
Tenex Ammunition

Combined cost $12110.88

of these items I have only paid for the Tenex outright. I am currently paying for the rifle with a loan and can always use more ammunition


This is not all of my costs but just an example of how quickly they add up. My Tenex bill has been reduced due to the generosity of the Eley factory. 

Currently I am trying to minimize my use of ammunition in training to reduce my bills. In a normal training day I would use up to 300 rounds of Ammunition. At a retail price of $30 per 50 that’s 60 cents a shot. That’s $180 a day. It’s pretty obvious that I can not sustain training at such levels. I am in need of purchasing ammunition again now.