Jamaica Defence Force Captain Dwayne Ford dethroned Guyana’s Lennox Brathwaite to win the Wogarth Cup as Jamaica won the Team Match by the smallest of margins as the West Indies Full Bore Shooting Council Championship came to an exciting climax at Twickenham Park on Saturday.
Jamaica’s eight-member team were forced to dig deep to hold off a hard-charging Guyana which made the victory satisfying for Jamaica Rifle Association Vice-President Karen Anderson, who was also a member of the winning team.
"Jamaica is positively thrilled to have won the West Indies Cup team match on home soil and defeating Guyana in the process," she said.
"It has been a long slog in trying to beat them over the years and to do it on home soil, in particular, after a really tough tournament. We showed a great level of consistency. There might have been some doubt after the long-range team match the day before where we finished last but it bodes well for the team's confidence how we managed to end the tournament and win that particular cup."
She also reserved special praise for team leader, Captain Ford.
"It is even more heartening when you see Dwayne Ford win the Wogarth Cup which is a tremendous achievement in defeating Lennox Brathwaite, who is a seven-time Wogarth winner. We are on a high and we are just going to build on this going into next year's competition."
Captain Ford, a recently crowned O-Class champion, led his team by example. He and teammate Nicola Guy shot impressively at 300 yards, each scoring perfect scores of 50.4 to give Jamaica an early five-point lead. The home team scored 373.23 over its nearest rivals Antigua and Barbuda with Guyana on 360.16.
Jamaica extended its lead after 500 yards with a score of 379.20 but Guyana eventually narrowed the gap and claimed victory with a score 383.23.
Braithwaite answered the call at 500 yard with score of 50.3 that would prove pivotal at the final range as he and Ford battled for the Wogarth Cup that goes to the top-scoring shooter in the West Indies Cup.
At 600 yards, Jamaica dropped 10 points early on and found themselves in a major shoot-out with Guyana. However, the shooters managed to steel themselves and recovered to score 1114.58 to hold off Guyana who shot a 1113.63.
In the end, Ford defeated the seven-time champion Brathwaite by 0.1 to take the Wogarth Cup.