Relaxed approach, solid roots help Steve Nelson win Sporting Clays Championship

MILLBROOK — On Sunday, Aug. 17, dozens of sporting clays shooters assembled in Millbrook for the Orvis Sandanona Club Championship Shoot.

I brought our local club skeet champion Gary Harrington over from Great Barrington, Massachusetts, to see how he fared. Harrington can produce perfect scores at the skeet range, but Sporting Clays present a wider variety of targets, flying at different altitudes, angles, and speeds. They present a realistic presentation of the varied game hunters encounter in the field like quail, pheasants, grouse, ducks, doves, teal, and rabbits.

I spoke with Peter Rundquist, an Orvis manager, about the facility. The Wing family in Millbrook developed the property over three generations. A combination of wealth in the 19th and 20th centuries from being big players in the chemical dye industry and also agriculture, developing the jersey cattle breed, allowed the family to acquire hundreds of acres of forest, fields, streams, and wetlands in Dutchess county.

The latest generation Wing took an interest in bird hunting and raising pheasants, and was very good at both.

A hunting lodge was built using the original Nine Partners Road Schoolhouse, a very historic building itself. The estate was named Sandanona, a Native American word for “brilliant sunshine,” and the birds raised there were used to stock fields where hunters were invited to shoot over dogs.

Sandanona was the first licensed game bird preserve in the country. Birds were also sold to other clubs and to New York State to stock public hunting lands. Now, thousands of birds are raised and stocked all over the state. In the 1990s, sporting goods company Orvis bought the property, a natural fit for them to create a shooting and fly fishing preserve to add to their list of prestigious facilities where sportsmen could hone their skills, purchase the equipment they needed in the field, and meet other sportsmen.

The facility also hosts an Orvis Game Fair each Fall, open to the public, where over 5,000 people come from all over and receive free instruction in shotgun shooting, fly tying and fishing, dog care and handling, game cooking, falconry, game management, conservation, and a host of other outdoor activities.

Zach Clum from the Orvis Upland Department filled me in on the course and targets. Zach is a New York State champion sporting clays shooter; he and his team set a challenging set of targets for this championship shoot. 100 targets over 16 stations; all pairs — no single birds — requiring 2 shots, some targets released simultaneously, others “on report” with the second target released after the competitor fires his first shot. Fourteen stations were six shots — three pairs — but two were eight shots — four pairs.

The competition commenced at 9:30 a.m. and by 11 a.m. scores were coming in. When the dust settled, it was Steve Nelson of Rye, New York, with the high score of 84. Runner up with 80 was Alan Pana, followed by David Campbell with 78. The average score was in the low 40s.

Harrington hit a respectable 51, and was well within the top third of the field. Clum had won his recent New York State championship with a score of 57.

I interviewed Nelson after we were served a lunch of sandwiches, fresh salads and cold beverages on picnic tables in the shade. He started with shotguns as a young teen in rural Virginia; his grandparents were small game hunters — not for sport, but to put nutritious food on the table. He learned from them how to hunt upland birds, but he did not continue.

Instead, he raised a family, studied law, and is now a Commercial Real Estate attorney. In 2020 his son brought him to a father-son target shoot at Sandanona. He enjoyed it so much that he took up the sport.

Nelson appreciates getting out of the office and stretching his legs. Sunday, he took a relaxed approach to the competition; he was there to enjoy the good weather and good company for the day. He admits he is not a quick shot, but he said mental training at problem solving may have helped him puzzle out how to overcome physical reaction speed with the best choices of which bird to shoot at first, given his body type.

He said he is pleased to be a club member, and is highly impressed with the friendly Orvis staff. They all know his name, and are happy to see him every time he arrives.

“I used a Caesar Guerini Summit Limited 12 gauge shotgun that I purchased from the great team at Orvis Sandanona,” Nelson said of his equipment. “I used Winchester AA shells.”

Orvis Sandanona’s shooting preserve and learning center provide opportunities for everyone from the well-to-do sportsman to beginning youngsters. The Orvis Game Fair, set for Sept. 20 to 21 at Orvis Sandanona in Millbrook, will welcome visitors of all interest and skill levels to the facility. More information is available online at www.orvis.com.