Soddy-Daisy High School junior Eli Christman continued his sensational shotgun success last weekend at Paris, Tenn.
He was 5-for-5 in Class B and junior championships in the Tennessee state competition for international and 5 Stand clay shooting at the Holly Fork Shooting Complex. He earned eight championships in all, including the high overall award for all ages and classes in FITASC in-state.
The acronym stands for Federation Internationale de Tir Aux Sportives de Chasse – a worldwide form of sporting clays – and 5 Stand is a faster-moving, space-compressed version that includes more action than trap and a greater variety of flying patterns than skeet.
Christman was second overall in Super Sporting and True Pair in addition to winning the Class B and junior titles. He will return to Holly Fork next week for the Tennessee Junior Olympic skeet competition, where the top six finishers will advance to the National Junior Olympic tournament in June in Colorado Springs.
“I don’t dislike any of the disciplines, but I’d say international skeet is probably my favorite,” said Christman, whose home club is Montlake Classic Clays. “My goal is to be in the Olympics in 2020.”
He’s already been placed on the national junior development path by USA Shooting, which oversees the country’s Olympic process. It operates separately from the National Sporting Clays Association and the National Skeet Shooting Association.
“Very few people shoot Olympic,” said Bill Christman, Eli’s father and this year’s head coach of the Soddy-Daisy sporting clays team, after serving the past two years as a volunteer assistant and an assistant coach. “It’s kind of hard to switch back and forth, even though Eli has been doing it.”
All competitive shooters start in Class E, the elder Christman explained, as Eli did last July. By September he had progressed from E through D and C to B in sporting clays, and he’s close now to Class A status.
In addition to previously winning state skeet titles, the 11th-grader has shot in five college tournaments with high school divisions and won multiple top prizes at all, including as measured against the collegians. He’s also won multiple categories at regionals in St. Louis and Savannah, Ga.; the International East Coast Championships at Fort Benning at Columbus, Ga.; and a Super Shoot in Tiller, Ark.
He’s had college scholarship offers for his shotgun prowess.
“What make you really good for college competition is when you can shoot everything really well, which Eli does,” Bill Christman said. “Shooting international skeet helps make him good for every other discipline of shooting.”
How does Eli account for his success?
“I guess I’d say hard work – a lot of time and effort,” he said. “I practice my gun mount twice a day.”
Contact Ron Bush at rbush@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6291.