The 2024 Daisy BB Gun National Championship was the biggest in its 57-year history, featuring a new contest, special appearances by NRA President Bob Barr, NRA Second Vice President Mark Vaughn and 4-H National Shooting Sports Program Coordinator Scott Stuhr, intense competition and plenty of fun. The match was held in Rogers, Arkansas, July 1-3.
NRA President Bob Barr spoke at the Opening Ceremony, and Second Vice President Mark Vaughn was a speaker at the Closing Ceremony and also presented NRA Distinguished Expert awards. In addition, new laptops and scanners for scoring targets were provided by The NRA Foundation.
“Thank you to Daisy for what you do in sponsoring this event and so many other programs for our young people and their families,” Barr said. “I’ve benefitted from it and I know everyone else here has, too.”
NRA Board Member Edie Fleeman, along with NRA National Matches staff members Terry and Brad Sutherland, also made the trip to Arkansas to support the 57th Annual Daisy BB Gun Nationals.
The representation from NRA officials was appreciated by all in attendance.
Two volunteers who have worked at the Daisy BB Gun Nationals for nearly two decades, Clyde and Mary Furr, said this year’s tournament was the best one ever, both in its scope and the demeanor of the competitors. “This was a wonderful match, the perfect championship to be visited by NRA dignitaries,” Clyde said.
As for this year’s winner, the Humboldt Sharpshooters team hailing from South Dakota walked away from the 57th annual Daisy BB Gun Nationals as the national champions with a final score of 2400-94X.
A SPECIAL MATCH
The Daisy BB Gun Nationals is the national championship of youth five-meter BB Gun competition. Teams of five youth shooters (plus two alternates), all ages eight to 15, must qualify for an invitation to this exclusive tournament by placing in the top three at their state matches, so all these kids can shoot. Every competitor shoots a Daisy Model 499B single-shot BB gun and takes 10 shots in each of four positions—standing, sitting, kneeling and prone—for a total of up to 10 points for each shot and 100 points in each position. Additionally, shooters must take a written safety and rules test that is worth 100 points, thus each competitor is shooting for a 500-point total score.
“I observed the competitors taking the test, most of which is taken from the NRA BB Gun rulebook,” NRA Board Member Edie Fleeman said. “The competitors have to fill in the answers on a ‘bubble sheet’ which is then scanned by the Orion system, just as all the targets are scored. The test was proctored by many adults and the kids were very well-behaved.”
Anyone who has ever attended or been a part of this competition will tell you that the match is just a part of what makes the Daisy BB Gun Nationals special. It’s often said that this event is more like a three-day party with a shooting competition thrown in. With three days devoted to the kids, there are fun contests, costumes, a barter bar when all the kids bring items from their home area and trade amongst themselves, plus Daisy’s massive amount of solid gear. The kids go crazy at the Opening and Closing Ceremonies (this year featuring a t-shirt cannon and more cool stuff), as well as at the free after-party held at the Rogers Aquatic Center waterpark.
“The kids remember this their whole lives,” Daisy’s Vice President of Marketing Andy Carroll said. “Yes, everyone competes, but it’s everything else that makes this event a yearly trip for many people across the country. For example, we have a team from Oregon, the Timber Beasts, who have attended every year for 20 years.”
MATCH RESULTS
This year’s Daisy BB Gun Nationals marked the debut of the Top Gun Shoot-Off, a new contest that for the first time gave competitors money for further education—$3,000 to the winner, $2,000 for second, $1,000 for third, $750 for fourth and the remaining six earning $500. At the end of the regular competition, the top 10 individual high aggregate scorers competed against each other in a 10-shot match fired in the standing position.
The champion of the inaugural Top Gun Shoot-Off was Carly Stover of the Penns Valley, Pennsylvania, team. In second place was Chase Perico of Wyandotte County 4-H (Kansas), and in third place was Taylor Slider from Montana’s Yellowstone Young Guns team.
Daisy presents the Paul T. Teifer Award each year, which is given to the teams with the highest combined score on the written test. This entire shooting program is built on a foundation of education and learning—before any team member ever touches a BB gun, he or she must spend at least 10 hours in a classroom setting learning gun safety and procedures. The Daisy BB Gun Nationals written test supports this continued education. This year, there was a tie for first place, with the Humboldt Sharpshooters and the Middletown Marksmen (Pennsylvania) both taking top honors to share the Paul T. Teifer award. In addition, the team from Walton County, Georgia, secured second place, while the Roberts County, South Dakota, team finished in third place.
“Daisy has always devoted a lot of effort in teaching gun safety,” Carroll said. “We developed a 10-lesson gun safety curriculum that was actually used in public schools back in the 1950s. Most of the teams use our curriculum to introduce young shooters to safety before they ever touch a BB gun.”
The Daisy BB Gun Nationals is designed to allow the maximum number of eligible youth to be exposed to shooting competition. If a youth shoots this year, he or she cannot compete as a team member for one year. However, they are still invited and compete in the Champions Match with others who were on a team the previous year. Likewise, the alternates have their own contest, and the top shooters in those matches are awarded medals and recognized on the podium during the Closing Ceremony.
Those who age-out of BB Gun often continue by participating in the Air Rifle Match, a 10-meter, three-position match with each competitor shooting Daisy’s 599 PCP air rifle. This year in the Air Rifle Match, the gold medalist was Makenna Quick from the Guns R Us team out of Carroll County, Georgia. Emma Allen of Appling County, Georgia, walked away with the silver medal, and the bronze medal went to Bethany Shirley from Walton County, Georgia.
In the Champions Match, the gold medal went to Ellie Pickin of the Rockingham Rockin’ Shots team from Virginia with a score of 481-18X. Taking silver was Stazy Sass from the Pierre Jr. Shooters team from South Dakota, and the bronze medal went to Clara Iverson of the Roberts County team, also from South Dakota.
In the Alternate Match, the gold medal went to Ella Iverson of Roberts County with a score of 480-20X. Silver went to Kendall Anderson of Humboldt, and the bronze medal went to Derek Manzow of the Tift Red team out of Tifton, Georgia.
While the Daisy BB Gun Nationals is a team event, individual team members are also recognized with medals. With a score of 492-21X, the Individual High Aggregate gold medal went to Taylor Slayder of the Yellowstone Young Guns. Silver was claimed by Clayton Weber of the Aces Youth Shooting Sports out of Madison, South Dakota, and bronze went to Carly Stover of Penns Valley.
In the main event—the national championship— winning the gold medal and the prestigious traveling National Champion trophy was Humboldt Sharpshooters from Hartford, South Dakota, with a score of 2400-94X. Humboldt is coached by Stuart Plucker, with team members Mausten Stelter, Elyk Swiden, Ema Dissing, Braylon Plucker and Sutton Plucker.
The Roberts County team from Rosholt, South Dakota, scored 2378-81X to claim the silver medal. Roberts County is coached by Heidi Pelzel, with team members Micah Pelzel, Riley Spatz, Izabell Ceroll, Kammi Pelzel and Grace Brandenburger.
Finally, the Yellowstone Young Guns secured the bronze medal with a score of 2366-71X. This team from Laurel, Montana, is coached by Matthew Slyder, with team members Taylor Slyder, Bridget Thomas, Sophia Schellig, Kash Werning and Zoey Kogelmann.
See the full results of the 2024 Daisy BB Gun Nationals at this link.
Learn more about the Daisy BB Gun Nationals at daisynationals.com.
Special thanks to NRA Board Member Edie Fleeman and Daisy Public Relations Director Lawrence Taylor for their help with this article.
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