Ireland's William Tell: Fairclough takes dead aim at Athens, then LA

Jack Fairclough has gone from discovering skeet shooting at his birthday party to being on the brink of qualification for the Olympic Games. 

IN HIS SIGHTS: Shooter Jack Fairclough: 'I was just a bit of a nerd back in the day. I just played a lot of video games and the hand-eye coordination just naturally helped.' Pic: David Fitzgerald/Sportsfile

You may hear Jack Fairclough before you see him. Well, not him per se. More so the 12-gauge Beretta DT11 shotgun with customised Ergosign stock that he hopes will see him through to the next Olympic Games, in Los Angeles.

Is it a bang, a crack, or a pop? It’s definitely loud and the sound reverberates around the Courtlough Shooting Range in North Dublin as the 28-year-old calls ‘pull’ and trains that long barrel on the orange clay discs as they whizz across his radar from right and left.

A grass mound visible to one side is heavily dusted with their remains. Shards mixed with orange dust. The Beretta snaps open after each retort, the Fiocchi cartridge shells ejected and chucked into a growing pile beside him.

It is methodical, exact and immediately gripping.

This is Olympic skeet shooting and the targets - sometimes one, at other times two - fly from two towers at a speed of roughly 65 miles an hour. For five rounds of 25 shots apiece. That’s 125 pulls of the trigger in total and Fairclough holds the Irish record with a 123.

This is world-class, Olympic medal territory. The trick is to do it time after time.

“I'm naturally going to say it's hard, but if you put the work in you'll definitely see the results,” he says, “and it's a really rewarding sport to be in because you can definitely see a direct translation between time and effort to results out on the range.” 

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Fairclough was in his mid-teens when the sport entered his sights. His mum and dad were debating what sort of birthday party they would organise for him and his friends. The choice got boiled down to go-karting or a nearby shooting range.

“So obviously I made the least financially viable decision and career choices,” he laughs. “I did it for my birthday and I was absolutely hooked and just knew immediately after that first session that this was something I really wanted to pursue.

“The 2012 Olympics was on roughly around the same time and being able to see something that I found such an interest in, being able to watch the Olympics and know that there's a route to compete at this level, was all a part of it.” 

It was one thing being hooked. The fact he took to it like a duck to water was the real clincher. The people at Manchester Clay Pigeon Club knew talent when they saw it. A standout on day one, he was very quickly hurried along the Team GB pathway.

Mum Allison knew this was serious when he stuck at the mandatory eight-week gun awareness course run by the Greater Manchester Police, and during which his abilities stood out to officers who, you would imagine, knew a thing or two about handling firearms.

It wasn’t long before he was the highest-ranked junior skeet shooter in the country, but ask him now why he was good so soon and the explanation will ring a bell with anyone who, like him, played Call of Duty, Wii Sports, or Mario Kart.

“Yeah, the truthful answer, I was just a bit of a nerd back in the day. I just played a lot of video games and the hand-eye coordination just naturally helped.” 

Raw talent and dexterous digits only count for so much. Fairclough would love to be one of those people whose shot technique has stayed the same since he was a kid. Instead, he is constantly evolving while maintaining a solid foundation.

How he acquires the target hasn’t changed. The pre-shot routine is the same now as it was ten years ago. The big difference is that he is a lot more forgiving of himself in some of the technical aspects, something he says comes from coaching Ireland’s juniors.

“Now, there is a much bigger focus on visuals and the lock onto the target.” The Beretta isn’t as heavy as it looks, and the kickback wouldn’t bruise your shoulder or cause a backward step as long as it is handled properly, but the mental challenge of shooting in competition over either two or three days is at least half of this battle.

There isn’t any secret sauce, just a mix of acceptance commitment therapy (ACT) and cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) to help train his mind and his muscles into a routine that stands to him day in and day out.

Key to it is staying aggressive out there.

“If you go in trying to protect the score, or think about the score, you tend to be more defensive and slow down. We shoot our targets in 0.73 seconds so we really don’t have that time or freedom to step off the gas. It’s gotta be instant.” 

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Courtlough was the ground established by Richard Flynn after he competed for Ireland in the trap shoot at the 1976 Games in Montreal. It’s one of just a handful of grounds here that is suitable for Olympic trap or skeet, but that’s the elite level.

There are almost 1,000 gun clubs in Ireland and over 24,000 members.

Fairclough divides his time between the ranges at Courtlough, another 20 minutes down the road in Lispopple, and the National Shooting Range in Esker just south of Athlone. That’s in Ireland. Eaton Hill in Uttoxeter is his go-to when across the water.

The family's Irish connection is strong and is strengthened by his mum Allison, whose support has segued from unwitting instigator back in the day and into the role as High-Performance director for the Irish Clay Target Shooting Association.

Generations of her family hailed from Co. Down and her parents retired to Bray when the kids fled the nest. Allison has a sister living there now, another in Belfast and, with her husband, their own place in Wexford to where they have gravitated for 25 years.

“All my family is Irish and I have always felt a strong tie to Ireland,” says Jack whose first shoot in a green vest came at the World Cup in Morocco in January of 2023. “I knew deep down at some point that I wanted to represent Ireland.

“I had also reached my natural progression with GB and I knew the team in Ireland were putting in really good procedures and pathways. The more I heard about it the more I knew I just wanted to be a part of this team.” 

Next up are the World Championships in Athens this week but LA is the over-arching goal. The qualification details are a confusing labyrinth, but he could make it via a quota place or a wild card. The simple fact is that he needs to keep shooting 122 and over at the big events.

This year has been a huge step in that direction.

Davie Christie was the holder of the ISSF Olympic Skeet Irish record with the 120 he shot at a World Cup in 2014. Fairclough bettered that with a 122 in Nicosia in May this year, and then went one better at the European Championships in France in July.

That latter score was set at Châteauroux, the same venue three hours south of Paris that played host to the 2024 shooting programme at the 2024 Olympics. Setting the record at an Olympic venue made it that bit extra special. Now for 2028.

“It would just be a dream come true. It’s something I think about nearly every day and something I am desperate for. It’s something that I know if I keep working how I am working then it’s something I can definitely achieve.”