Chairman of the Bang
By PJ DelHomme
The Union Sportsman’s Alliance chairman of the board explains why he loves breaking clays.
Team USA’s Vincent Hancock made history at the Paris Olympics this summer when he won his fourth Olympic gold medal in skeet shooting. He joined other athletes like Michael Phelps and Carl Lewis, who have also won the same event in four different Olympics. Not to be outdone, members of the Union Sportsmen’s Alliance (USA) know a little about busting clays, too, specifically sporting clays.
Compared to skeet and trap shooting, sporting clays offer the most realistic, “in-the-field” shooting experience. The courses are designed to simulate the hunting of ducks, pheasants, other upland birds, and even rabbits. You might be presented with a clay rolling across the ground and then a clay flying straight up. And that’s just one of the reasons Union Sportsmen’s Alliance chairman of the board and president emeritus of the United Union of Roofers, Waterproofers and Allied Workers, Kinsey Robinson loves it.
“I grew up hunting, and I was drawn to sporting clays because of its variety,” he says. “You might have 20 or 25 stations in one place. Then you go to another shooting venue, and they’re all different. And it’s a very social activity. Think of it as redneck golf.”
Kinsey’s maternal grandfather took him hunting at a young age. “He didn’t teach me as much about shooting as he did the enjoyment of hunting and hunting with the dogs. He taught me about why we hunt and that it isn’t all about the kill—just enjoy being out there.”
When not shooting clays at a USA event, you’ll find Kinsey and his wife Mona practicing at their local shooting club north of Washington, D.C. Mona didn’t hunt or shoot prior to meeting Kinsey, but it didn’t take long for her to excel at both. “Once she started, she never looked back,” Kinsey says.
Kinsey and Mona Robinson on an Alaska duck hunt.
The Robinsons make every effort to share their passion for shooting with others by attending tournaments and USA events across the country together. And they absolutely love getting youth involved.
“I’m really concerned about having young people experience the outdoors,” Kinsey says. “Mona and I have spent a lot of time over the last 20 years trying to get women and kids involved in shooting. The whole idea was to get kids from single-parent homes into shooting, so we started the kids’ shooting program at USA.”
The USA’s first Twin Cities Get Youth Outdoors Day was held in Clear Lake, Minnesota, in 2012 the day after the USA’s annual Roofers Twin Cities Sporting Clays Shoot to introduce youths to the shooting sports, including clays shooting, rifle shooting and archery. For more than a decade, Kinsey and Mona volunteered at the event, instructing youths at the clays station and helping many of them bust their very first clay.
Kinsey and Mona Robinson assisting a young boy at USA’s Twin Cities Get Youth Outdoors Day.
The Minnesota event eventually led to USA Get Youth Outdoors Day events in Tennessee, Texas, Kansas, Michigan and Maryland, and thousands of kids have learned gun safety and had the opportunity to shoot as a result.
If you’d like to get your kids or spouse into shooting, Kinsey suggests you think of it like taking them fishing.
“You don’t take them out for steelhead first. You take them somewhere they catch a shit pile of perch. It’s the same as shooting,” he says. “Take them where they can have fun and not shoot too much. And put them in a gun that makes sense. Don’t start kids and wives in small gauge guns because those guns are for experts. An over/under 20-gauge is not good because of the recoil. Put them in a 12-gauge or 20-gauge autoloader with an open choke. The worst thing to happen is they shoot, and they’re all black and blue.”
Perhaps Kinsey’s best piece of advice? “You’re probably better off if someone else teaches your wife instead of you.”
PJ DelHomme writes and edits content from western Montana. He runs Crazy Canyon Media and Crazy Canyon Journal.
