Wednesday, July 28, 1999
Hot shot!
Ed Masaki is the first person
By Al Chase
from Hawaii on the
U.S. Pistol team
Star-BulletinEd Masaki has medals from shooting competitions all around his workshop, and a slew of Aloha State Games medals hangs on brightly colored ribbons from two corners of a cardboard box.
He is a Triple Distinguished Shooter (.22-caliber rifle, high power rifle and .45-caliber pistol), belongs to the President's 100 Club and has been a member of the USA International Civilian Pistol Team numerous times.
But nothing compares to the pride and jubilation he felt when he qualified for the United States team that competed earlier this month in the Mayleigh Cup International Pistol Team Match.
The competition took place at Camp Perry, Ohio, on July 17, and Masaki was the first person from Hawaii to make the team. It is the highlight of the shooting career of the 66-year-old Kaimuki resident, which began when he was in ROTC at McKinley High School.
The Mayleigh Cup is open to any English-speaking nation and has been contested annually since 1947. Ten-man teams with two alternates compete with .22-caliber pistols. The match consists of three strings of 10 shots, slow fire at 50 meters on a 50-meter target.
Masaki was Mr. Consistent, scoring 87, 87, 87 for a total of 261. The U.S. team had scores ranging from 257 to 276 as it notched its sixth consecutive win.
"I wasn't nervous, but after the 30 rounds, it hit me," Masaki said. "What if I screwed up and let the team down?"
In most shooting competitions, the participants pair off and score each other's target, but not in the Mayleigh Cup. Only the judges touch the targets. Masaki's fears were unfounded when the judge checked the U.S. targets and announced the Americans had won.Masaki has competed in the National Matches every year except one since 1992. This year, there were 762 competitors and he finished second. Being in the top 15 only led to another round of shooting to determine the 10 members and two alternates for the U.S.
Yet being in that lofty position didn't faze Masaki.
"That never bother me because I thought I would be eliminated. I was shooting among the heavyweights in the United States," he said. "If anything, I might be an alternate. But when they brought the scores back, I was in the top five.
"Making the team is the highest achievement. I'll probably never do it again."
He was the only master shooter involved. The rest were high master shooters.
"You are standing and shoot with one hand. You cannot touch nothing. If your clothes so much as touch the bench you are disqualified. It's real rough. I was very fortunate," said Masaki, who practices three times a week.
A self-taught jeweler who hasn't quite retired, Masaki started modifying guns for competition about 15 years ago. He is well-known locally and on the mainland for the competition guns he has modified and derives a lot of pleasure from sharing his knowledge with other gunsmiths.
"The challenge is to make a gun that can shoot 50 yards like this," said Masaki, folding his thumb and index finger into a circle the size of a bull's-eye (about 1 inches across). You want to make it accurate and reliable for competition so you can put 10 bullets into the bull's-eye. You don't want a gun that jams."
The coordinator of the pistol competition in the Aloha State Games now can add self-taught gunsmith to his resume.
"It's having an eye for what goes where, what causes accuracy and what causes malfunction," he said.
Ruby Fox, a shooter for the U.S. Army Reserve team, was the top female shooter at this year's National Matches using a gun modified by Masaki.
After the competition, her husband said they were sending all of Ruby's guns to Masaki to be retooled.
"I've had a good life and thank the Lord for what he gave me," Masaki said.
Career Highlights
1951 - Earned first part of Triple Distinguished Shooter, his senior year at McKinley, with a 22 caliber rifle on 50-foot range targets.
Note: A Triple Distinguished Shooter has to place within the top 10 percent of competitors
