Courtesy photo Ryan Beck, a Northern Bedford graduate, has gained national recognition in Pro Series Precision Rifle Shooting.

It has been said that an individual can often succeed in any endeavor for which he or she possesses unlimited enthusiasm.

Ryan Beck, 36, a resident of the small village of Henrietta near Martinsburg, has been proving that adage true in the sport of competitive long-range rifle shooting.

“I really got hooked,” Beck, a 2007 graduate of Northern Bedford Community High School, said of his love of rifle shooting. “It’s been a huge passion for me. I like competing, and there is nothing in this world that I would rather do than to shoot long-range with a rifle.”

Beck has parlayed his passion for shooting into achieving national recognition in the sport. After placing eighth among the nation’s 232 top shooting finalists in the Pro Series Precision Rifle Shooting (PRS) finale in Mountain Home, Idaho Nov. 2-3, Beck finished the 2024 season tied for fifth place in the national points standings.

Beck has been competing in the sport for the past seven years, including the past four at the professional level. His many, many hours of hard work, preparation, and practice all went into achieving national distinction this year.

“I’ve been doing this for seven years and I’ve made a lot of sacrifices,” Beck — who is employed as a mechanical engineer with the Concurrent Technologies corporation in Richland, Pa., a company that makes small arms ammunition and other products for the United States military — said of his participation in long-range rifle shooting. “I’ve had a lot of time practicing, making sure my rifle is dialed in, making my own rifle (a custom-built six-millimeter Creedmoor bolt action rifle with scope), and loading my own ammunition.

“It’s been years in the making for me to get to this point, and I was super pumped to shoot that well in the finale,” added Beck, who earned $2,000 for his fifth-place finish in the 2024 PRS national points race this past season, which began in January and concluded with the November national finale in Idaho. “It seems almost surreal.”

There are a variety of different shooting skills that are required for success at the PRS national finale, which was held at an outdoor facility in Idaho that required competitors to shoot at different types of steel targets from different distances and from different vantage points — with the competitor being required to shoot from disparate spots like rock piles, tree branches, and fence posts, rather than being prone on a shooter’s bench.

Shooters typically fire 10 to 12 shots each in events known as stages, with only one minute and 45 seconds allotted to each shooter for each stage, and the shooters are also required to quickly adjust the scopes on their rifles for the various distances from which the targets are positioned at each stage. There are 10 stages of competition on both of the two days, and shooters could accumulate a maximum of 212 points in the finale, which was won by Georgia resident Ben Gossett, who scored 200 points. Beck logged a score of 190 points.

Gossett also finished first in the PRS national points standings with a cumulative score of 497.222 points, while Beck was fifth with a cumulative score of 488.333. The national points standings are determined by each shooter’s best three scores at competitions throughout the year, in addition to the scores that they achieve at the finale event.

Beck said that the variety of skills required for each shooter at the national finale make the competition extremely challenging. Adverse weather conditions like the wind, rain and sleet that presented itself in Idaho this year make the competition even more difficult for the participants.

“I think the most important thing is to have 100 percent mental focus,” said Beck, who is married (wife Emily). “The whole competition is probably 75 percent mental and 25 percent physical because of the fact that you get only one minute and 45 seconds in each stage to shoot at the targets, and that each stage is different.

“The matches are becoming more and more competitive, and they’re getting won or lost by one shot,” added Beck, who made his fourth appearance in a national finale event this year and noted that the 2025 national finale will be held in the northeast Pennsylvania town of Fremont, which will make traveling to it much easier for him.

Beck’s good friend and precision rifle shooting colleague, Chance Norris of Lancaster, said that he has known Beck for four years. Norris said that not only has Beck helped him to get indoctrinated into the sport of precision rifle shooting, but that Beck — an expert gunsmith — also built Norris a rifle to use in the competitions.

“He’s a phenomenal shooter, a great guy, and a great gunsmith,” Norris said of Beck. “He’s very determined, focused, and detail-oriented with the tasks that are put in front of him, and he’s really good at analyzing what needs to happen quickly in the competitions, and executing it very well.

“He’s been a great help for me in improving my shooting over the past several years,” added Norris, who qualified for the PRS national finale himself but did not attend the event.

Beck has always been around guns. As a youth, he hunted with his father, Bill. Later in life, he took up competitive target shooting with a semi-automatic rifle, a pistol, and a shotgun.

This year’s PRS national finale was Beck’s best competitive experience in the sport ever.”I literally got chills when I finished the match and found out how well that I did,” Beck said. “There are a lot more shooters who are getting into it, and a lot more shooters who are upping their game and becoming better. It’s getting harder and harder to win a match.”