Photo by Jake Olson: The Fairmont trap team fires its shots during its latest competition this past Wednesday at the Fairmont Trap Club in Granada.

GRANADA – It’s crunch time for the Fairmont High School trap team. With just a handful of regular-season competitions remaining, head coach Rich Wolf knows his group has to keep progressing ahead of the 2026 Minnesota Trap Shooting Championships, a state qualifying competition that runs from June 15 to June 23 at the Alexandria Shooting Park.

Fairmont, which groups together athletes from Blue Earth and Granada, currently sits behind Buffalo (21,359.50) and Melrose (18.136) in the Class 7A, Conference 2 overall standings through Week 3. The Cardinals’ 16.898 total team points place narrowly ahead of Minneota’s by less than 200.

Totino-Grace (14,800), Albany (8,898.50), Kerkhoven-Murdock-Sunburg (8,197) and St. Peter (6,333.50) round out the rest of the standings, respectively.

“Right now we sit in third place, part of the reason is that we’ve been shooting on some real windy nights,” Wolf said. “But we are doing all right. I want to say I’m cautious yet, but still feel good for where we are as a team.”

The Cardinals have a handful of top shooters who have been having solid seasons, with five individuals appearing across the latest conference top-25 standings.

Brock Rodning sits at the highest spot for Fairmont, placing 15th with his season average of 23. John Carr’s 22.67 is tied for 19th with the likes of Colin Gutridge from Buffalo and Minneota’s Jents Knutson.

Cole Nawrocki, Gavin Owen and Wyatt Survis round out the list with their 22.50 average, even with Kerkhoven-Murdock-Sunburg’s Tucker Wilts for 22nd. Wolf believes he could see a few of these athletes make the boys’ individual portion of the Minnesota State High School Clay Target League State Tournament, which requires participants to be in the top 100 rankings statewide.

“I think I have a few kids who can make the individual part of it, but they are going to have to step it up the next couple of nights, just to bring their average up a little bit,” Wolf said. “To make the top 100 as an individual, you can only drop maybe three or four targets all year. You have to be pretty good.”

But the main goal is to accomplish success in Alexandria at a team level. The state tournament at Prior Lake takes place late that week on Friday, June 26th. Teams must place in the top three of their respective class to qualify. The highest-scoring teams from the next 13 teams also earn a bid, bringing the total to 40 teams that have a chance to compete at the biggest stage. Wolf’s goal is to get back to that top spot, a place where past Fairmont teams have seen much success.

“Our big push is to be able to shoot on Friday at Prior Lake. That’s our main goal,” Wolf said. “We’ve been there many times before, and have actually taken second at state two years ago. So we have the kids and the talent to put this all together. Just got to have the right day. They all have to get it together at once.”

Fairmont will have its week five competition next Wednesday at the Fairmont Trap Club in Granada.