What is InterShoot?
InterShoot is an annual international shooting competition for Air Pistol and Air Rifle, held in The Hague, the Netherlands.
It provides an ideal training opportunity for all competitors as they can shoot three full matches during the three day tournament.
Competition is open to women shooters, both juniors and seniors for a 60 shot match and men, also both juniors and seniors for a 60 shot match. All matches are shot according to ISSF rules.
The first InterShoot match took place in 1976 and has been taking place annually. Typically the match takes place early February.
The roots of InterShoot
The roots of InterShoot go back to 1976. Stek Geerts, one of the leading promoters of the shooting sport in general and vice-chairman of the—at the time—shooting club Oranje Nassau in The Hague, was looking for an opportunity to enable his pupils to compete at an international level. With some friends from abroad he organised the first InterShoot, that was held in the SV Zoetermeer accommodation (although we recently discovered that there was a very early version of what now is InterShoot, held in 1976 at the "Achates" shooting club in Scheveningen).
Things ran out of hand rapidly and soon SV Zoetermeer became too small and InterShoot was moved to ‘de Houtzagerij’ sporting centre in the center of Den Haag.
When a major refurbishing program got underway to renovate ‘de Houtzagerij’, InterShoot moved to the Ockenburgh sporting centre, where it still has it’s happy home.
With the exception of 1983, 2021 and 2022 the competition has been held annually.
In 1983 the—very small—team was too busy organising the European Championships that was also held in The Hague. That the team has matured over time was proven in 1999 when both the InterShoot competition and the European Championship was run by the same team within a 5 week timeframe. The InterShoot team also had some major involvement in the running of the European Championships in 1990, 1999 and 2015, which were held in the Papendal Sporting Center at Arnhem.
In 2021 and 2022 InterShoot had to be cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The competition always has had an informal character, which is why many people love to come to Den Haag and InterShoot. The competition is run entirely by volunteers—many of whom have been part of the team for many years. When Stek Geerts died in 1988 the team dedicated its effort to keeping the competition alive in memory of Stek—so far with great success. The ‘InterShoot Foundation’ was formed and still organises the competition to date.
Stek Geerts