The 10th Pyramyd Air Cup is in the books, and the 2026 edition of the event saw more competitors than ever before! North of 240 individuals descended upon Marengo, Ohio for 100 yard Benchrest, Field Target and our Gunslynger speed silhouette competitions. The Field Target portion of the Cup has been the largest match in the US for many years now, and quickly sold out (max of 120 shooters) about a week after entries opened. Benchrest grew from 2025 by nearly 30 competitors, with 180+ shooters in attendance. Additionally, our Gunslynger PCP bracket was our biggest ever with 73 shooters squaring off in head-to-head speed silhouette. Some incredible milestones for the event, which also means some incredible performances were needed to finish at the top.
Before we talk about those performances, I want to highlight some of the people that make this event run so well. First, Cardinal Shooting Center has been an instrumental partner that has been very helpful to us over the years. Their fantastic facilities have allowed us to have ample space for the competitions, vendors, and the public. To all of the manufacturers, suppliers and vendors that sponsor and show up to the event to interact with the competitors and public, we thank you. Your continued support of both the event, and Pyramyd AIR as a company has been a massive contributor to the successes we have enjoyed over the years. To the competitors, whether this was your first Cup, or you’ve been with us for all 10 (believe it or not there are more than a few that have), we cannot thank you enough for the support and making the choice to spend your time and hard earned dollars with us. Last, but certainly not least, I want to thank all of our incredible staff that sacrifices time with their families and their day-to-day work responsibilities to help make the Cup run. For me, this event has always been a passion project and a great way to give back to a community and industry that has given me so much. While I know many of our staff members feel the same, I know that perspective is not shared across the board, and that is okay. You still continue to show up and support the event, the competitors, the sponsors, and our company. For that, you all have my gratitude and thanks.
I will try to keep this report a bit more brief than in years past, but I will do my best to cover the highlights by event.
100 Yard Benchrest
With last year’s two card final being such a big hit and so well received, we saw no reason to change our format from last year. This meant that each competitor would shoot two cards to qualify for the finals, and two cards for the final itself. Competitors drew their bench assignments on Wednesday afternoon during check-in. Based on the total number of attendees, we were nearly full. Our max capacity for 4 heats of bench is 192 shooters. When all was said and done, there were over 180 shooters. Because of the way the bench draw worked out, 10 shooters would qualify for the finals out of group 1, and 12 shooters from each of the other 3 groups would qualify. This amounted to a 46 shooter final, where it’s important to remember that we award the top 10 finishers with cash prizes.
Thursday morning, competitors shot their first card. I would say that the wind was fairly light in the morning for groups 1 and 2, and began to pick up steadily through the day. Friday was definitely a bit windier, as storms were rolling through the area. We even saw a little bit of rain around 11am, which I am certain had an impact on some of the shooters. But looking at the top scores from each group, scores were very solid. In group 1, Jude and Adam Gardner both shot their Skout rifles into the top two spots, shooting 465 with 13x’s for Jude and 11x’s for Adam. In group 2, Jonathan Hermann posted a huge 471 with 14x’s to qualify for the finals. His qualifying score was the highest among all competitors. Out of group 3, Amado Delgado finished a whopping 8 points ahead of his nearest competition, posting a 467 with 13x’s. In group 4, two past champions qualified 1 and 2. Bill Squillace shot a 468 17x to earn the top spot, and Nikolai Boldov posted a 463 12x to take second.
We were fortunate that LongShot Camera’s were in attendance again, and running their custom camera setup to provide both competitors and spectators real time feeds of each target. This is an incredible tool for shooters and our scoring team. We were able to watch crossfire’s happen in real time in a few instances and competitors were able to point to exact shots they had or hadn’t taken, simply by pulling the target up on their personal device. Beyond that, the interface allows shooters to track which bulls they’ve shot at, and which ones they haven’t. It’s an amazingly well thought out system that we are really happy to have at the Cup, and we hope LongShot will continue to support the event with this setup.
The finals take place on Saturday morning, and the conditions were definitely windier than 2025 from what I remember. This is very likely due to storms that came through during the evening/early morning and were still lingering a bit. The sky was overcast, and it looked like a lot of the wind was doing a lot of shifting. Not necessarily very strong, but tricky, particularly for the first card. It strengthened during the second card, and the shooters that managed the conditions best certainly performed well. Scores were actually quite similar between 2025 and this year, ultimately with Thayne Simmons and Henry Leonidas Tejeda both shooting 469s. What separated them was X count. Thayne shot 16x’s and Henry shot 12x’s. Congratulations to Thayne on another well earned victory with his Karma Red Panda.
Gunslynger
After the first day of Bench concluded, we quickly transitioned over to our Gunslynger Speed Silhouette event. This is the best spectator event at the Cup, and maybe in all of airgunning. 4 sets of 5, 1/10th scale silhouettes (20 targets total) lay before each competitor. These targets are made right here in Ohio, by RX Target Systems and have worked flawlessly for us for many years now. Draws are randomly assigned and each shooter goes head-to-head with the winner moving into the next round until a champion is crowned.
We start each year with the spring guns, since they take a little longer and we cap each round at 6 minutes. Nathan Thomas quickly established himself as a top contender, beating 2025 Champion Ryan Spanagel in the second round. He was on a collision course with Nic Gregoris in the semi-finals, with Nic winning his first two rounds in 4 minutes each. On the other side of the draw, Dan Putz and Jeff Swartz proved to be the best, and rounded out the semi-finals. Ultimately Jeff bested Dan, moving him into the final. And Nic took out Nathan to move into the finals himself. Nathan faced off against Dan for 3rd place, which carries a $500 prize. He must have had something to prove, because he finished his 20 silhouettes in just 2 minutes and 40 seconds. I cannot say for certain, but that may be some kind of a record, and was definitely the fastest time we saw. Turning our attention to the finals, Nic showed why he has been one of the top speed shooters around for many years, taking Jeff out in 4 minutes and 17 seconds. A great showing for our top three finishers.
The PCP bracket was MUCH bigger! Both physically, and in terms of the number of shooters. Over 70 competitors made this our largest bracket to date, and also meant it was going to take a little time to whittle our way down to the championship match. What kept things moving steadily though was a wave of semi-auto rifles like the Karma SLS and Skout Semi, that had shooters blazing through all 20 targets, sometimes as fast as 30 seconds! Don’t forget, this includes loading the first magazine into the gun AND a mag change because we only allow the first mag to contain 10 rounds. What was interesting to me as an outside observer though, was how well the side-lever shooters were able to hang with the faster semi-auto guns. This is largely due to the smaller size of the targets. 1/10 scale silhouettes measure just over 1.25” across for the chickens (10 yards) and about 3.25” across for the rams. This means shooters cannot just spray-and-pray but actually have to slow down and aim in order to efficiently hit their targets. Add in a bit of wind, and things get very interesting, very quickly.
In the top left quadrant, Nic Gregoris, fresh off his Springer victory, made it three rounds into the quarter-finals where he would face-off against Tom Adams. Both shooters running side-lever actions. In the bottom left quadrant, two shooters running Karma SLS rifles made it to the quarters. Thayne Simmons, toppled side-lever speedster Caleb Dickenson on his way there, while PJ Clarke dropped the hammer on a few tough opponents of his own. On the other side of the draw, Barb Pellegrino topped close friend and typical speed contender Lauren Parsons in the biggest upset of the draw on her way to the quarters where she would square off against Skout Semi shooter Jeremy Pepin. Adam Migel steadily made his way through the bottom right quadrant with his Skout Semi. The former Gunslynger PCP champ faced off against Matt Younkin in his quarterfinal match, also shooting a Skout Semi.
Tom Adams ultimately took out Nic Gregoris, running his Daystate Red Wolf into the semi-final match where he would face off against Thayne Simmons and his Karma SLS. On the other side, Jeremy Pepin ended up victorious in his clash with Barb Pellegrino, cementing his spot in the last four. And unsurprisingly, Adam Migel defeated his fellow Semi shooter to round out the semi-finals. With thoughts of a place in the final and a shot at $1500 on the line, tensions were high. Tom and Thayne run two contrasting setups, a bolt gun against a semi-auto. In a fantastic first semi-final, Thayne mowed down the 20 targets with great speed and secured his spot in the final. Adam Migel did the same, knocking Pepin into the third place match. Pepin and Adams quickly reset, and in what may be a changing of the guard, the semi-auto Skout Semi carried Jeremy Pepin to a third place finish. Not to be outdone, Adam Migel ran his own Skout Semi to victory lane against Thayne Simmons and his Karma SLS. Securing another Gunslynger PCP crown, and a $1500 prize. Does this mean it’s time for a semi-auto division of Gunslynger PCP? Time will tell.
Field Target
The field target portion of the Cup filled up in just about a week, and with 120 competitors signed up, it takes a fair bit of time to shoot the event. We set out to design two challenging courses that would test top shooters, but also give new shooters some success and encouragement to continue to pursue FT glory after the Cup concludes. Both courses featured 30 targets, with each competitor shooting each target twice, bringing the total number of shots to 120 for two days.
Our yellow course featured 16/30 targets over 40 yards, 11 of those were over 45 yards. With distance comes two unique challenges, the targets become harder to range, and the environment has more time to act upon your pellet (read that as wind). The Troyer for the yellow course was 34.03T, making it the hardest course we have ever set for the Cup at Cardinal. The blue course was not far off though, with 18 targets over 40 yards, and 12 over 45. The Troyer rating was just below the yellow course, at a 34.01T. Now what the numbers don’t tell you is that the wind in our field section of the course whips around in ways that mystify even the best shooters. And the shadows created by the thick tree canopy make ranging targets an extra difficult challenge, particularly for those targets that are painted black. These challenges ultimately were compounded by temperatures in the high 80s, and humidity that made you sweat while standing still.
With all of that, we still saw some incredible day one scores. Barb Pellegrino posted a 57 on the blue course, building a commanding lead with her closest competition 3 shots behind. Owning a 3 shot lead of his own, was Greg Shirhall in Hunter Piston, finishing with a 43 on the yellow course. Things were much tighter in WFTF PCP, with Greg Sauve clinging to a single shot lead (54) over Lauren Parsons and Doug Vinson (53). In WFTF Piston, John Cerne posted a stellar 53, which gave him a massive 5 shot lead heading into the second day. And in Open PCP, Brian VanLiew held a two shot lead, finishing on 54.
The second day saw temps a little lower and an overcast sky as things kicked off. Eventually, that cloud cover faded, and the sun began to illuminate things in the woods. This creates some tricky shadowing that I mentioned earlier. The winds were mild, but picked up as the day progressed. I was down on the far end of the course all day, and there were no major issues or stoppages to speak of, which is a Match Directors dream. With a few lanes remaining, I caught word that Greg Sauve was still clean, meaning he had yet to miss a shot. Cleaning or clearing a course is a real rarity in Field Target, particularly at Grand Prix events like the Cup. There are few who have achieved such a feat, especially at this level. I have witnessed two such instances at the Cup before. The first was multi-time World Champion Jack Harris, back in 2019. The second was two-time Hunter PCP National Champion, Bill Rabbitt in 2023. Frankly, I did not even consider that this would happen this year with the increased course difficulty. Greg had other plans.
I was fortunate enough to catch Greg’s last two lanes of the day, which he masterfully cleared despite the wind and darkness working against him. While Greg has been away from WFTF style shooting for almost two years, it appears he has been doing plenty of practice and is still sharp as ever, gracing us with a perfect 60/60 on day two. His 114/120 proved to be the overall high score for the event. He was followed by Doug Vinson on 107 and Lauren Parsons on 104. In Hunter PCP, Barb Pellegrino posted a day two 55, to total out at 112/120 and take the title. Caleb Dickenson managed a 103/120 for second place. And in third, the winner of a shoot-off, Jeff Swartz just one point behind overall, on 102.
In Hunter Piston, Greg Shirhall built upon his lead with a day two 39. His two day total of 82 was 10 points better than second place Tony Pellegrino. Tony had an 11 point lead over 3rd, which was Carl Forrey on 61/120. In WFTF Piston, John Cerne held his nerve and his lead to finish 4 shots better than Ken Hughes, with a 103/120. Ken posted a 99, and Leo Gonzales was 7 behind with a 92. All three shooters ran Air Arms TX200’s. Last but certainly not least, was Brian VanLiew in Open PCP, who finished with a 110/120. He bested Keith Walters by 6 shots. In third, was Joe Garland, who took third by way of a shoot-off, and finished on a 92.
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As has become customary, we concluded the event at our banquet, which started off under some strong rain and wind before things cleared to give us a beautiful sunset and rainbow backdrop. I suppose that is the most fitting way to end a fantastic week, where we fended off the threats of bad weather with nothing but hope and luck. Awards were given, applause and praise was heaped upon the winners, and we handed out a silly amount of raffle items. Hunt Chef catered with fantastic barbeque that was enjoyed by all. Overall, the 2026 Cup was not only the biggest, but maybe the best one yet.
Again, thank you once more to our fantastic sponsors for their support, our staff who worked tirelessly to ensure the event ran smoothly, and to all of you competitors for choosing to spend your time with us. I hope you enjoyed yourselves, and we look forward to having you back next year for the 2027 Cup.
Tyler Patner
– Match Director