FORT CHAFFE (KFSM) -- An international competition at Fort Chaffee is testing the skills of snipers from all over the world.
The 24 teams are competing in the 45th Winston P. Wilson Sniper Championship and the 25th Armed Forces Skill at Arms Meeting.
Sniper instructor Aaron Pierce said the competition might be more mentally demanding than physically, and the competitors were fairly exhausted on Tuesday (April 19), the fourth day of the competition.
"They are short on sleep, a little sleep deprivation, and the pace of the competition is high,” Pierce said.
Sgt. Ben Holley with the Arkansas National Guard did not have to travel far to get to Fort Chaffee, but some competitors are here from as far as Canada and Denmark.
And Holley said that is all a part of the experience: learning from everyone else.
“The bullet flies the same way, but everyone has a different way of making it do that so it's good to see that we're learning a lot from the other guys,” he said.
Tim Grover and Taylor Middlebrooks with the Iowa National Guard said they are also seeing gear they haven’t seen before.
"We get to mess with some of the newest gear out there,” Grover said.
And even though they are sharing information and gear with each other, everyone still wants to win.
“There’s a big conciseness that everybody thinks they're doing poorly, when they don't realize that everybody else is struggling too,” Pierce said.
According to a news release from the National Guard Marksmanship Training Center, snipers from the active Army, Marine Corps and National Guard are competing.
The snipers are competing in 19 matches and events during the five-day championship.
The competition ends on Thursday (April 21), with an awards ceremony.