SPOKANE, Wash — United States Army Sergeant First Class (Ret.) Eric Uptagrafft has devoted his life to his country. Spokane born and raised, Uptagrafft has twice represented America as an Olympic athlete. Far more importantly, he served with U.S. military forces in the war on terror as part of “Operation Enduring Freedom” in Afghanistan.

Uptagrafft is one of the premier competitive sports shooters of all-time, sharing the world record in his specialty, the 50-meter rifle prone competition. He competed for Team USA in both the 1996 Atlanta and 2012 London Summer Olympics in men’s small-bore rifle, prone, 50m. Uptagrafft has captured three gold medals in World Cup competition, as well.

The one-time aerospace engineer recalls first learning how to shoot as a Spokane youngster in an interview with pilkguns.com.

“I started in 1977 at Foresteen Junior Rifle Club, that’s in Spokane, Washington,” Uptagrafft said. “It was a CMP (Civilian Marksmanship Program) club, actually had pretty old roots, had a lot of state support, that kind of stuff.  (I was) 11. My dad and my uncle got me started out there.”

He mentioned how his uncle influenced his interest in shooting.

“My uncle is a high-power shooter, Al Ewing,” he said. “He won inter-service rifle back in ’63 in Quantico, Virginia.”

Uptagrafft was interested in all kinds of shooting, always eager to learn more about the sport.

“(Foresteen) was a small-bore club,” he said. “I kind of started out high power and small bore about the same time. I didn’t really get into high power too much until a year or two later.  It used to be small bore in the winter and high power in the summer.”

Today, Uptagrafft runs his own company in Alabama, working on the development and testing of a new .22 competition rimfire rifle action with his wife, Sandra. In a striking example of “all in the family,” Sandra is also an esteemed competitive shooter, having participated in the 2012 and 2020 Olympics in pistol shooting. She is the winner of four gold medals in the Summer Pan American Games from 1995 to 2019.

Such a unique matrimonial union may lead one to believe that never has there been such a couple of square shooters.

Boy, I aim to tell ya.

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