JACKSON, Miss. — Team Federal’s Derrick Mein has put a lot of miles on his shotgun case this year. He flew to Kazakhstan in May and came back with an ISSF World Cup silver in trap. In July he crossed the Atlantic and anchored the U.S. men’s team to gold at the World FITASC Championship in Lisbon. His most complete week of the fall, though, came a lot closer to home.
Mein, a two-time Olympian, won High Over All in both FITASC and Five-Stand at the 2026 NSCA South Central Regional Championship, held Sept. 29-Oct. 4 at Providence Hill Sporting Club. The regional drew 772 competitors over six days, and each of the events Mein won pulled a field of more than 400.
His Five-Stand score is the number that will get talked about. Mein broke 99x100, with only one target getting away from him across four rounds. In a game where every station runs its own menu of singles and pairs, that’s about as close to spotless as a championship week gets.
FITASC was a grind by comparison, as it usually is. Shot low gun from pegs set around 25-target layouts, the discipline rewards shooters who can read a fresh presentation fast, and winning scores tend to sit well below what you see on a Five-Stand leaderboard. Mein’s 94x100 topped a FITASC field of 414.
He nearly made it a hat trick. Mein’s 98x100 in the Sightline Preliminary was good for runner-up.
Mein spent the summer on world-championship ground, so his review of the Providence Hill layouts carries some weight.
“I think the location of this event is the premier sporting clays course in the world,” Mein said. “The place looked amazing, and the course was well set yet challenged my ability, forced me to pay attention and stay on top of my game.”
Providence Hill, a 1,250-acre private club on the west side of Jackson, has been here before. It hosted the South Central Regional in 2017, the first NSCA regional ever held in Mississippi, and again in 2019.
Mein’s sporting-clays shell of choice is Federal’s Gold Medal Paper target load, which pairs a paper hull with hard, high-antimony lead shot and a two-piece wad. He keeps his reasoning simple.
“I use paper shotshells because I feel they hold a dense pattern out to longer distances and help minimize recoil,” he said.
Between FITASC, Five-Stand and the Sightline Preliminary alone, Mein shot 300 registered targets.
Mein also had company on the FITASC podium. Thomas Jacobs, a friend who also shoots Federal Gold Medal shells, finished runner-up behind him, and the two posed together afterward with their FITASC plates. Fellow Federal shooter Cameron Hicks added a runner-up finish of his own in the Winchester/White Flyer Preliminary.
Mein, for his part, sounded like a man who has already circled next year’s date.
“This event and the competition certainly were fun, and I look forward to it every year,” he said.
Complete results from the 2026 NSCA South Central Regional Championship are available on Score Chaser.
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