October Dundee IPSC Match Videos

On Saturday, the Croc Dundee club in Dundee, Oregon -- also known as the Chehalem Valley Sportsman's Club (CVSC) of the Columbia Cascade Section of USPSA -- presented their regularly scheduled club match. This was also the monthly Points Match, which means that scores are recorded for the annual CCS Points Race. At the end of the competitive year, the competitors with the highest scores (percentage points in each Points Match) in each Division/Class are offered the Section's allotment of entry slots to the USPSA National,

Because these Points Matches are the most important matches in each month, special care is taken to ensure that the highest quality of stage design, construction and match administration are adhered to. Nobody gets a 'gimme' hit; if there is a question about any hit, the overlays come out and everyone puts their nose to the target to determine if it's in, or if it's out.

We had twelve competitors in our squad, including two young men who were shooting in what turned out to be their second IPSC match, ever. (They did a fine job, and we'll welcome Jason and Steve to come back and shoot with us anytime.)

I took the opportunity to film a few shooters, and will present here some small (1mb or 2mb, max) videos. Of course, I only filmed the more experienced competitors, and many of the film clips show flaws either minor (hesitation over calling a shot) to medium (miscounting rounds, leading to a standing reload).

One competitor took a nose-dive in the gravel during the "Steel Blues" stage. He was advancing very aggressively to a shooting position, misjudged his traction in the surface, skidding into and tripping over a shooting box. He sprawled and slid some more, taking most of the abrasion on his weak-hand and his strong-hand forearm. We all remarked on what an admirable job he did in keeping the muzzle downrange and the gun out of the dirt. When he realized that nobody was going to stop him, he bounced up and finished the stage in 19 seconds total. (I took over 20 seconds, shooting too conservatively and making up too many missed shots on the steel.) He was almost as disappointed that nobody had a camera running as he was that he couldn't talk anybody into giving him a reshoot for "Range Equipment Failure".

I was disappointed, too, because it would have made an excellent video clip. But I was VERY happy that he had no injuries other than some minor abrasion (didn't even draw blood) and he handled the gun so professionally that no DQ conditions were extent, nobody was in any danger at any time.

If he hadn't fallen, he would have had at least one of the top 3 scores in the match. Sometimes, I think IPSC almost qualifies as an "XTreme Sport".

Moving on to The Main Attraction: Click on the thumbnails to download the WMV files.

Our first clip was taken during the Classifier Stage. On CM99-18 (High Standards), a 24-round Virginia Count stage, there are three full-face IPSC targets which are engaged in two strings.
First String: Starting at the 15-yard line, engage each with 2 rounds free-style, reload, engage each with 2 rounds strong hand only.
Second String: Starting at the 7-yard line, engage each target with 2 rounds free-style, reload, engage each with 2 rounds weak hand only.

There are two key moments in this stage: reloading, and weak-hand shooting. The problem with weak-hand shooting isn't just how well you can shoot left-handed (for example), but also how quickly you can transfer your pistol to your weak hand.

Here's one shooter on his second string, who not only bobbled the reload slightly, but as a consequence had some trouble with the transfer. He was NOT happy with his time for that string. (Turn your volume up when you watch CLASSIFIER BLUES!)



The next star is Jerry the Geek, "Bobbing for Alphas". It's too bad that some people just can't call their shots with any confidence.

Also Bobbing for Alphas is Nick, shooting his first match in Open Division. He's been shooting Limited 10 since Cooper was a D-shooter, but he thought he would try sharing the Open Glock in Major-9 with his son, Ryan. Ryan knows how many rounds he has in the magazine; Nick thought it was impossible to run dry. Hard lesson to learn.

Down in the Rifle Pits, SWMBO had "No Misses" in the CAR WARS stage.

Nick recovered nicely, did everything exactly right, and made it look easy.

We then moved up to the Croc Bay and watched The Geek embarass himself on "Steel Blues". (This is the stage where Nick slid into the final shooting position . . . and beat The Geek anyway!)

Finally, Big Dog shows us just how awkward it is to shoot far targets with a lot of hard-cover obscuring the majority of the target face. Also, he demonstrates how easy it is even for competitors who always shoot hi-capacity magazines to lose track of round-count.

We really enjoyed this match, and Match Director BARSOOM did a great job of making sure everything was just right, even up to and especially including the weather. (More on that in a subsequent post.)