I take three points from this brief exchange:
- "Those guys look awful close to the targets! I have to sit or stand 200 yards away and don't even get to use a scope. ;-( If you were that close, how much back-spatter would you get on you?" Translation: IPSC looks scarey, and you could get hurt, and how hard can it be when you are so close to the targets?
- "I shot IPSC once, then switched to IDPA. At least there I can compete with a stock Springfield XD without getting smashed by guys with 6" race 1911's." Translation: IPSC is Elitist.
- "Man, that looks like a blast. Never shot that way before..." Translation: "Man, that looks like a blast. Never shot that way before..."
I'm not sure that we can ever recover the acceptance of these people, and that's saddening. They like to shoot, but they will likely not be receptive to any kind of recruitment to IPSC competition unless they meet someone who competes in IPSC and who they trust.
I think that means that we must all make positive efforts to meet and make friends with people who are involved in other shooting sports. We may not recruit them to IPSC competition, but at least we can present to them the comcept that we are no different from them, we just have different but similar interests.
Person #3, however, seems to have an open mind about shooting competition. I've visited his blogspot, and perhaps I'm biased in his favor because he likes to write (and writes well), and he likes guns.
Well, when you think about it, what higher praise . . . ?
5 comments:
Geek, you can't say you haven't gotten hit with bullet spatter in all the years you've shot, can you? Just watching, I've been hit from bullet splatter off of steel. I feel it, it rarely draws blood, and if it does, it's just a prick. USPSA does have a distance minimum shooters need to be away from steel (5yrds?). And aren't you limited on bullet makeup? (no steel?) Also, many stages have no steel, and paper doesn’t cause spatter. Safety is very high at IPSC matches, and rightly so. No one is casual about the safety rules.
Second guy is just wrong. The XD is very completive in Production. Didn't TGO win something with his XD recently? In my own opinion, I think IPSC is more fun than IDPA, as IDPA has more rules on shooting the stage (cutting the pie, shooting from cover, retaining mags, etc), and IPSC is more freestyle. Both are better than Action Pistol or PPC as stages vary every match.
Education of Guy 1&2 is what's needed. Recruitment is lifeblood, and getting the word out is great. I've never shot shotgun matches, but I dont mind watching it on TV. To each their own.
Overload,
if you re-read my comment, you'll find that I said:
" . . . there's no problem with "back-spatter". When we shoot at steel targets (as we often do), the IPSC rules require that we stay at least 10 meters away from the targets. Yes, we do still get bullet fragments bounced back to us from time to time, which is why the rules require us to use safety glasses."
For the purpose of this discussion, I'll say that "back-spatter" can be defined as: "When you shoot at something, and stuff comes back at you".
I never meant to imply it never happens, just that it's "not a problem".
Actually, I once saw a LRN 230 grain bullet from a .45 acp hit a rock and ricochet BACK a measured 200 yards to hit and dent a video camera held by spectator. Okay, so it was a problem to him; the video camera was brand new, and he had to take it home to explain to his wife why it had a dent in it.
Considering this kind of oddball circumstance, you have to admit that it could have easily been a rifleman who shoot from a 200 yard distance, hit a rock, and his round bounced back another 200 yards. The concept of 'back-spatter' isn't unique to IPSC competition, although you have to admit that pistol competition usually involves ranges of much less than 200 yards.
When you are shooting at targets 'out doors', you can expect to hit rocks and other hard things that make bullets fragment or bounce or ricochette. I doubt if the rifle-person who commented will contend that he has never had his bullets ricochette; if it comes back toward his shooting position, this is 'back-spatter'.
Deal with it.
Yes, of course I have had bullets come back in my direction, and sometimes the fragments of the bullet (rarely the entire bullet) strikes me or someone else present. As you say, this usually stings. Once in a while it causes a small cut, which results in temporary bleeding. This is because the fragment is, essentially, 'shrapnel' (term used advisedly) and that means it has sharp edges. I have even seen these bullet fragments stick in the skin. The person impacted says "Ouch, that hurts! and pulls the fragment out with a fingernail . . . and forgets about it.
While I've see this happen a few times a year during IPSC competition, I've more frequently seen in happen, for example in Speed Steel. They shoot more rounds at close targets, and the targets are (of course) made of steel. The rounds are more commonly down-loaded because you only have to HIT the steel, you don't have to hit it HARD and down-loaded rounds cause the pistol to recoil less severly, providing a positive reason to load them with a light powder charge.
Even more frequently, SAS shooters ("Cowboy Action") shooters seem to have entire bullets bounce back at them. This is actually a more severe situation, because entire bullets can raise a welt. They rarely penetrate the skin. SAS shooters typically shoot lead rather than jacketted bullets, if only because they are cheaper than jacketted bullets. These tend to maintain structural integrity at the low velocity at which they are loaded (again, they have no 'power factor' requirements to meet, unlike IPSC shooters), so their bullets don't typically fragment.
All of this is offered only to suggest that action pistol sports involve short distances between shooter and target, often involving backstops of a rocky nature, and while the possiblity of 'back-spatter' always exists, it isn't considered a 'problem'.
In point of fact, the photos which were the cause of comments were taken in an area where the backstops were muddy banks, not rock. The worst 'back-spatter' I've seen in this situation is that you may get mud spattered on you. I recently blogged about "Mudders" just to demonstrate this. You will note that I found no competitors who had rips in their clothing or skin. This is because it just didn't happen.
Again, IPSC competitors are occasionally subject to 'back-spatter', and while it may infrequently result in their precioius personal bodies (mine especially, because then I'm not shooting I'm often the Range Officer, standing right next to the shooter!), it's not a sufficiently significant factor that anybody take a more than incidental notice of it.
I have NEVER, in 23 years of IPSC competition, seen anyone seriously injured by what the original commenter described as "back-spatter".
It could happen, sure. But so could a bench-rest rifle shooter have a .308 round bounce off his noggin.
BTW, do bench-rest shooters wear protective eye-wear every time they shoot?
IPSC competitors do.
Safety, in IPSC, is a 'belt and suspenders' thing.
We make every effort to prevent (for example) something from 'going wrong', and then we REQUIRE protective gear to keep us safe when the unthinkable happens.
Wow, that wasn't what I meant at all. I didn't mean to construe IPSC as "elitist" but rather that it was out of my league. I'm personally used to doing much better than I did in IPSC, and I can excel in IDPA.
seems to have had a bad experience in his single trial of IPSC shooting, and is evermore biased against it for reasons which have no grounds in fact.
This may be somewhat true, but no grounds in fact? It is a fact that I shoot better in IDPA against other shooters who are more on my par then the guys that I shot against in IPSC. Maybe my bad experience was due to someone getting preferential treatment in my class, and if I shot it again, it wouldn't happen. Who knows?
The fact is that I prefer what I see as more practical over what I see as more sport. I only have time for one pistol sport and I chose IDPA and from that you extrapolate all kinds of half-truths and assumptions? Could it be that someone prefers IDPA on its merits over IPSC? Was I "evermore biased" when I made that comment? No. This post sure isn't the way to win supporters, though.
Well written! As regards to "back spatter," at one match a lady in my squad caught a piece of the copper jacket, a small "hook" shaped fragment maybe 3mm in length, on her cheek just below her shooting specs; it lodged there and drew blood. She just took it out, shrugged it off, everyone said, "Wow!", and we carried on!!
Josh has a point.
I attributed his preference for IDPA rather than IPSC competition as resulting from a single experience which biased him against IPSC. It was, perhaps, unfair of me to make such a presumption, even though his response seems to validate it.
I've never tried IDPA. I read the rules, decided that they were unrealistic and presumptive, and lost most of my interest in trying it.
Of course, part of the reason I've never tried it is because as far as I know there has never been an IDPA match presented in Oregon. I'm sure there has, I've just never heard of it.
Frankly, I don't really care what shooting sport you (any of us) prefer. The important thing is that there are many disciplines which one can choose to shoot competitively, certainly enough that one ought to appeal to almost everyone.
My comments were based on the tone of the comments which I cited, because they seemed to denigrate IPSC competition for reasons which were vague and, as it seemed to me, to be based on considerations which were no more than secondary.
It never occurred to me that "I tried IPSC, I tried IDPA, I liked IDPA better" (a paraphrase of Josh's comment) was a perfectly valid statement.
So yes, I do owe Josh an apology for seemingly dismissing his choice as being groundless. No matter what his reasons for choosing one shooting sport over another, I'm glad that the shortcomings of IPSC, as he perceived them to be, didn't cause him to reject the 'shooting community' in toto.
Thanks for hanging in there, Josh, until you found something that really worked for YOU.
I didn't intend to start the "my sport is better than your sport" Thread From Heck.
IDPA is probably more 'practical' than IPSC in many ways . . . I've railed for years against the changes in IPSC which moved it away from its practical origins. In fact, the man who started IPSC, Col. Jeff Cooper, was so distraught by these changes that he left his IPSC office in protest.
It's just that, what other sport is there where you can shoot so much in so short a time, without using a full-automatic firearm?
What a rush!
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