I use the term "Points Match" from time to time. It simply defines a club match in which the match-points accumulated can be used to award the best shooters with an invitation to attend next year's USPSA Nationals without having to pay the Premium Price. Every club is awarded a certain number of 'slots' (match entry at the lowest possible fee) to the USPSA Nationals. In the Columbia Cascade Section, Match Points earned at one match per month determines which competitors are offered this premium entry. It's not really a big deal, except it gives us a reason to try extra hard to shoot well, once a month. Points Match are typically attended by more than the usual number of competitors. I'm not sure why, because here in Oregon we're an insular bunch and sometimes 'slots' are returned un-used for redistribution to sections which have more people able to invest the time and money to travel to a National Match.
The Tri-County Gun Club has experienced a change in leadership this year. Last Year's Club Representatives have moved on, and Norm The Ungrateful and Potty-Mouth Shaun have taken over the helm at this club for the 2007 Competition year.
I've lambasted both co-Match Directors in their first two matches because of flaws in their stage designs. They didn't like it, and I don't blame them a bit. I understand that match administration is a difficult and onerous task, and it would be a lot more fun for the people who contribute their time and effort to just ... let them put on a match, for goodness sakes!
But we need to be aware of the way in which stage designs are dictated by the USPSA Rule Book, so sometimes I'm less forgiving in my criticism than a friendly person ought to be.
After Norm and Shaun both responded as gentlemen in January and February matches (their respective turns as MD), they combined their efforts this month as co-MDs and produced a superlative match. Norm is recently returned from a Florida match, and brought with him stage designs from that experience.
There is much to be said in favor of cross-polination of stage design theory between sections, and this match benefitted from Norm's experience. At least two of the Major Stages were either influenced or direct steals from that match, and we who competed today at TCGC are grateful for the innovative designs which tested our skills.
Stage 5: "In The Round" was based on a Florida Stage. The original stage featured 30 targets requiring one hit per target. Norm didn't have enough target stands to present the original design, so he used 15 targets and scored the best two hits.
Stage 6: "Florida Sunshine" featured a lot of vision barriers, a hefty handful of 8 Pepper Poppers, two fast swingers initiated by stepping on a 'foot trap' box, and both near far static IPSC targets.
Stage 6 offered a neat half-dozen ways to shoot it; stage 5 could be shot at least 60 different ways, although our squad found that we could shoot the first four or five targets from positions near the starting position, then (for hi-cap magazines) shoot all the rest of the targets from a fortuitous 'sweet spot.
Our squad discovered the hard way that there were hidden 180 traps in Stage 5. If you lost track of the 180, you earned a trip to Dairy Queen ("DQ") by engaging targets just a little bit past the 180 line. We lost two squad members in five minutes this way.
One of the DQ's just packed up his gear and went home. The other stayed for the whole match and helped RO, score and tape. I have no criticisms to offer for either reaction. I've DQ'd three times and never managed to stick around for the end of the match. Some people just have a lot more character than I do. I recognize it, I applaude it, but I haven't yet managed to emulate it.
We lost those two squad members (one way or the other) on the second stage of the day, Stage 5, and the rest of the match went without serious incident.
Geek Lite incidents of the day:
- WhiteFish brought his new STI Open Gun to the match. I have spent the past ten years trying to talk him into using an STI in favor of his (old) Para Open Gun, or his (recent) Glock Open gun, and he finally caved in and got a decent STI shorty a couple of months ago. The trigger had way too much slack, as the previous owner swapped triggers as a favor but failed to set it up in the best way. Fish got Major Nyne gunsmith Rob S. to walk him through an adjustment, and the gun ran clean and smooth all day. The only drawback is that the .38 Super Comp is Major Obnoxious. I RO'd him for two stages, and had to stay well behind him to preserve the fillings in my teeth. As a consequence, he bought three pounds of VV 3N37 powder from Bobby the Vendor after the match, in support of his declared intent to be even more obnoxious to Range Officers in future matches. I tried to steel his new powder and throw it away, but he was too quick for me and easily retrieved it from the back of my truck.
- Harold the Barbarian is back! Harold has been a near-charter member of The Usual Suspects Squad, but due to a new job and family pressures hasn't been able to go to IPSC matches for the past six months. His job has settled down enough that he could come play with us today, and he was able to enjoy the unseasonably balmy Winter-In-Oregon weather. He's a little rusty, but he had a couple of very good stages and added some continuity to the squad mix and a lot of levity to our day.
- ah, this post is already too long. You don't want to hear about the minutiea of a local match, and I don't want to bore you with it. It's enough to say that the sun was shining, the rain was off-and-on but easy to ignore, the stages were challenging and fun (thank you Norm and Shaun!), and we all learned a few things about shooting challenging stages ... which we'll forget before the next match because we're old and because we're less concerned about being 'competitive' than we are about having a good day at the range.
NOTE: Photos (and, evenually, Videos) of this match are available here.
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