It wasn't cold on this Oregon September match day, but you couldn't prove it by watching the competition.
We saw a couple of competitors with ammunition-feeding problems. Richard was still fighting his perenial magazine problems, and Craig was so plagued that he quit before finishing the stage. It's hard to fault Craig for this decision, and nobody like to be labeled A Quitter, but I believe I would rather have stuck to it if only to engage the last of the 'easy targets' and taken my chances.
Perhaps not. Again, if you're not the guy fighting the gun, it's easier to criticize than to deal with the problems.
This stage was notionally 'free style', except that you had to take the first three targets through a port. In reality, there were only a few variations available on the theme ... when/how you engaged targets T4 and T5, and when you reloaded. About the only advantage you could find was, surprisingly, when and how you engaged the 'difficult' targets in the back left corner from the shooting port in the front right corner of the stage.
There were two cardboard IPSC targets, close to the ground and hidden from any other position, which were bounded by no-shoot penalty targets. Most competitors dove into the port so they could get as close as possible, needlessly wasting a couple of seconds to move closer. I stopped two steps farther away to engage them ... but then, I hit one of the penalty targets and loudly cursed both the course designer and the set-up crew. On the other hand, Al did the same thing with his Limited gun and made the shots, clean. Skill is always a factor, and when they tight, difficult shots come at the end of a 30-second run it's the more physically fit competitors who prove to be ... competitive.
This video is also available at Jerry the Geek's Shooting Gallery as a 15mb download.
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