2008 Croc Match: Stage 6 - Paradise Island

This is perhaps the most 'video' of all stages in this match, because you can see what the competitor is trying to do, even though (due to a plethora of solid vision barriers) you can't see the targets.


The stage design requires the competitor to start sitting in a lawn chair, feet on the footstool and hands interlaced behind his/her head. The unloaded pistol is on the side table.

There are a lot of hidden targets (steel and cardboard both) as well as some moving targets which are initiated by hitting the steel targets.

Stage Bay: 5
Title/Link: Paradise Island [105 kb]
Designer: Paul Meier
Round-count: 59/295 points
Targets: 25 IPSC, 7 USP, 2 Pepper Poppers

We've got video of three shooters (maybe more, later) demonstrating varying degrees of success on this stage.

First up it the Match Director, and the man who designed the stage ... Paul.

The thing about being the Match Director AND a Competitor is that your day is so busy that sometimes you not only do not have time to perform well as a competitor (because you're frequently called away from your squad, but often you don't have time to do the minimal amount of preparation needed to shoot a stage successfully.

Here, Paul discovers that he has not checked his magazines: his 3rd magazine is .... empty. No bullets. This is a true WTF moment. As soon as you realize that you don't have enough ammunition to shoot at all of the targets with the minimum number of rounds, the best you can do is to shoot at each cardboard target (2 rounds) with at least one round.

This dire situation is exacerbated in a "High Round Count" stage, which is typical in this match:

______________________________________________________

The next shooter is Ron, who experiences the Agony of Deplete when, part-way throught the stage, discovers that one of his magazines has been accidentally dropped back at the starting position. He has insufficient ammunition to complete the stage! (Look for the little black dot under his chair as he starts the stage: that's his dropped magazine.) The Assistant Range Officer (Caryn) shouts "The magazine is under the chair!". The Range Officer asks "What do you want to do?"

Ron answers ... "Back up?"

And so Ron demonstrates a good way to run backwards while keeping the gun-muzzle pointed in a safe direction. He dumps the short-loaded magazine remaining, reloads with a full magazine, and pumps 23 rounds into the remaining targets from atop The Platform.

The crowd goes wild and rewards him with a standing ovation and the verbal rewards of "Nice Run, Ron!"

And ... "I love this game!"

Ron declines the opportunity to actually Take A Bow.

The third shooter is Ernie, who is reshooting the stage. (The first attempt was nullified by a Range Equipment Failure ... one steel target, which activated a moving cardboard target, was not correctly reset.)

Ernie did everything right, quickly, and accurately. Perhaps more important, he retained sufficient ammunition on his person to complete the stage without wasted time.


Yet to come (watch this space): CHAT!

The things people say after they watch someone else shoot a stage.