Custer (Washington) Club Matches: Challenging!

If it need be said, these are NOT 'my' videos; I cannot shoot to this level of expertise, but I admire the experiences of those who can.  It's fortunate that 'Gunbot' posts these match videos for the rest of us to enjoy.

Shooting USPSA in the Sand @ Custer | Gunbot!:

Custer’s range is one of the best run with very interesting bays which allows them to design fun and challenging stages. This month’s match had lots of low ports which makes it hard for aging knees to deal with, at least the bays had soft sand. I felt slow in some stages because I was waiting for a perfect sight picture instead of shooting early, calling my shots and correcting them if needed.

I competed at the Area 1 match at this range in 2001 ("The Space Oddity" match) and the range had not been anything like as well developed, nor as sophisticated in range design, as we see today.

You have got to watch this exciting run!
It's not on YouTube ... so please go to the underlined link above to see the embedded video.

The End of the Hiatus

Regular viewers may have noticed that I haven't report about USPSA (Practical Pistol) matches I have attended lately.  The reason is simple:  I haven't been to many since "I Blew Up My Gun".  Over a year ago.

I did try to shoot a match at the Dundee club a few months back, but as I reported at the time, that came to No Good End.  Ammunition fizzled because it was reloaded with 'old' gunpowder which had apparently drawn moisture.   It was, of course, the best USPSA match I even attended in which I fired less than a single magazine.

Today, after months of encouragement from my good friend (and fellow Linguica Pizza Aficionado) The Homeless Brasser, I took advantage of the Bi-Mart sale on .45ACP ammunition ... "$19.97 per box of 50, as many boxes as we have" ... and took my Beloved Kimber to a match at the Albany Rifle and Pistol Club!

USPSA Open Nationals on Shooting USA?

Shooting Wire:
(July 30, 2014)

 Shooting USA - USPSA Open Nationals - Inside STI It's the fastest run and gun racing of all, with fully enhanced Open Division guns competing for the national title. Plus, the inside story of STI, the employee owned company that has claimed more national titles than any other manufacturer. Then John's got the Benchrest secret on cleaning for accuracy in a Brownells Home Gunsmithing project. And the story of the Long Lee Enfield, that's now one of History's Guns.

This all sounds pretty interesting.  Unfortunately, I haven't bothered with cable TV for 15 years (Aging Curmudgeon Alert!) so I'll never see any of it.  

If anyone knows whether/when this will be available on the internet, please let me know in the comments.

Can USPSA run a profitable Nationals?

USPSA Finances Part 5: Can USPSA run a profitable Nationals? | Gun Nuts Media:

Today I want to regather my focus and look at Nationals, the single largest expense on the USPSA tax returns.
----
It is immediately obvious that USPSA loses money each year on the National Championship matches. The average money lost by USPSA over the six year period of Nationals we tracked is approximately $250,000 a year. That is an awful lot of money.

Today we have two questions: can USPSA run a profitable National Championship series

and more importantly, should they?

I don't know if USPSA should run a "Profitable" National Championship series.  Probably not .. they never have before.

But SHOULD they?

Well, that would be nice.

I dont think that anyone who has ever been to a Nationals Match expects that it .. or USPSA as a whole .. should be a "Profitable" venture.

This is an all-volunteer venture.  The sole purpose is to allow us, the members, to compete at a variety of skill-levels.  Most of us are really not very good at what we love the most ... shooting at difficult targets under challenging circumstances.  It stands to reason that the National Matches present the greatest challenges.

Most of us who spend our time, money and energy competing  in USPSA matches don't expect to win.   It would be nice if we came in at a 'high level' in our own designated Class and Division.  But there are always those people who are 'talented' who almost invariably win.  We secretly loath and detest 'talented' shooters, but the statistics don't lie;  they are better than us.

We can live with that.

Every year, hundreds of not-very-good shooters compete in the Major Matches: Sectional, Area or National matches, it doesn't matter except that the higher-rated the match, the chances grow increasingly slim that we will "do well".

We don't care.

We just want to shoot a "Major Match".

Your reasons for spending hundreds of dollars may vary.  You may want to see how you stack up against the best of the best.

You may want to meet the best and brightest in the USPSA world.

You will spend more money than you can afford, you won't win a darned thing, and you'll come away thinking that it is "money well spent"

Say it ain't so! (USPSA Range Officer Collusion?)

Range Officer Cheating Scandal in United States Practical Shooting Association | Gun Nuts Media:

 (June 18, 2014)

Why cheat at USPSA?

I've just read the article (via Gunwire ... probably rotated out by the time you read this) and you can click the link at the top of the page to read it for yourself.

I will not name names ... which are clearly shown in the referenced link ... because so far there are only accusations and I haven't found anything on the USPSA website (even as a "News Flash") which suggests that the accusations have been officially confirmed by the Regional Autority.   And by now *(1730 on Friday) the office is closed, so I can't even call to ask for a statement.

The entire weekend remains for rumor and inuendo to proliferate.  I won't be a party to assuming guilt without hearing from 'the other side'; I encourage you to wait, also, before you assume anything about the reports.

Essentially, a trained and experienced CRO (Chief Range Officer) has been accused of reporting stage times at Level II or Level III USPSA matches to influence the outcome of the match.  For one competitor, the stage-time reported by the RO to the person writing the figures on the score-sheet were faster than the actual time taken; for (some) other competitors, the times were slower.

Thus, the RO is accused of both means of cheating:

1. biasing reported stage time in favor of one competitor
2. biasing reported stage time to the detriment of other competitors

Surviving the CHRONOGRAPH Stage At A Major Match

Traditional Ammo Is Fundamentally Flawed

USPSA match scoring is based on three factors: Speed, Power and Accuracy.

The ACCURACY is based on the points you score on each target .. less penalties.
The SPEED is based on the time you take to complete the stage. ("Timed Fire" is judged a little differently, but still ....)
The POWER factor is based on your declared power factor, except at a Major Match when they actually determine the power factor of the ammunition you are using, on that day, at that place.

And if your ammunition doesn't actually perform to the level that you have expected, it can ruin your whole day.

What I want to talk about is one of the points that I include in my "Introduction to USPSA" Safety Class, when we start to talk about "POWER FACTOR" in the segment about Scoring Your Target.

This is A True Story, and I tell it once every month when I give a class

No Joy in Muddville ...

Announcement from the Columbia-cascade Section (Area 1) and the IPSC Director of Albany (Oregon) Rifle and Pistol Club:

Sent: Thursday, February 6, 2014 11:48:23 AM
Subject: ARPC USPSA match cancelled

From ARPC Discipline Director Jan ****:

Alex,
Please send out to the section

Points match saturday Feb 8 at ARPC is canceled due to weather.  Currently there is 8 inches of snow on the ground I-5 is closed and chains are required in Albany and south.  Snow is going to continue thru the weekend.

Thanks,
Jan

Here's why:

As you can see, the snow in my driveway is up to the hubcaps on my GeekMobile.  And it's still snowing.   Weather forecast for the next couple of days is "Freezing Rain".

This is the third time in my memory that a CCS match has been cancelled, and it has always been because the prevailing weather conditions has made it unsafe for people to travel.

As for me?   I need groceries, the store is five blocks away, and I think I'll just make do with what I have in the pantry.  Oh, and we've already had two short power outages in my neighborhood ... 20 minutes away from the range.

BALANCE:
Chatted with my daughter in San Diego today.  She and her son are in bed with colds ... even though the weather is in the 80's.  She says my grandson envies me the Oregon Snow.

As well he should!

Which is the more dangerous sport?

Florida high school basketball player, 18, dies after collapsing during practice | Fox News:

An 18-year-old Florida high school basketball player died on Saturday after collapsing at practice a day earlier, one of his former coaches says.

 When I respond to people who want to sign up for my "Introduction to USPSA" class, I include the following boilerplate text:

"IPSC competition is safer than high-school football."

Perhaps I should widen that comment; perhaps I should say "safer than high-school athletic sports."

I've never seen anyone die on the Playing Fields of IPSC.

Which is more than we can say about Florida High-School Basketball.

ARPC Match; September, 2013

The 2013 IPSC season is winding down in Oregon ... kind of ... but you couldn't tell it by the September match at Albany.  There were 66 competitors at the match.  For reasons too complex and boring to go into, I didn't compete but I did show up toward the end of the match to watch a couple of people shoot.  Also, I had a half-dozen people in the last couple of month's "Introduction to USPSA" class who I had hoped will complete their certification, and I wanted to see how they did.

In the actual event, only 2 of the recent class participants actually competed.  Note that this is the final phase of Certification Training; each participant must complete a scheduled match without incurring a Match Disqualification (violation of a Safety Rule) before the training is deemed to have been successfully completed.

The two class members were "Hodgins" (because he looks so much like the Bug&Slime Guy on the television show"BONES") and his partner, Kelsey.  A young couple, they were typical of the people who show up for class:  enthusiastic, gun-savvy, and with great gun-handling skills.  (More on this later.)  I didn't get to watch "Hodgins" shoot, but Kelsey looked like she had been doing IPSC matches for years on the one stage I witnessed.   It was a six-target stage with movement between shooting positions ... looked like a Classifier, although I can't name it right now.   Her last two shots were snake-eye A-zone hits, and she wasn't wasting a lot of time;  she was focusing on accuracy, which is exactly what she was suppose to be doing.    I was impressed by her no-nonsense "Get It Done" attitude.  No nervousness,  just having fun and being safe.  The accuracy was a pleasant bonus.  (She seemed more nervous during the class than at the match!)

Funny Stories:
No-Shoot Targets are Penalty Targets.  We all know that they are introduced into a stage design in order to force the competitors to tighten up on their accuracy.  Almost invariably, the no-shoots (or "WHITE targets ... the backside of IPSC targets are colored white, as opposed to the 'shoot targets' which are brown in color found on the front side) are strategically placed so they they overlay at least a portion of one or more 'shoot targets'.

This confuses and confounds many of us 'average shooters' because we have to slow WAY down to focus on accuracy.  The better shooters shrug it off, because they ALWAYS shoot accurately.  In fact, at this club the top shooter is often Gene, with second place being the real race.  There are a half-dozen very good shooters (usually Master class) who really have to fight it out amongst them.  This race is complicated by the division in which they choose to compete at any given match.  A few stick with Open gun, while a few have chosen the more 'challenging' divisions; on example was Bill the Elder who chose to compete in Single-Stack Division shooting a 9mm (Minor Power) pistol.  No surprise that Bill won Single-Stack, because he is just that good.

But in this case, Trevor -- who is always working hard at everything he does -- allowed himself to get distracted by the White Target on one side of his final stage.  He ended up with a "D-hit" and a Miss, but as he told me later "... at least I didn't get a No-Shoot!"

That was sufficient to put him down a slot; Yawn got 2nd Place and predictably Gene won the match "overall".

On the other hand, my old friend Whitefish (so nicknamed for his penchant of selecting white-target-seeking bullets) actually shot a clean match!  No misses, no penalties!  It's not QUITE as unusual for him to shoot a clean match than it is for me, but rare enough that it's worthy of notice.

Unfortunately, he did have on single little .... incident.

You know those new magnetic magazine carriers which are guaranteed not to drop a mag until you SLIDE it off the surface?  He had positioned one on his gear belt a bit too close to his holster.  Apparently, it had not occurred to him that this was problematic, until he drew on one stage and caught the muzzle-brake (or forward end of the slide ... not clear in the telling) on the magnet.  He tugged and tugged, he could tell that he had cleared the holster, but he could not raise the pistol!

Finally, he looked down and saw that it was stuck on the magnet.  It was no great chore to then 'slide' the gun off the magnet and commence shooting, but he lost several seconds of stage time trying to resolve the UNIQUE problem.

When he told me this story after the match, I asked him to please photograph his equipment belt when he got home and send me the photo.  He demurred, saying: "I moved the magnet to the back of my belt, and that's where it's going to stay!"

Then he and I and Mike the Revolver Guy swapped stories about using race-gun holsters and failing to unlock the gun before drawing.  Think: grown men swearing while pulling their holsters (and underwear) toward their armpits.  No, it's not a pretty picture.

Gun-Handling Skills:
At the pre-match "Introduction to USPSA"class conducted the weekend preceding the class, there was one young woman who had a very limited amount of experience with shooting, especially with a pistol.  She participated in the Classroom Discussion and demonstrated a good understanding of the rules and procedures, but Classroom work is all intellectual; it doesn't test actually physical skills, nor does it necessarily lead to safe shooting practices.

Due to limitations of time and resources, there was no way she could be incorporated into the class without taking away from the other participants, all of whom were experienced   So she graciously sat through the entire 3-hour class while waiting for her friends to finish ... including the guy who owned the car that was going to take her home.

I advised them then to register her into the "Basic Handgun" class offered by the club on a monthly basis.  And for myself, I will alter my 'boilerplate' instructions to New Students to emphasize that the "Introduction to USPSA" is an ADVANCED class, and only open to participants who have sufficient experience and expertise to meet the minimum requirements.

Until a while ago, I had expected that the applicants for the class would go through the Discipline Director first, and he would ascertain their experience and qualification.   Essentially, he would question the people who wished to take the class, and if they were not qualified he would direct them toward the training which more accurately built their skill-sets.  The club has re-organized, and we haven't got all of the "vetting process" resolved.  Since this young woman was an adolescent (17) I had required that she be accompanied by a parent or legal guardian .. and so she was.  I explained to her and her attendant parent that I could not allow a tyro to participate in the Live Fire Exercise, so she was relegated to the Peanut Gallery while she watched others (including her drive) shoot.

No, IPSC is not a Spectator Sport.  She was very patient, but had it been me I would have been quietly fuming.  She had to watch everybody else have fun shooting, and she didn't even get to gear up!

This business of training shooters is an iterative process, and often the instructors learn as much as do the students.  For every potential student (those who express an interest by the process of contacting me to register for the class) I send a several-page "Boilerplate".  This supposedly covers all the questions and requirements which may be helpful to the students.

Unfortunately, I have not yet thought to revise it to specify that the class was available only to "EXPERIENCED" pistol shooters.   Nor have I identified the class as an "ADVANCED CLASS".

I shall revise the Boilerplate to emphasize that requirement, and I do hope that this will serve to avoid disappointment to future attendees.

There's always something that can be improved in every course of instruction.  The trick is to identify it before discovering that one has just disenchanting a prospective Competitor,

Interesting 'field course'

Albany Rifle and Pistol Club, October Match .. stage 3:  "Are You Fast?"

Funny little stage this weekend, involving not only awkward physical positioning but some awesomely convoluted stage design!

Picture this:  A shooting hours (more or less), flanked on the right by a Pepper Popper and three Metric Targets, and on the left by two US Poppers and two Metric Targets.

Shooting position is on a 3'x5' box, right in front of the closed door. 

Behind the door?

Two 'swinging' targets, activated by opening the door.  The door is locked, and the shooter 'unlocks' the door by knocking down the Pepper Popper on the right outside wall.  (Actually, the door activates the left inside swinger, which in turns activates the right inside swinger.    It's complicated.)

Inside the competitor also engages a static metric target on the right side of the house;  there's also another static target on the left side.  But it's positioned so that the only way to engage it is to hunker down and shoot through a 12"x10" cutout in the opened door.

Starting position?  Standing in the box and stretching to put both hands on a mark to the left side of the door.

I know, it's not obvious from this description, but essentially you can take your time and shoot the stage with a minimum of contortions.  Or, if you ARE fast .... you can shoot it with a minimum of movement as long as you are limber enough to perform a total Aerobics workout in 15 seconds or less.

The standard way?  STRETCH to reach the mark on the left side of the door, but when the buzzer goes off engage the targets on the right side of the house ... hitting the Pepper Popper last to activate the swinging door.
Then grab the two fast-moving swinging targets before they bob behind strategically placed soft-cover barrels..  The tall static target on the right side of the house is almost a 'gimmee'.  However, you have to twist left and stoop down to engage the static target on the left side of the house.

Seven shots on the right side of  they house, and eight shots inside the house.  Production and Limited 10 shooters have to reload sometime between those two arrays.  Limited and Open shooters have the luxury of engaging both arrays without losing time.

Then taking a step to the left, placing your foot carefully ON TOP of the back left corner of the shooting box (because you can't see the last target without extending beyond that point), take US Popper / cardboard / Pepper Popper / cardboard in whatever sequence suits you best.  Yes, it obviously CAN be taken in under 15 seconds.  No, not many of us did.  (Okay, THREE of the 56 shooters managed it.)

Here are three views of the stage being shot.  Apologies for the poor quality; I was so slack-jawed watching people trying to beat this mini-monster, I forgot to actually aim the camera.

Which is pretty much the same way I shot it .. yeah, I got a miss on the stage, but I'm not going to admit missing a static target;  here, or anywhere else!

Nobody Is Perfect

I checked my results from last weekend's ARPC match (sent from USPSA.ORG) and ... as much as I appreciate the great statistical-reporting we now enjoy, I was appalled to read that I had got major penalties in almost every stage.

 I took a picture of the printout: this was sent to me at 1:50 pm after the match.

(Right-click on the image to see full-size image in a new tab)

Yes, that was my USPSA member number all right, and the right class, division, power factor ... but down in the lower right corner under "Pistol Statistics" it says:
Total Penalty Points: 140

... according to this, I shot only one stage clean.  Gee, I know I haven't been practicing much for the past few years, but I could only recall two stages where I got penalties!  (Wow!  I must be getting Sudden-Onset Alzheimers since last weekend)

A little explanation; I haven't read my email for a week, and I always read from the oldest unread email to the newest.   So the next email was ALSO from USPSA, sent at 2:00 pm.  It told a slightly different story:

 (Again .... right-click on the image to see full-size image in a new tab)

 Same identification info as the last time, but this version has my competitor number as #79 ... which I recall as being correct since I was almost the last to sign up for the match, and I saw guys in line ahead of me with numbers between 49 and 78 ... so I know I wasn't competitor 48.
and the actual stats were a lot closer to what I remembered, too:
Total Penalty Points: 20

... Except these (a) were the stages for the APRIL APRC match, not the MAY ARPC match, and (b) it shows me as DNF on the last stage (classifier: "Melody Line"), and I shot that match complete, including the classifier. And I strongly doubt that my competitor number was "79" in April, because there were not that many competitors for that match.   Since the email identified it as the results for the MAY ARPC match, and I dispute the reported results for that match, I have no confidence in any of the match results I receive.

...

It has been a long time since I really worried too much about being competitive.  In fact, it has been since I was no longer able to reload .38 Super ammunition, so I could compete in OPEN division (in which I can still see the sights AND the target clearly).   Consequently, I'm not concerned that my reported statistics from ... well, either or both matches .... don't meet my very low expectations.

However, if YOU are competitive, and you want honest accurate reporting on the results of your matches, I strongly advise you to record your own stats from the match before you leave the range, and compare them to the results you receive from USPSA.

"Unsafe Gun Handling"

I've had about a week to think about the sole Match DQ at last weekend's ARPC Club Match, and I'm still not sure what happened.

I mean ... I was there. I was watching the guy, and when I say it happen I said to him: "What are you DOING?"

What he was doing at the time was to violate the single simple rule of competition, which is to NOT handle your gun except (a) at the safety table or (b) under the direct supervision of a Range Officer.

WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED: BACKGROUND
This was the second stage of the match, which I guess was Stage 4. The starting position was (as nearly as I recall ... ignore the quotation marks) "Sitting at the table, with your gun flat on the table, unloaded, slide forward, hammer down".

Basically, the gun was to be in the same state as it would be during the match when you were not competing, except that it was on the table: safe.

We all are aware that we need to be immediately available when it's our turn to shoot. And the competitor was obviously aware that he could only handle his handgun at the safety table, or on the line under the direct supervision of a Range Officer.


It was his second match after his certification training; he had been told that, and he understood that.


WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED: IMMEDIATE
When it was his turn to shoot, he quite confidently moved to the starting box, pulled his pistol from the holster, placed it on the table and assumed his pistol in the chair. His arms were crossed, he was confident and secure in his confidence that he had done exactly what the Stage Procedure Document stipulated. (This was the point at which I said: "What are you DOING?")

Unfortunately, he forgot one small detail: the Range Officer had his back turned and the competitor was not under the "direct control of the Range Officer". That is; the "Make Ready" command had not been given.


WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED: ULTMATELY
When the RO turned around, saw that the competitor was more-or-less in the starting position, he said: "I am DQ-ing you".

The RO, a trainer and a long-time competitor, knew EXACTLY what the competitor had done, as soon as he saw the pistol on the table. Making unfounded assumptions (considering the lack of RO guidance), the competitor had assumed the "ready" condition, which unfortunately required him to handle his pistol. His understanding, I assume, was that it was okay for him to place his pistol on the table at his convenience ... not under the "direct control of the Range Officer".

The competitor is a helluva nice guy, we all knew that he was just trying to make the match run faster. It did not occur to him that he was performing an Unsafe Act. He know that nobody was downrange, and in his mind there was nothing wrong with performing exactly the same actions as he would have done when the RO turned to him and said: "Make Ready".

But he forgot that SAFETY is the most important component of IPSC/USPSA competition; and that "direct control of the Range Officer" isn't just A Good Idea, it's The Law.

COMPETITION VS "JUST FOOLING AROUND
This is a mind set which I usually see immediately after a class.

For instance: immediately after a class I was talking about guns to a student at the safety table, trying to explain to her the difference in controls (if I remember it correctly ... but it doesn't matter) between the controls of a 1911 and a "safe action" pistol such as a Glock. She had her pistol in her hand at the time, and it was pointed at the safe backstop behind the Safety Table. During her response, she casually turned to face me ... and rotated the pistol until it was pointed at my belly. (Not the first time this has happened after a class, by the way.) I mentioned that she was pointing her gun at me. She blushed, turned around and bagged her pistol. I never saw her again. Sometimes embarrassment can serve as to filter out the people who think "Safety" is only important during a match, vs those who understand that "Safety" is important ANY time a firearm is present.

The conversation is incidental; safety is paramount, all the time, every time. That's what I try to teach, but it doesn't always take. (Note to self: I do need to stress this point in future classes!)


WHY DOES THIS HAPPEN?
This is not something which typically happens with people who are entirely new to pistol shooting.

It happens with people who have been shooting for a while, but their experience has usually been in a more casual circumstance. They are accustomed to coming to the range, and everyone is on their own; at their leisure, they un-bag their guns and lay the pistols on the counter which separates the "shooting area" from the "downrange area". It is ASSUMED that they are safe, because .. hey, there's nobody downrange from them. No problem!

The concept of a Range Officer ... of "oversight" ... is not common to their experience. And at first, "Range Safety" is a casual, interpretive, unimportant concept. They are with friends, or alone, and there are no rules, really.

They're not "Bad", but in the context of the character in "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" ... they're just drawn that way.



And so, when they feel most comfortable and relaxed ... they are at their most vulnerable moment; and most likely to BE unsafe because they FEEL MOST SAFE.

...

I'm not going to denigrate new shooters because of their prior experiences have taught them to be lackadaisical in their approach to firearm safety. They don't know any better, and sooner or later they are bound to act as if it's just an afternoon at the range with their friends.

After all, haven't they all been taught that? I know I'm guilty as much as anyone, because that's the way I feel at a match.

But, until the concept of SAFETY is fully ingrained by experience, it constitutes a disservice to our New Friends to allow them to thing that ... just because the timer is not running at a match ... they can ease off on the Safety Regulations.

(SIGH)

It's impossible to cover all possible ways of "Doing Wrong" in a three hour class; and nobody would stand still for it, it's so negative!

Ultimately, the only way to gain experience in a potentially dangerous high-stress competitive environment is to tell the new practitioners what they must and must not do, and then allow their friends to serve as bad examples, for the edification of the others.

I'm not happy with that "solution". I think that every new shooter should have the experience that experienced shooters have; that is a conundrum, I admit, and it bothers me that I can't teach them EVERY way that they can .. well, "screw up".

It's a balancing act. As a trainer, if make the training too tough, I lose the potential of new shooters who are interested, but are discouraged by the negative tenor of the class.

If I'm too "nice", I lose the value of the Safety Training; I graduate people who don't understand how easy it is to be unsafe/how important it is to achieve the discipline to be always safe in a "running gun" situation.

On the other hand, if I'm too "tough", I dissuade people who have the potential to be safe, EXPERIENCED competitors who understand that ... "Hey, we want you to come shoot with us, but we will hold you to a 'higher standard' which flies in the face of all the practices you have experienced in a less stressful environment" ... your experience is unsafe, and we will not tolerate a lower level of safety."

(more sighs)

SUMMARY:
This is a very long and convoluted post, and I apologize for imposing my "angst" on you. I'm not really trying to apologize for my inability to be a perfect trainer. What I'm looking for is some s
suggestions from other trainers about how to achieve the perfect balance of "tough" and "attractive" in a three-hour training session. Ideally, each student would be given individual instruction, and ideally the training session would continue until the student had learned all that he or she needed to know.

Practically speaking, that is impossible. Even under the most ideally perfect situation ... it ain't going to happen. It's beyond the realm of human endeavor to cover every possibility; the best we can do is to hit the high points and hope for the best .... and in the actual event, to monitor the performance of each New Shooter very closely ... without making him or her feel so self-conscious that he/she has no possibility of performing "satisfactorily".

The only thing that I can suggest is a concept which I have only recently realized is a viable goal: That they perform "right" rather than "well".

In the early stages of a new shooter's career, they should not attempt to "perform well" (to be competitive); they should only attempt to "perform right" (to be safe).

I'm not sure that's a conceptual differentiation which will be acceptable to every new shooter, but it's a goal which may perhaps be achievable.

And it may prevent them from DQ'ing because they tried too hard, too early.


x
x

Too Much Information

Today was suppose to be the day I loaded 10mm in preparation to a match at Dundee.

Unfortunately, I got hit by the Stomach Flu this morning. I know that's not much of an excuse, but I'm out of Large Primers. I don't dare get that far away from the house to go buy any.

The reason why the match was so important to me is that I was hoping to catch up with my old friend "Randomly Hitten' Witten". Randy and Sandie and I use to squad together a lot, but he gave up USPSA for shotgunning and other shooting sports so we haven't seen much of him lately. We enjoyed visiting with him and Donna when The Usual Suspects gathered at their house once or twice a year for barbeque and BS. We haven't done that since the birth of my second grandchild .... I now have seven of them.

Catch up is important though. I may just go up with the ammo that I have, shoot until I run dry, then stand around and take pictures the rest of the day.

Oh ... that's always assuming I'm not still sticking close to The Big Telephone by Saturday.

I know, nothing anybody wanted to hear.

Still, I was hoping I could find the photo of Randomly Hitten' when he completely destroyed a disappearing target by splitting it ... edge on, several time. It was his proudest moment.

Guess Who Went To A Match

That's right, I haven't competed in six months, but I shot the ARPC match on Saturday and it was terrific. I got to say hello to a lot of friends I haven't seen much of lately, and the weather even cooperated .... temperature in the mid-forties, but the sun was shining most of the time so you didn't need much more bundling up than a jacket. ( I was overdressed, and was too warm toward the end of the match.)

Match Director Mike McCarter and his assistant "Yawn" built some challenging stages. As sometimes happens, that caused problems for some of us.

We had several new shooters who were attempting to complete their USPSA Certification Process by successfully completing an actual match. I'm afraid a few found the challenge was more than their experience level could meet. They ... and we ... were disappointed that they were DQ'd. In my squad alone, we lost one shooter due to "finger on the trigger while clearing a jam", and two because they broke the 180; those two lost it on the same stage. Even more experienced shooters had to concentrate on their perception of just where the 180 was; moving to or from a port, to or from downrange. The close-quarters drill was based upon a structure with walls in a direction about 30 degrees from the zero-degree angle of downrange, and we do tend to rely on the props to orient our understanding of just where that 180 line is.






(Click on the image to view it in full size.)

I shot poorly overall, which was no surprise to me after such a prolonged hiatus from competition. Fresh air, light exercise, good friends and about 130 rounds of shooting all combined to focus my attention on the immediately important things in life.

The classifier stage was 03-06, "Pepper Poppers".

---

Many of us learned something that we didn't realize until we were reminded by the MD. The staged named "4 By 6" was a virginia count stage with three Bianchi barricades and three metric targets. Two strings, movement between barricade A and B with mandatory reload, engage all 3 targets with 2 shots each freestyle from A and strong hand only from B was string one. String two was freestyle engagement from B and mandatory reload moving to C, with weak hand engagement from C. Barricades were staggered center/right/left, moving downrange between shooting positions.

The problem was that several shooters used the barricades as a support when not shooting freestyle. As I recall the rule is 10.2.8.3 ... even leaning against props is support, and results in a per-shot penalty.

I didn't quite fall into that trap, but my shooting was so poor that I got a lot misses out of the 24 shots, and an extremely low A-count. No idea how many folks got dinged, but I know there were more than a few who just plain forgot about it .... even though that rule was WRITTEN IN PEN ON THE STAGE PROCEDURES by the time we got to it.

The good news, two of the new shooters from last week's "Introduction to USPSA" class beat my scores in LIMITED division ... congratulations Will and Carol. I've heard that there's a problem when the student becomes more proficient than the teacher, but of course there's no problem here. I never much liked them anyway.

---

Tonite, I had the first-time opportunity to appreciate the new features of the USPSA website. I had signed up for match results to be sent to me, and that was pretty kewl when I looked at them. Here are some match results from USPSA: the match results are here, and the results for the classifier (03-05 / Pepper Poppers) in LIMITED division are here (including individual competitor scores)

PHILOSOPHY:
I'm pretty sure that somewhere in time, someone has defined SUCCESS as " .... meeting your own expectations". If true, I had a successful day if only because I had low expectations. I just wanted to enjoy the moment, and shoot safely.

PS:
I had bought a new camera recently, and I brought it to the match so I could take some pictures. Unfortunately, the battery had run down after being fully charged, then riding for two weeks in my coat pocket. Be very wary of Sony Cyber-Shot camera; it has a convenient slim pocket design, good lenses, lots of neat features and 14.1MP resolution --- but the battery runs down whether you use it or not. And it appears impossible to get extra or replacement batteries, either in a small town or through AMAZON.COM (who sent me the battery I ordered ... but not the battery I needed).

Dundee Match Cancelled - Feb 26, 2011

Global Warming Deniers -- be warned!

Resistance is Futile! You Will be Assimilated!

Email received this afternoon from "Evil Bill", Match Director at the planned USPSA match 2/26/2011 at Dundee:

As of this afternoon there was snow cover in all the bays at Dundee. Saturday morning's low temperature is forecast at 15 degrees, with a wind chill of near zero. Slick bays, slick roads, bitter cold, and no placeat Dundee to get out of the cold---I'm going to cancel the match for reasons of safety.

Bill

I think this is a good idea, considering the steep hills which surround the Dundee range and the forecasts for snow (and possibly icy roads due to daytime warming).

Through the years I've proudly announced to people who ask "do you shoot in the rain?" that in all my years of competition, I've only seen ONE match canceled because of the weather; that was when the road was icy and the Stats Mistress at TCGC couldn't get up the hill to the range because it was too slippery".

Actually, Mike McCarter 'called' a match a couple of years ago at ARPC, because of the danger of ice on the freeway. That makes two.

This year we have had two cancellations due to unsafe road conditions.

Hmmm ... that "Global Warming" thingie isn't working too good for us.

I've got it! We'll call it "Climate Change!" That way, no matter what happens, we're covered.

Tri County Gun Club Cancels Sunday Match!

The last time TCGC (in Sherwood, Oregon) canceled a match 'at the last minute' was in winter of 2004. Heavy snow, partial thaw, then freezing overnight. The access to the range is a steep uphill climb, and that morning the Stats-Mistress couldn't get her aging Tempo up the hill. So SHE canceled the match.

Tonite I received a forwarded email from the Match Director via the Section Secretary:

Tri-County had the action range resurfaced and it looks great, however there is no cover available, no safety tables and everything is out of the bays. It is going to rain heavy tomorrow and as a result I'm going to cancel the match. We'll resume normal festivities next month.

Can you forward this to the distribution list and ask folks to pass it along? We won't get to everyone but we'll do the best we can.

Obviously, this is a time-sensitive message and I doubt anyone will read it here tonite and change plans for tomorrow.

But this is the oldest "IPSC" club in Oregon, and as far as I know the oldest club in a 3-state area. It's where I got my first competition training, shot my first year or two exclusively (until other clubs started a program) and it's one of the premier clubs of the Pacific NorthWet. It will always be important to me.

PS: Norm, Mark ... I passed it along. I did my part.

The Best Match I Never Attended

At the beginning of this month, The Hobo Brasser made the generous offer to load 1,000 rounds of ammunition so I would be able to shoot while the XL650 was being 'rehabbed' by Dillon. While I have been named A Fool by my detractors, I proved them all wrong by quickly accepting.

When I got home, I grabbed a big bunch of Montana Gold 115gr hollow-point bullets, an unopened four-pound keg of Vitha Vourhi N350 powder, all of the Small Rifle primers I could find, and three 100-round bags of new, unprimed Winchester .38 Super brass. The next weekend, I wheeled up to Canby and delivered them to Chez Hobo. I also told him the powder-weight to load them, and included a handful of rounds I had loaded and one of my STI magazines, so he could confirm and check the correct over-all length of the loaded cartridge.

I also ordered another 1,000 Winchester brass, and when they arrived from Dillon I grabbed two bags out of the box and took the other 8 bags up to HB, also. Yes, that adds up to 1,100 cases. I had given him a total of 1,200 primers, as well ... primers disappear magically during the reloading process, and sometimes you get a bad load, so I wanted to make sure he had all the components to actually build 1,000 shootable rounds.

And if he happened to just keep loading until he had filled all the cases? Well, if he was such a good friend to make a generous offer, I'm friend enough to milk it. Who knows? Someday I may be in a position to do him a favor. It would be unkind of me to make him feel guilty if he accepted. This way ... he owes me one.


Last week HB emailed to say he had finished loading the ammunition, and when did I want to pick them up? I suggested that I get them from him at the monthly Dundee match (which was this weekend), and since we usually squad together that seemed a reasonable solution.

[Actually, we usually manage to squad with an amiable group of folks and we all have a good time. HB and I enjoy a camaraderie of exchanging verbal quips and cheap-shots, kind of like Don Ameche and Frances Langford as The Bickersons. Neither of us can shoot all that well, but we enjoy the social occasion at least as much as we do the competition.]

I was really looking forward to the Saturday match. Friday evening I spend a couple of hours an hour at least 15 minutes getting all of my gear together, along with a box of books and a bottle of 14 year old Jamesons' as a thank-you gift to HB. I laid out a Springfield Armory t-shirt to wear to the match, climbed in bed and waited for sleep to overcome me.

And waited.

Couldn't sleep. Finally I got up and too a sleeping draught, and crawled back in bed to wait for sleep, or morning ... whichever came first.

And waited.

At 6am I was still waiting for sleep, and wondering if I shouldn't just get up and get started.

The next thing I knew, it was 9:30am. The sun was shining, and I had managed to sleep through two alarms. This is not good. The match starts promptly at 9am, and the range was 80 miles away over country roads. What to do, what to do?

So I took the coward's way out, and went back to sleep for another hour.

Two cups of coffee later I felt alert enough to shower, dress, load the car and headed for the range. By then it was noon, but I figured they wouldn't get off the range until 2pm. I had just time to drive to the range, meet HB and get the reloads, and then we could go to our traditional lunch of Linguica Pizza at the Abby's Pizza Parlor in Newburg. I could do this.

[Incidently, Linquica Pizza is the super-secret power lunch of IPSC shooters the world over. As far as I know, you can only get it at the Abby's Pizza Parlor in Newburg. How IPSC shooters all over the rest of the world get their power lunch, I'll never know. I guess that's the secret.]

On the drive up I called HB on his cell phone. I knew he wouldn't hear the phone ring, but he might see the missed call, and know to call me when he saw it. And he did, and called me back. But I had changed my ring-tone last week and I couldn't hear it over my new ZZ Tops CD which I was playing as I drove. About half-way to the range I checked my phone, discovered I had a message from HB. He found the missed call, and .... save the reading time here and just assume a short series of voice mail exchanged.

When I got to the range at a quarter of two, the competitor cars were already leaving. I saw a ridiculous day-glow orange Subaru Forrester stop in the middle of the flow, and HB leaned out the door and waved to me. We pulled off the road, and agreed to meet at Abby's and exchange cartons of 'stuff'' there.

Turns out the Subaru was a loaner. His pickup had broken down ... for the second time this summer ... and he was driving around in this "Oregon's Answer to the Pimp-mobile". Not hard to tell why the shop used it as a loaner car. Who would steal it?

I bought the pizza, HB bought the beer. As the beertender was pouring a small pitcher of wheat-bear, HB was telling me about his match. He decided to shoot Single-Stack this time, and there was a stage where you start with your pistol on the top of a barrel. Apparently, when he picked up the single-stack (last time I looked, it was a well-used Charles Daly ... a brand which is now totally defunct), and the front sight fell off. After he finished the stage "I only got one miss!", he got the squad to search for the sight in the gravel. Fortunately, they found it. So he put a piece of tape in the dovetail, pounded the front sight back in, sighted it in (that's a first) and finished the match.

I had to interrupt him.

"How did you know the front sight fell off? Did someone tell you?" I asked him.

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"Well", I answered, "it's not as if you ever actually LOOK at the damn thing."

Yes, I DID wait until he had paid for the beer.

While we were waiting for the pizza to burn, he started telling me about the match. "Great match", he said. "Interesting stages. I had a lot of fun. Weather was perfect. I didn't do all that well, but gee I sure had fun."

"Stop, stop" I said. " I don't want to hear about a great match. I don't want to hear you had fun. I missed it. I don't want to have missed a great match, I want to hear that it was a crummy match, the stages were cheezy, everybody had a lot of trouble ... don't make me think I missed anything by oversleeping!"

"Oh, gee, I'm sorry", he said. "Okay, you don't want to hear about having missed the best match you never went to. I won't tell you about it."

And then he smiled.

The bastard. I never liked him, anyway.

....

This is my revenge.

"You realize, of course, that I finally have something to write in the Blog about tonite?"

"Oh", he said. "This is BlogMeat, right"

Damn straight.

That's when he told me that he 'might have' had a couple of problems with the ammo. A couple of primers showed up in the primer-discard tray. They were crushed, he said. He didn't know when that happened, but I "might want to check the ammunition" before I shoot it, he said.

Eleven Hundred Rounds.

If you shoot IPSC in Oregon, you may someday see a snowy-haired, decrepit Senior Citizen hunched over picking up brass with all the fervor of a hobo picking up return-for-deposit beer bottles. If you do, my best advice to you is: don't muck with him.

That's all I'm saying.




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Loading with the XL650 ... sort of (Part 1)

I had expected to allow the Continuing Story of Dillon and The Geek lay fallow for a while, hoping that I could eventually segue directly into the good news that the XL650 had been completely repaired and rejuvenated by a Factory rebuild.

That is, I had hoped so until friend Antipoda piped up this weekend asking “…how did your match go? Did you make a respectable showing? Did you have enough ammo? Have you solved your primeing problems? Have you considered selling your 650 at the next gunshow, and buying a 550b? “

[sigh]

Okay, I can’t afford to ignore the Compleat Contrarian.

Weekend before last, I stayed up until midnight trying to load enough ammo for the match. It took me roughly four hours to load 176 rounds of ammunition (some of which were later rejected when I examined them for flaws). I should have quit earlier, but sheer stubborn determination encouraged me to preserver when a more realistic man would have just borrowed ammunition from a friend.

The new parts for the XL650 did not solve the problem. If anything, it was worse. The primer disk wouldn't advance, because the primer arm didn't retreat to pick up the next hole in the primer disc and rotate it so the next primer was in place. I had to manually move the primer arm up and allow it to grab the next primer disk hole. I loaded about 100 rounds that way, and decided that if this wasn't enough ammunition to complete the match, I would just stop when I ran out of ammunition.

Then I spent another hour getting my gear together. It had been 9 months since I used the Open gun in competition, and I had to switch magazines, etc. I was sure it wouldn’t get done if I left it to the morning. In the end, I couldn’t find the extension which allowed me to use the same race holster for both a limited and an open gun (longer because of the compensator), so I decided to fake it.

Fortunately I had cleaned the gun thoroughly last time I used it, but I grabbed a bottle of solvent and ran a wet rag thru the barrel anyway. No spider nests, clean rag, good to go. Ran an oily rag thru the barrel, checked the sights (yep, battery still good) and put it all back in the gunrug, and that into the range bag with my 176 (+/-) loaded rounds.

I got to bed around 1 a.m. and then couldn’t get to sleep until around 4:30 a.m. which made me very groggy when the alarm went off at 7:30.

MATCH DAY

Quick shower to wake up, threw on jeans, shoes and the match shirt from the 1999 Limited Nationals at Las Vegas. My first National shirt, maybe it will bring me luck. I can use all I can get.

Stopped at Burger King for a breakfast sandwich, milk, stinky/greasy potatoes.

Then stopped at Dutch Bros for some hot coffee. I have to stay awake!


I ate the greasy/stinky potatoes on the drive up, drank a bit of milk, and ALL of the coffee!

When I go tot the match, it had already started. It's haying season in Oregon, and combines were moving from one field to the next over the country road on which I was traveling. Traffic gets backed up for miles behind combines which travel at 20 mph, tops. So it took me an hour and a half to make the drive which usually takes an hour.

It's worth mentioning that the range was entirely unfamiliar to me. CVSC (the Dundee range) had learned at the beginning of the summer that their neighbor, a grape vinyard, was expanding its growing acreage. The range would no longer be able to shoot to the West because that's where people would be working. It's a tall berm, but not definitively safe when people may be working the vines on any given day.

CVSC has spend between $40,000 and $50,000 according to Evil Bill to re-contour the land on the range, pointing the down-range configuration on the most uphill 4 bays to point South, rather than West.

Right now the bays are gravel-topped with a lot of very tall berms. No way of knowing now how well it work when the rainy season comes; I wouldn't be at all surprised to find that the water runs downhill and fills Bay 4. But for now, it all works fine.

My first stage was in Bay 4, which is about 20 yards wide and deep. (Measures are a guess, so don't take this as gospel.) I found The Hobo Brasser there, and shot the first stage which includes a 6-target plate rack and four US poppers. I had trouble knocking the small targets down. Hobo Brasser made fun of me, saying "you're suppose the put the red dot on the steel and squeeze the trigger!" He thought I had forgotten how to shoot an open gun. Not true; I had forgotten that I should not drink coffee before a match, because that red dot was bouncing all over the target ... on and off, and my job was to figure when it was going to dance over the steel and time that with my trigger so I hit the steel. No, I didn't do really good on tight shots, but I was doing the C-More Shuffle for most of the day.

It was a well-designed, and balanced match, but by the time we got to the 3rd stage I was feeling the effects of the heat and the sun. I worked as RO for the first 5 shooters on that stage, but then I had to hand off the 'brick' (the timer) and let someone else RO. I was feeling faintly nauseous, and that's the first indicator of Heat Exhaustion. (Heat Stroke is something else, often hits without obvious warning signs, and is a killer.)

When we got to the last stage, we gained the benefit of being the smallest squad in the match, with 8 shooters. Everyone had to work, but we got though stages quickly. Having arrived late, I was the last in my squad to shoot the first stage. But I was the first shooter on the last stage, so I may have been the first shooter to complete the match.

I didn't impress anyone, but by virtue of my late start and early finish I probably spent less time actively competing of all the nearly 60 shooters.

The Hobo Brasser and I had planned to have Lingquica pizza at Abbey's Pizza in Newberg, so we were eager to get off the range. But HB was responsible for posting scores on the internet, so we waited for over an hour for the other squads to finish.

Finally I grew tired of waiting, so I hopped into my truck and went down to where the last two squads were trying to finish the match. One squad had 2 shooters to go, the others had 4 shooters. I grabbed their completed score sheets and ran them up to the make-shift stat's shack. so the StatsMistress could enter them into the computer.

Then HB and I bailed out. Evil Bill agreed to email him the final scores for publication. I didn't care, I was tired and dirty and hungry (although happy!) and I just wanted to get my lunch.

As far as I was concerned, the gun had run reliably and well, I had completed the match, and I actually had a full magazine left over. Darn, if I knew I would end up with that much ammunition left over, I could have got to bed an hour earlier last night!

(Completed below under "Loading with the XL650 ... sort of (Part 2)" below.)

Loading with the XL650 ... sort of (Part 2)

After we left the range, HB and I made tracks directly to Abby's Pizza and a small pitcher of Heffeweizen.

Everyone else had either already left the match to go home, or they had only just finished the match and were waiting for the awards ceremony. HB and I have both attended hundreds of Awards Ceremonies, and while we usually stay to honor the winners, we had more important things on our mind: food and drink!

After the pizza and beer had been served, we talked about the match. HB related the story that on the last stage of the match, while I was shooting, one of the squad members commented that I had managed to shoot the whole match without a malfunction. (This was strikingly different from the last time I had shot the Open Gun, last October in Dundee, when a weak recoil spring had forced me to deal with a gun which would not return to battery ... one of the longest videos --- and most embarassing -- I have ever posted to YouTube.)

No sooner was the comment made, but the gun jammed. I pulled the trigger, gun went [click!] instead of [bang!] I think it was a high-primer, because I needed only perform the "Tap/Rack/Bang" drill and the gun performed flawlessly for the rest of the stage. Probably that would have happened even if nobody had mentioned that I was shooting a trouble-free match.

Probably.

But under any circumstances, it was clear that I had not the clear advantage of reliable reloaded ammunition.

By this time, it was clear that my Dillon XL650 was one sick puppy, and I was unable to use it to load ammo for competition. I mentioned my firm intent to sent the press back to Dillon during the coming week, because I was unable to fix the problems.

The Hobo Brasser chose this moment to offer to load 1,000 rounds for me on his own press, so I could send my 650 back for factory maintenance. He didn't want me to miss more matches than necessary at the dwindling end of the Summer Shooting Season. (In truth, I suspect he wanted me to shoot so that I would add an element of "Comic Relief" to the matches.)

Faced with this extremely generous offer, I hemmed and hawed around for about half a split-second and accepted his help.

The next weekend (now Last Dunday) I showed up on his doorstep with 300 rounds of new Winchester .38 Super brass, 1200 CCI Primers, and 4# of VV N350 powder. I also had a half-dozen rounds of loaded ammunition (so he could confirm the correct Over-All Length) and the range of power load for each cartridge, which was 8.0 - 8.6 grains. I also included an STI .38 Super magazine, which allowed him to make a final check on OAL: if it will fit within the magazine, it's not too long a load!

During the past week I have contacted Dillon via phone and got a Return Authorization Number, dismounted the 650 and sent it (including the shell-plate and the entire primer feed assembly, along with the 1050 handle) to Dillon via UPS.

At this moment I have about 26 rounds of (probably usable) .38 Super ammunition left over from my last match. I have also ordered another 1,000 rounds of Winchester Brass from Dillon, and when it arrives I will forward it to The Hobo Brasser. Along with the 1200 primers, that should be sufficient components for him to load 1,000 rounds of ammunition.

Not to put any pressure on but this year's Croc Dundee "You Got Bullets?" match has been replaced by a "Monster Match" at Albany Rifle and Pistol Club over the Labor Day weekend.

This match will require a minimum of 400 rounds, and I very much want to shoot it.

One of the problems with the Croc Match in the past has been the very tight schedule, which didn't allow shooters to pick up their brass after having shot a stage. This match announcement states that shooters will be allowed to brass at the end of a stage, as long as it doesn't delay the match. I REALLY don't want to dump 400+ rounds of once-fired brass on a range and lose it. Especially since the brass costs something like $200 for 1,000 rounds, including shipping.


So that's where I am right now. I checked the UPS Tracking Number on Friday last (August 6) and the 650 had got as far as Phoenix, Arizona. I assume it will be in Prescott sometime Monday. I don't know how long it will take them to fix it and return the press, but at lest due to the generosity of The Hobo Brasser, I won't have to sit out the rest of the 2010 competition season because I don't have ammunition.

Now all I have to do is relearn how to shoot the Open Gun.

Midnight At the Oasis

Actually, it's 1am. I've managed to load 176 rounds ... and the last ten were like pulling teeth

I doubt that this is enough for the match, but if I run out of ammunition I'll just take pictures and videos of the other shooters anyway. The point of the game is that it's a chance to get out of doors, a little light exercise, get sunburned and be humiliated by your friends.

And ... the good folks at Dillon will be receiving a phone call from me next week. This just cannot go on. For the money, the press is suppose to work a lot better than it does now.

The reasonable suggestion, that I send it in for a rebuild?

Did that two years ago. It worked well for 3 months.

But I'm not going to let any of this spoil my weekend. I've check the pistol, ran a solvent rag thru it (which I did when I last used it) and did a little oiling. The batteries on the C-more are up and I have a spare in the bag. There's some ice in the freezer and water bottles in the refrigerator, ready to go in the cooler at 7:30 am.

A good (short) nights sleep, and then a pleasant hour drive to the beautiful Dundee Hills.

Can't way to see what Evil Bill has in store for us this time!
See you on the range.