Yesterday I participated in a USPSA match at the Marysville Rifle Club. One of the stages was a first for me in a couple ways. The first part of the stage was fairly ordinary. You started in a shooting box and upon the start signal you drew your gun and shot three targets partially hidden behind a picket fence. From there you had to go maybe 75 feet forward and around a corner where a second set of targets became visible.

This was the most interesting portion of the stage:

There were two targets in the open, one on the extreme left of the picture above and the edge of one almost visible on the extreme right of the picture above. There were two targets visible behind the green door (no relation to the movie), and two targets visible from underneath the barricade to the left. Still nothing particularly unusual.

The interesting part of the stage are the targets in the distance on the right. There are three paper targets behind a sheet of black plastic (soft cover). In front of two of the targets are Mini-Poppers*. These targets are about 25 yards away. You can’t see most of the paper targets because of the soft cover, you have to shoot the steel targets down to get good access to the paper targets, and you have to shoot these fairly distant targets from below a barricade. Going prone left you with the problem of shooting the two targets to the left at almost a 90^o angle and while prone I was unable to get enough elevation to hit the distant targets and still be stable. I, and many others, squatted or kneeled to shoot below the barricade. Being a tall person this pushed my aging flexibility to the limit and a little beyond. My back felt a little odd for the rest of the day but is almost normal now.

I have never shot a stage where soft cover was the only way to get good hits on a target. I have never shot a stage where my flexibility was a limiting factor. Also unusual was that I was also the only person, out of 70 shooters, to get all 26 A-Zone hits.

My time of 29.98 seconds put me at 6^th place out of 20 shooters in my division and 33^rd out of 70 shooters overall.

Here is how the stage (and match) winner shot it in Open division in 19.30 seconds:

* See here for a picture of one. Official dimension are as below:

Via Eileen to the right @10Sgirl61:

It’s a little over stated. I figure I lose about 20 IQ points as soon as the buzzer goes off. Hence, my plans for the stage are made such that the average first grader should be able to follow it without too much trouble.

I had relatively modest goals for my Area One performance:

1. Don’t get hurt or hurt anyone.
2. Don’t get DQ’d.
3. Don’t finish last.

I met my goals. In Limited I came in 81^st out of 118 shooters. If you just look at Limited B class shooters then I came in 32^nd out of 38. Or if you just look at Limited Seniors then I came in 9^th out of 15. And finally, my favorite view, in Limited, Senior, B class shooters I came in 2^nd out of four shooters.

I had a good time at the match. My squad was very pleasant to be with. The last time I went to Area One, over 20 years ago, it was sometimes very uncomfortable. Some shooters were very aggressive in asserting their bullets had touch scoring rings that the R.O. called as out. I didn’t like that atmosphere. These were nice people to be with.

One of the most unusual event I have heard of at a USPSA match is that one guy got DQ’d at the chronograph stage:

I have a lot more to say about the event. But that is going to wait until I have time to edit the video.

Today I shot in an USPSA match at the Paul Bunyan Rifle and Sportsman’s Club (results are here). I’ve been shooting USPSA matches for over 20 years so one might expect there are very few, if any, things I have not seen and/or done or at least heard of in regards to stage designs. I certainly thought that before today. Sure, at the big matches they have fancy props and they do interesting things with platforms, carrying odd objects (I seem to remember a squirrel statue from many years back), and even a mining cart. But have you ever seen a stage which one only required one shot? A state which required a reload between each shot? Or a fixed time stage with no timer? Well, today I shot all of those oddities.

The stage called Quick or Slow was a single USPSA Popper at 35 yards. You started standing in a box with the gun loaded. Upon the signal you were to draw and knock down the Popper. If you missed you were required to reload between each shot until you knocked it down. I was the first shooter in our squad and I felt pretty good about dropping it on my first shot with a time of 2.21 seconds. Others did quite a bit better. The overall winning with a pistol caliber carbine dropped it in 1.17 seconds. The best pistol shooter (with an optic sight) dropped it in 1.38 seconds. I came in at 13^th place in Limited class out of 26 shooters, 38^th out of 97 overall, and got a whopping 2.647 points (in overall ranking) on that stage. One poor person took over 37 seconds to get 0.158 points (in overall ranking).

The stage called Murmaider had four disappearing targets which the shooter activated by stepping on a slightly raised platform. It was Virginia Count scoring so you had a maximum of eight shots. Your gun was loaded on a table directly downrange of the activator. Two targets were drop turners which presented themselves three times. The presentation time couldn’t have been more than a half second for each turn. There were two swinging targets that were pretty fast acting too. The “fixed” time was the total time the targets were visible. It was self actuated so there was no buzzer required. Hence, no timer. Here is how one shooter handled the problem:

Out of 40 points possible the overall winner got 31 (Limited class winner got 29). I got 22 points even after reflexively shooting at one of the drop turners three times when I realized I had a miss as I fired the shot. I knew I made an error and didn’t take one of the two shots I should have taken at one of the swinging targets which were much easier shots. This avoided the extra shot penalty but cost me the opportunity of another five points. The 22 points gave me a tie for 4^th and 5^th out of 28 shooters in Limited.

There was one other first for me today. I shot a Popper, got a clang from a hit, assumed it went down and continued with the rest of the stage without confirming that it went down. I didn’t realize it didn’t fall. I was totally surprised when the range officer asked me if I knew that I left it standing. We went over to look:

There was nothing wrong with my shot. I was shooting 40 S&W with a Power Factor of 170 or greater so I asked for a calibration test. I’ve never done that before. I’ve shoot low plenty of times and figured it just wasn’t worth the effort to get a calibration test and took another shot (or two) to get it to fall.

This time the range master came over, shot it with the 9mm calibration ammo almost exactly dead center in the circle portion of the target, and it slowly fell forward as it was supposed to. I got a miss. Oh well, it was a bit of bad luck.

For the first time in over 20 years I’m attending a level III USPSA match. In two weeks I’m going to Bend Oregon to participate in the Area 1 Championship. This consists of 17 stages shot over the course of three days. At this level match you get to shoot some interesting/different/challenging stages.

Some of the stages have a western theme such as Wild West, Showdown, and Outhouse Slider:

But there is one stage of particular note. This will be the most interesting/different/challenging stage I have ever shot:

I was at the range a couple days ago and noticed my handgun was shooting a couple inches high at 10 yards. Odd, I thought.

I put the target out to 25 yards and tried again. Yup, obviously high. I adjusted it down and continued my practice. It bothered me and I kept thinking about it.

Then I noticed the front sight looked a little odd. I looked closer and from a different angle and discovered the problem:

On the left is a new sight from my spare parts bin. On the right is the old sight.

I apparently broke it off shooting through a port at a recent match. To avoid damaging your gun you need to push all the way through the port or stay out of the port completely. If you are mostly centered in the port the recoil can interfere with the proper cycling and, as in this case, damage you gun.

I replaced the sight when I got home, order a new one to put in the spare parts bin, and went back to the range the next day to rezero my gun:

The top group is from five yards and the bottom group is from 27 yards away. One flyer with each six shot group but good enough to believe the sights are where they belong.