My first pistol match

Yesterday I bit the bullet and entered a USPSA club match.  I've had exactly two practice sessions with the club and I was hooked.

Here is the blow by blow:


First stage.  This stage was called confusion and I wish that I could have come at it a little later in the day.  From the start box there were two stacked targets on the right and two side by side targets on the left.  When that buzzer went off I was so hopped up I managed to miss one target completely and Alpha/Charlie the other three.  After the first two you run through a doorway and there are four more targets, two left, two right.  Somewhere in that group you've got to do a mag change.  I should have shot left first, then it's easy to do a safe mag change when switching to the right hand targets.  I failed at that and almost got a DQ for muzzle breaking the 180.  Then you procede through another doorway and engage three more targets, two left, one right.  I did ok on these and then it was time for another mag change.  Then there are four steel targets to shoot through a low porthole.  I took two shots on each before I got them all down.  The second row of targets were all A/C while the three before the steel were A/D, A/A, and A/C.  Third row were all C/C  An absolutely dismal performance.

Second stage.  This stage started in a chair facing a porthole with three targets.  I did really well on these getting A/A on all three.  Then there were two more groups of three targets that I believe were all A/C and then three steel targets that had to be engaged through the porthole.  I missed the steel quite a bit and that hurt my time as well.  I went slower on this round but those C hits really hurt.  Some people may be able to miss fast enough to win this game, but I can't.  The range officer warned me that I had my finger in the trigger guard during my mag changes.  This is a first for me.  I'm usually very careful about that but when concentrating on everything else it appears that I slipped.

Third stage.  Steel Qualifier.  With only six targets 36 feet away, you'd think this one would be easy.  So they but a board right in front of you and make you shoot around it.  When I practiced this, I placed one foot on each fault line and used that extra wide stance to get low and lean around the barrier.  When I shot it for real, I tried a left foot back stance.  I really had to crane around to shoot at the targets and it took me twelve rounds to put those six targets down.  After the stage, the range officer told me that I was missing left.  That was a real eye opener two me as I though I was missing high.  On further examination my middle finger was tightening with my trigger finger pulling the gun to the left.  *Sigh* Yet another thing to work on.

Fourth stage.  A texas star.  Hunt youtube if you want to see what this is.  I did pretty well on this stage making my goal of under one minute.  Of course par time would be 12 seconds so you know what my score was like.

Fifth stage.  I'd gotten another warning about my trigger finger so the only thing I worked on during this stage was trigger finger placement.  I ran it really slow and got some awesome hits through out the stage.

Moral of the story?  Slow is smooth and smooth is fast.  If I'd fired all my stages like the last one, I would have finished much higher in the standings.  I'll have to remember to come read this before my next match.

Religious Fanatics

The little punk ass preacher down in Florida?  How come this makes the news?  Burning books, what is this 1810?  The guy is a complete nut job with an invisible friend that talks to him.  The only people who should be paying attention to this guy are the ones with the nicely tailored jackets and rooms with upholsterer walls.

Hippie

You are 35% hippie.

 

You're in the middle, leaning towards the non-hippie side of things, but you're not afraid to try out some hippie philosophies.  Good going!  An open mind is all a person really needs to lead a happy life.

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New Gun on the Way

So, I was hanging out on my favorite gun forum and I saw a gun up for sale in the trading post.  Sig  239 in 9mm with 5 mags, 3 holsters, etc.  Basically the whole kit and caboodle minus ammo, for about the price of the gun in used condition.  I've only gotten to shoot a Sig once, a single stack full size 9mm.  I liked it, but not enough to spend the money on one.  This week, I bit, the price was just to good.  I can hardly wait to shoot this gun.  Will is be as nice as I remember?  Will it be as accurate as I've always heard they are?  Will it be small enough to become my new EDC?  I hope so, it cost me $300 in wife tax to bring this one home.

I Write Like

I write like
Ian Fleming

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Win 1000 rounds of .380 ACP Ammo

During the great ammo shortage of 2008 I really caught the reloading bug.  I've come to enjoy the simple pleasures of making my own little precisely measured dollops of lead poisoning.  That said, I wouldn't have the brass I needed to enjoy reloading without places like Lucky Gunner to buy ammo at.  So when Breda posted that Lucky Gunner and The Firearms Blog were giving away ammo.  I got excited.  With ammo prices still running almost 150% of 2007 pricing.  Every shooter is feeling the pinch.  Now I don't shoot .380.  Not because I don't like it or think it's not effective.  I just don't want to complicate my ammo supply.  So, because I've enjoyed reading Breda's blog so much, I'm giving any .380 ammo I win to her.

All this reminds me on why I've made my personal ammo decisions.  I stick with NATO calibers for all my firearms.  7.62 is plenty big enough for any animals I hunt.  5.56 is a great plinking round.  9mm is everything I need in a defensive round.  12 gauge is what the Marines use for house clearing, I've never been one to argue with a marine about ammo choices.  I find that twelve gauge works just fine from home defense to Canadian Geese.  It can be a lot of fun to play with different calibers, but if I really want to shoot a .45, I've got lots of friends to help scratch that itch. 

Now my son, he has to get all fancy with that 25-06, the little rebel.  He listens to rap music too.  I guess if that's as bad as he gets, I've probably got the best kid in the world.

PF9 Mark II Update

My new to me PF9 has performed beautifully for me.  It's been to the range three times kicking about 250 rounds down range each time.  No malfunctions to speak of.  But I've got a problem.  I can't seem to trust the PF9 design as much as I used to.  Having the takedown pin walk out on me makes me wonder when it'll happen again.  What if it happened when I really needed the gun?  So I found a screaming deal on the Sig P239.  Hopefully it'll be small enough to become my every day carry gun.