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Safe Area Reloads


ES13Raven

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Is practicing reloads with unloaded magazines in Safe Areas legal?

The Rule Book says:
2.4.1 Competitors are permitted to use the Safety Areas for the activities stated below provided they remain within the boundaries of the Safety Area and the firearm is pointed in a safe direction. Violations are subject to match disqualification (see Rules 10.5.1 & 10.5.12).
2.4.1.3 Practice the insertion and removal of empty magazines and/or to cycle the action of a firearm.


In IDPA, it will get you DQ'd:
2.10.7 Reload practice within the Safe Area is not allowed. An empty magazine may be inserted into a firearm to test functionality or to drop the hammer on a firearm with a magazine disconnect, but reload practice is prohibited.
2.10.8 The violation of any of the cases above will result in Disqualification from the match.

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You answered your question in the first post. Rule 2.4.1.3 allows practicing empty mag reloads. Empty being the important part. If you decide to do this, I'd advise you remove all other mags from your belt, just to make sure you don't accidentally pull a loaded one.

Edited by JAFO
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You answered your question in the first post. Rule 2.4.1.3 allows practicing empty mag reloads. Empty being the important part. If you decide to do this, I'd advise you remove all other mags from your belt, just to make sure you don't accidentally pull a loaded one.

+1

Liked!

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Consult the USPSA rulebook for USPSA and the IDPA rulebook for IDPA.

Thanks Captain Obvious...

IDPA spells it out pretty clearly. I was verifying if USPSA allows it.

uspsa also spells it out pretty clearly. you even quoted the rule.

there is good advice above to remove all other mags from your belt before you go into the safety area. It would be very easy to walk in there, replace your first loaded mag with your empty mag that you carefully brought in, and be dq'd.

I often do a few reloads before a classifier with a reload just to reinforce looking at the magwell and going at the speed I can see and do the reload consistently, and I am always careful to remove all other mags and leave them with my chair/range bag, and go to the safety area with ONLY the empty mag.

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Your best bet is to ask the MD at THAT match because there is always plenty of "Wanna be Range Police" that don't KNOW the rules looking to complain about something. If one of them see you doing it they are going to waste a good ten minuets of your day.

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I did exactly this at the Indiana 400. Hell, I asked Sarge to make double sure seeing as he was the CRO nearest the safety area I was about to use. I caught another shooter giving me a weird look, so I made sure to show him the empty mag. I was having mag drop issues and wanted to make sure it was fixed.

All the above advice is great. Use common sense and go by the rule book and you will be A-Ok.

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I do a bunch of draws and reloads before the first stage of the day at most every match. I do it before I load any of my magazines for the match, so I know they are all empty.

I often do a few reloads before a classifier with a reload just to reinforce looking at the magwell and going at the speed I can see and do the reload consistently, and I am always careful to remove all other mags and leave them with my chair/range bag, and go to the safety area with ONLY the empty mag.

This seems like the best plan if you are doing dry fire reloads after you have already started shooting the match.

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perfectly legal under the rule you cited. But in all honesty I never take anything but a gun and case into a safety area. I don't trust myself to not fondle a loaded mag.

+1

Gosh, I am even concerned that sometimes I'll have a few live rounds in my gun bag when I walk to the safe table. That's why I rarely will put my gun bag on the safe table. I stand behind it and holster my gun and then put the gun back on the ground by my feet to do my safety check and maybe a few draws.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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perfectly legal under the rule you cited. But in all honesty I never take anything but a gun and case into a safety area. I don't trust myself to not fondle a loaded mag.

+1

Gosh, I am even concerned that sometimes I'll have a few live rounds in my gun bag when I walk to the safe table. That's why I rarely will put my gun bag on the safe table. I stand behind it and holster my gun and then put the gun back on the ground by my feet to do my safety check and maybe a few draws.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

You can have loaded ammo in you bag or in magazines on your person, you just can't handle it.. so leave ammo that's in your bag in its boxes and leave loaded mags on your belt on your belt and don't mess with them, if you just are gonna gun up or down.

if you are gonna do reload practice during the match, I still like motosapiens idea.

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perfectly legal under the rule you cited. But in all honesty I never take anything but a gun and case into a safety area. I don't trust myself to not fondle a loaded mag.

+1

Gosh, I am even concerned that sometimes I'll have a few live rounds in my gun bag when I walk to the safe table. That's why I rarely will put my gun bag on the safe table. I stand behind it and holster my gun and then put the gun back on the ground by my feet to do my safety check and maybe a few draws.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

You can have loaded ammo in you bag or in magazines on your person, you just can't handle it.. so leave ammo that's in your bag in its boxes and leave loaded mags on your belt on your belt and don't mess with them, if you just are gonna gun up or down.

if you are gonna do reload practice during the match, I still like motosapiens idea.

Hm... Maybe it's just our range rule, but I thought it was a Uspsa rule that there was No ammo ON a safe TABLE.

Either way, i try to take the safe/conservative approach.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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perfectly legal under the rule you cited. But in all honesty I never take anything but a gun and case into a safety area. I don't trust myself to not fondle a loaded mag.

+1

Gosh, I am even concerned that sometimes I'll have a few live rounds in my gun bag when I walk to the safe table. That's why I rarely will put my gun bag on the safe table. I stand behind it and holster my gun and then put the gun back on the ground by my feet to do my safety check and maybe a few draws.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

You can have loaded ammo in you bag or in magazines on your person, you just can't handle it.. so leave ammo that's in your bag in its boxes and leave loaded mags on your belt on your belt and don't mess with them, if you just are gonna gun up or down.

if you are gonna do reload practice during the match, I still like motosapiens idea.

Hm... Maybe it's just our range rule, but I thought it was a Uspsa rule that there was No ammo ON a safe TABLE.

Either way, i try to take the safe/conservative approach.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The rules are pretty clear on this. :cheers:

2.4.1 Competitors are permitted to use the Safety Areas for the activities stated below provided they remain within the boundaries of the Safety Area and the firearm is pointed in a safe direction. Violations are subject to match disqualification (see Rules 10.5.1 & 10.5.12).

2.4.1.1 Casing, uncasing, and holstering unloaded firearms.

2.4.1.2 Practice the mounting, drawing, “dry-firing” and re-holstering of unloaded firearms.

2.4.1.3 Practice the insertion and removal of empty magazines and/or to cycle the action of a firearm.

2.4.1.4 Conduct inspections, stripping, cleaning, repairs and maintenance of firearms, component parts and other accessories.

10.5.12 Handling live or dummy ammunition (including practice or training rounds, snap caps and empty cases), loaded magazines or loaded speed loading devices in a Safety Area, or failing to comply with Rule 2.4.1. The word “handling” does not preclude competitors from entering a Safety Area with ammunition in magazines or speed loading devices on their belt, in their pockets or in their range bag, provided the competitor does not physically remove the ammunition, loaded magazines or loaded speed loading devices from their retaining or storage device while within the Safety Area.

Edited by Bkreutz
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Your best bet is to ask the MD at THAT match because there is always plenty of "Wanna be Range Police" that don't KNOW the rules looking to complain about something. If one of them see you doing it they are going to waste a good ten minuets of your day.

I have had a couple less experienced people ask me if what I was doing was OK. Fortunately everyone knows I'm a real RO that was worked and shot a bunch of big matches so they generally take my word for it. We also are fortunate to have quite a few trained and certified RO's in our club now. I see it as an opportunity to educate other shooters about the rules.

Edited by motosapiens
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AND remember the table is not all there is to a safety area. You can't handle ammo in a safety area. Rule doesn't specify table.

Excellent point (as usual). The safe area should be delineated by fault lines. If you are going to remove the ammo from your belt, do it OUTSIDE the fault lines.

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Of course range rules may still prohibit ammo in a safe area so make sure you read the signs posted around the area as well the rule book.

At a sanctioned match, only USPSA rules apply. Not local range rules.
And. Here we go!
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Of course range rules may still prohibit ammo in a safe area so make sure you read the signs posted around the area as well the rule book.

At a sanctioned match, only USPSA rules apply. Not local range rules.
And. Here we go!
Oh come on not this again.

Just sayin...

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Of course range rules may still prohibit ammo in a safe area so make sure you read the signs posted around the area as well the rule book.

At a sanctioned match, only USPSA rules apply. Not local range rules.

Range Rules can be more restrictive.

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