Curtis B. v2.0

[DocMedic]

I haven't been able to do a lot of shooting during the winter due to family commitments and other shooting projects I'm working on, however I was able to sneak in a Monday night uspsa match this week. It went as well as you would expect for not even picking up the gun in about a month to even dry fire. I didn't give the targets the attention that they deserve and ended up throwing a Miss on the first stage were only the A zone was visible. What made the matter worse is I shot it 3 times to make up that one miss and all that resulted was a nice one inch group in the hardcover. After doing that on my first stage it was almost impossible for me to stay focus for the rest of the night throwing at least 4 deltas through out the match. The one thing I can take away from the match is that the longer barrel guns will flop all over the place if you don't keep a strong grip on the gun and its a good reminder to squeeze the hell out of it when shooting or your not going to have solid recoil control.

Weather permitting I'll will try to shoot a match this coming Sunday, I need to focus a little bit on dry fire, and more importantly my grip. most of my sub par hits at Monday nights match was just the lack of me wanting to grip the gun hard and pulling the trigger when the sights just barely got into focus.

Right now I'm working on 3 different gun projects... Hopefully by before Christmas I'll have my 6.5CM Rifle put together from my SPR action and get it ready before the NewMexico PRS match in April. The Glock 34MOS came in and a FF3 was slapped on the slide to have some fun with Carry optics, It needs some trigger work! And 3rd project is turning my old National Match M16A4 into a True Iron 3gun rifle that weighs 9lbs. Like I said busy winter ahead.

[d_striker]

It's always surprising how quickly fundamentals like grip and reloads goes to shit when you're not shooting regularly.

[DocMedic]

I can't wait to get back to a normal regiment of shooting, I haven't touch my pistol since last time I posted due to the holidays and work. I had to beg and plead with the match staff ( Thanks guys ) to get into the match last night letting them know I would be late. I literally walked onto the range and heard my name called on deck. (I was last shooter) I took one quick look through the stage topped off my starting mag and made ready. Its real interesting to shoot a stage with just one look through, even though it was a simple 3 position stage shoot every time I got into a position I just got lost were to point the gun at. I ended finishing the stage train wrecking on a headshot only target, and that pretty much set the mood for the rest of the match for me. On the plus side I did do a decent 13-08 considering the fact I stunk it last time I shot it.

Right as of now, I don't see me shooting in the next few weeks either due to other commitments hopefully I can start getting back into Dryfire.

[DocMedic]

Well another month of Crap-tastic weather we're having in Colorado, but I did end up shooting more this month then I have in the past two. Outside of the Jan 4th match I haven't been able to shoot a USPSA style match in a while. However since I picked up a part time job at the indoor shooting range I've been able to practice live fire at least once a week, and its kinda crazy that I can burn 100 rounds in about 15mins with a live fire practice and get something out of it. Since I'm not 100% what I need to work on at this point I just been setting up classifiers and working my approach to how to them as they always seem to be my issue in any match. Everytime re-shot a COF I would focus hard on something else that I would like to work, like Grip strength and squeezing the gun as hard as I can throughout the array of targets, or going completely "Panda Mode rekt speed" and do nothing but target focus even though some targets have 50% hardcover. I honestly felt like I got more out of the practice then I have the few "club" matches I have attended.

On Sunday I attended a .22 Rimefire bolt match with target ranging from 50 yards to 200. Some of the targets a 50 yards must had been the size of a quarter and targets at 200 where as small as 4 inches. Since I'm shooting a PRS in April I figure this would be a good time to start understanding Wind calls and how to make them work for me. I did end up getting a fire hose worth of info too. Shooting 22 bullets with up to 20mph winds at 200 yards really makes you understand how wind can just wreck you if your not ready to adjust for it, also learned about "values" of wind. I'm not sure if I completely ready to use it at a match setting as of yet but It will require some more training. I also took this time to zero my .223 savage rifle at 100 yards... I wasn't able to get very tight groups with it at 100 yards using Federal red box .223 maybe 1.5 inches at the tightest, I might try to load some of my own 55s to see how much tighter I can get, or even use some of my left over 69's from last year, the only issue is I'm not sure what Twist rate my rifle is. Last time I asked in a savage forum I was given 3 different twist rate for my rifle. 1-12, 1-10 and 1-9. someone also pointed out that savage did release a 1-7twist of my rifle the same year I bought mine.

I also in the process of putting together a Form 1 to SBR my PCC gun, to have it ready for PCC division in USPSA, Because you know its coming

[DocMedic]

I haven't really done a lot of pistol shooting the past two months as I'm getting ready for the NM PRS Match in April, namely getting all the right pieces of gear put together and getting a good solid zero for my 6.5cm. I've printed probably the best group I've ever done in my life at a indoor 100 yard range. Only issue is I was using hornady 140gr Factory loads and these will not be the ammo I will be shooting for the match, instead I need to start working on my reloads which will be 140gr Noslers with IMR 4451 and CCI 200's(?) and also workup a load of ELD Match hornady bullets before the actual match itself. Chamber test with the Noslers looks like I can load them to 2.755 without issues, so I'll start there. Also the past month I picked up a part time job at the local indoor range, to help to pay for extra toys, and a save up for my wedding in October........... This has allowed me to get some practice in with my .22 trainer for those awkward shooting positions that you see in PRS matches

Next thing I need to do is confirm my zero on my .223 boltgun with my surplus ammo I loaded a couple years ago. This stuff is too hot for a AR as it blows primer pockets but should be fine in a bolt gun specially if all I'm using for is positional practice at distance.

Edited February 24, 2016 by DocMedic

[DocMedic]

25 yard practice with. 22lr boltgun

Weakhand not weak wall

Edited February 25, 2016 by DocMedic

[DocMedic]

For the Month of February and early March I've been practicing positional shooting at 25yards with my .22 boltgun, It has been interesting on what I have learned about breaking a clean shot. The "Aim Small, Miss small" concept really comes to play in PRS style shooting. Last night I finished step loading some 6.5CM with IMR 4451 and I'm going to see how it shoots tonight to see which load I'll be using.

Also this past Sunday I was able to make it to a USPSA match, the original plan was to go Skiing but the sister family all got the flu, so plan B was 3gun. Couldn't get in. So Plan C, USPSA match. I shot at Aurora Gun Club and they had a staggering 85 shooters show up to the match! In the past I knew this match filled in the 100+ at times but I figured since a lot of shooters were shooting at Area 2 the match wouldn't be that filled..... This was the first time I've touched my Production gun since early January, and almost elected to go shoot Carry optics with my Glock 34 MOS, since its been the gun that I've been carrying at work the most and have actually put couple rounds through in the past two months. But I resisted and shot the gun I'll be shooting for are Level 2 matches here in Colorado.

I started on Stage 5 which I'll post video later on, but stage was you had to drop a chicken inside a bucket at start. Right after the beep I didn't quite had the best grip on my pistol on the draw so I kind of winged my first two shots at a 6 yard target, then transition to four targets at 20ish yards. Then I pushed out to the furthest left corner then back out to middle right then outer right. Outside of Left hand shooters I believe I was the only one that started at the left middle of the stage, every shooter on my squad elected to start at the very left corner of the stage once they dropped the chicken in the bucket. I don't believe it cost me any extra time the way I did it, and it allowed me to finish the hardest string of targets right away without having a goofy transition swing while retreating to the next target array. I did end up shooting the stage a little slower then I would like but seeing how it was my first stage in months I let the gun sights throttle my speed. When it was said and done I did drop 6 C's and 1 D. the Delta was called, I rushed a shot getting into position on the middle right targets and the sights were floating at the D when I pulled the trigger. As for the C's I chalk it up to nervousness, I notice in the past that if I don't stay discipline to dry fire and let my nerves get to me I tend to push the gun a little left when I pull the trigger, this was evident with the 6 C's as they were barely on the left A/C pref line of the target, even though I thought I called them A's.

Stage 1, had 13 full targets at 25 yards with a walls blocking them making it a some short of a memory stage. I just broke down the stage with 3.5 shooting positions engaging in 4,5,4 target arrangements. I shot my sights for the stage and did ok, turns out its been a while since I've shot at 25 yard targets and my bullets have a bit of drop at that distance. I ended up tagging the bottom C (14 times) on most of the targets just right under the A zone. I did end up dropping another D, on my last target of array due to rushing to get into the next position, oops. The trick to this stage was just get your hits, only myself and another shooter were able to clean the stage for production.

Stage 2, I finally got the nerves out of my system and ended up only dropping 2 C's on the stage with a decent speed. I did end up bobbling my last reload but I had about 4 feet of movement so I was able to get it in and position before I stop my movement completely.

Stage 3 Classifier. some 99 series, don't know don't care. got over confident dropped 2 Mikes in the hardcover, Sad face.

Stage 4, was a speed shoot with 2 paper targets with half hardcovers and 3 shots each and one popper that was in front of a No shoot. Even though it was a "Speed Shoot" I took as long as I needed to call A's only and took an extra tenth of a second to aim at the steel popper, and it paid off.

I'm loving the fact that more people are shooting Production now then when I started in 2008. At that time I think there was only 10 of us and the Production GM decided to move to Arizona (Thanks STU! >_<) So I had no one to chase and ended up shooting different divisions. The past few matches outside of my indoor match there has been nothing sort of at least 20 shooters in production, with some up in coming guys getting really good. We still don't have any GM production shooters (Jerry's close!), Maybe at the end of the my 3gun season I'll start taking a serious look at it. As right now its just to hard to focus on that level of performance for one gun game when the money is in PRS/3gun for me atm.

Oh also I wanted to add I've lost 10lbs since January too! I'm still in my Cut phase but I think I can drop another 10 by the end of June.

Edited March 8, 2016 by DocMedic

[thermobollocks]

Only two mikes in the hard cover? Look at this overachiever.

[DocMedic]

Little less then a month away from the NM PRS Match. I'm still fine tuning my 6.5 Creedmoor ammo for the match and have probably settled using Hornady 140gr BTHP match bullets with 42 grains of 4451. and for practice I'll be using Nosler 140gr Competition Match with the same grains. Last week I picked up a scale device that will allow to measure the Ogive instead of the OAL, so that should help keep the rounds a little more consistent between the different bullets and allows me to squeeze maybe a little more accuracy out of the barrel, both rounds are squeezing out of the barrel about 2790fps, I need to get to the range to True the flight at 300 yards and 600 yards to get a true DOPE card.

Last few weeks I've probably put in 50-100 rounds a week on my .22 trainer at 25 yards just practicing everything odd position that I can think off, and I can say the training still paying off. I also developed a "pump pillow" that I will think will serve me quite well, its a little heavier then a real pump pillow but has the modular ability to break down to several smaller bags if needed. I need to get away from the .22 for training here pretty quick and actually run my bolt gun outside of load Development, next week we'll be starting up are tactical rifle matches and i'll think i'll run the bolt gun instead. Targets are not far 300-400 out, and usually 4moa base targets but it will give me a chance to work odd position under a clock, and I'll keep it to a 1shot to one target game.

Edited March 17, 2016 by DocMedic

[DocMedic]

I was able to play a little USPSA last night at the local night match. Unfortunately I suffered a bit of a KaBoom on my pistol on my second stage of the match, not sure what it was, It didn't feel like a double charge but it definitely stop me in middle of my run as it didn't cycle the gun all the way, and I took a few seconds to examine my pistol to make sure I didn't blow it up before I finished the stage. Probably cost me a whole 5 secs but I would rather make sure my gun was fine. After the stage I took it back in the gun smith area to double check to make sure there was no damage, pistol seems fine but to make sure I had a couple people take a look at it. I couldn't even find the piece of brass either, so I have no idea what it was. On stage 3 I decided to lay back a little and see what the pistol would do but it seemed to run fine. Classifier was 13-06, I only dropped 2C's and had a good sight picture sweeping the headshot only target so that was fine.

Stage 1: was 3 open targets with the rest being headshot only, and only one shot per target. When I practice I usually do accuracy drills at 17 yards on the head A-box, all these target where under 7 yards, and I'm embarresd to say but I never shot head boxes that close, So ended up holding a little high on each head shot, just enough above the A-head-box area, Picked up a lot of B's on that one.

Stage 2: Is where I had my Kaboom in middle of the stage. This was the highest Point stage at the match. 125pts, and since the rest of the stages were worth less then 75pts each ( 75pts, 45pts, and 50pts) my match was sunked. Oh well at least I didn't come out of it with a blown up gun

Stage 4: Was shooting the same array as stage 2 only with one shot per target (9 targets) in low light, I was able to see my fiberoptic clearly but wasn't able to see out out side edges of the front sight, but since this stage was shot after stage 2 I decided to back off and see what my pistol was telling me, as I didn't want to completely destroy my pistol. but it ended up running smooth and I only ended up dropping 1C

Stage 3: was the classifier, I laid down what I thought was a decent time with only dropping 2C's. But with a HF of 5.9 it barely puts me at 71%

Little less then a Month left for NM PRC match, I've believe I got the load down correctly although a bit slow, at a 100 yards the groups can be covered with a dime, since this will be my first match using a Boltgun I'll take a download in speed for the accuracy (2705fps vs 2800 fps I should be aiming for). This weekend I'm going to confirm dopes out to 300,400, and 600 yards. As well as work on more position shooting with a good buddy to get ready for this match. I don't plan on beating some of the best guys in the PRS sport but I'm going to put every effort into it to have a top finish.

[DocMedic]

Two weeks ago I shot the New Mexico Precision rifle Championship down in Albuquerque. This was also the first time I used a boltgun in a major match. Due to the weather just sucking for the past two months, I never got a chance to stretch the legs out on the gun past 100yards, so by the time of the match the barrel had 120 rounds fired through it. I was able to get a solid zero at a 100 and had to use velocity to create my Ballistic cards. Before the match I settle on 140gr HPBT Hornady's at 42grs of IMR4451, speeds out of the barrel were 2680fps, the load was really accurate so I didn't want to mess with it to much weeks before the match.

Day one Saturday was a very long day, I figured trying to knock down 20+ stages in a 2 day match was going to be brutal. I was blessed being the first shooter on the first stage of the day , luckily it was only one distance from prone shooting at shoot / no shoot plate rakish target at 475? I ended up cleaning the KYL plates (Know your Limits) even though my heart was jumping all around in the glass, I was pretty ecstatic.

I manage to do well for the rest of the day given the equipment I have, only made a couple of mistakes, one was running out of ammo on stage, I'm so used to AR's locking back on last shot that under pressure my brain completely went into auto pilot and ran the bolt dry. Second mistake of the day was adding to much elevation (a whole mil to much) on a stage was only going to do hold overs. This was the last stage of the day and I chalked it on tiredness and not rechecking my settings on my dope card.

Day Two, we started on the long range stages, starting on the1000yard stage. I wasn't able to clean the stage ( couldn't hit the last target, not sure how small the target was) but did end up hitting 3 of the 4 targets, so that's pretty cool. first time shooting that distance with my own guns.

Stage 3 was suppose to be a gimme 6 point stage and I completely blew it, basicly shooting from prone at 12 inch targets at 300 yards, scored for points and then for time for tie breakers, and Unlimited rounds... I felt pretty confident as it was nothing hard but as I hit my first target I wasn't able to hit anything else... The back stop behind target Two must had been a good 40-50 yards behind the stand. So when I missed my first shot, I saw the hit go low, so I compensated for the shot and aim higher only for the shot look like it went low again, I ended up blowing 20 rounds on target two in the 60 secs we had on the stage never realizing I really was going higher on the target but the optical illusion made by the back berm seem I was missing low... after that stage my last 3 stages didn't go so great as that got into my head and I couldn't stop thinking of that screw up. Another factor that I wasn't aware of also is somewhere between 120 rounds and 240ish rounds my barrel picked up and extra 100fps of speed. Every stage past the 300yard turn and burn stage I was hitting POA/POI a half mil high. Not the greatest when your targets are 2MOA and smaller.

I did manage to accomplish 2 goals, One is not to zero a stage, even though my last 3 of 4 stages were only on point hit per stage, and two finish the match above 50%. If you included those who DQ I was at 50%. I was actually surprised I thought I shot a pretty solid match up to my last few stages. Even If did clean the turn and burn stage and got a few extra points, I would had only finished about 6 or 7 positions higher, it was a really tight match.

Things to learn from. I elected to not bring a Tripod to the match as I had no time shooting off of one and figured you would not have a lot of time to deploy one with the short stage times. What I wasn't ready for is HOW Tripods were actually USED in PRS matches. I was stunned! I thought USPSA/3Gun shooters were gamie as hell, boy I was wrong! I asked some veterans of PRS about what was going on and even they told me this is something kinda new and not a lot of people have been using tripods like that till the end of the past year. Dually noted. Bringing a tripod next time.

I really need to true my Zero out to a 1000yards, now this was more of a weather issue as it seemed to snow every weekend here in Colorado, but there was couple times I question my dope as it was all computer generated.

Follow Through! I had what I believe were rock solid position before I pulled the trigger but I let all the other things after the trigger pull disrupt me. ( working the bolt, dialing the turrets for the next target, looking for the next target.) that I never follow through the glass to see how the wind was effecting my shots. So I would make the same mistakes twice several times and not correct for the correct wind till the 3rd shot.

I felt I did pretty well not over magnifying on the stages, but I know they're two stages that I had to dial back to 15x due to either I couldn't find the next target or I couldn't see the dirt splash. I could had honestly left my scope at 15x the whole match minus one or 2 stages that I could had shot it at less then 6x.

Barrel speed up if they're new. Lesson learnt, chrono'd before the match at 2680, after the match the next day chrono'd at the same place only to get 2775.

Next up He-Man 3gun Nationals in less then a month, Focusing on lots and lots of shotgun loading practice and make sure I didn't lose zero on my GAP-10. Going to do some 25 yard off hand pistol shots too with the 45.

Edited April 19, 2016 by DocMedic

[CHA-LEE]

What is the Tripod gaming about?

[DocMedic]

Sorry Charlie, I didn't see your question. I won't spill the beans here but if you see me at a local you're more then welcome to ask me.

Just finished up shooting He-Man 3-Gun Nationals in Raton, NM. % wise I did a little better then I did the year before against Kuan. But other then that it felt like I did worse , I did a lot of practice with Shotgun and pistol, that I kind of let the rifle practice go neglected and the reason I did so was 1) I'm usually a strong rifle shooter so I didn't feel it would bite me, and 2) weather one the weekends here in CO has just sucked. The shotgun practice help greatly as I didn't miss any reloads and I only had to make up shot one slug target the whole match. The pistol practice was more the fact that I was using a different system then I have previously, which was a XDM 45cal 5.25. This pistol performed well for this match, I think I only had to make up 3 steel shots through out the entire match, last minute I decided to wrap the whole thing in grip tape and I'm glad I did, I was able to get a solid purchase on grip every time I pulled the trigger. For the rifle, anything that was under 300yards at I was good no issues, it was once they got past 350 and out I was having some serious issues. Multiple shots, and having to skip past targets, basically having to eat a Sh!t brick. Also on one of the stages the rifle targets where 200 yards and in, so I decided to use my "less then expensive" ammo and that ended up costing me 2 heavy jams on the stage.. Lesson learnt. Also I tried to mess around using my PRS shooting bag on stage... that was stupid, I had great rock steady positions for rifle shooting, at the cost of time, and it cost me a lot of time. PRS bag is great for PRS shooting but I'll leave it in the car for 3gun.

All in all I lost 3rd place in He-Man Irons by less then 2%. This match was a great but It has made me think of some future equipment changes if I want to continue shooting He-Man at RM3G. I let my Fiancée shoot my DPMS G2 with a scope for this match and that thing ran flawlessly, with no hic-ups what so ever. I want to see what that rifle will do with some handloads at 300 and 600 yards. If it proves to be a good rifle at those distances I might switch out from the GAP-10 to the DPMS. the Weight difference is insane between the 2 rifles and the DPMS really does feel like a "little" larger AR-15.

Next up is the USPSA Mile High Showdown. This one will probably be my only Major match that I will shoot pistol only, but its a good one to shoot, I'll be shooting production for this one so my focus for the next month is not to touch any other gun except my CZ till this match is done and over with.

Edited May 17, 2016 by DocMedic

[DocMedic]

Long week,I just got done helping to run our Burris regional steel challenge match here in Colorado. I assist the match as the assistant MD / RM. The few days prior to setup where nice and beautiful days. Day of setup on friday? 40 degrees with 20 to 30mph winds. We were fortunate that the next day main match was a beautiful 72 degrees with little wind and Lucky for me only one target needed repair through out match.

I shot my match after setup with some good friends and a buddies (14?)yo daughter, so even though the weather sucked I was with good company. Ive been really impress with the girl, I've been shooting with her for the past 3 years at this match and it's been amazing to see her grow up as a shooter. Her shooting is getting sharper.. As well as her tongue ;P. I decided to shoot limited as my first go around with my Cz 75 lts as mile high is only a few weeks. I was doing ok for the first few stages then the cold and wind started to really get bad, at the end of me shooting my last stage 5toGo I couldn't feel my fingers and had a slope performance because of it. In total my limited time was 139 secs. One of my worst.

I decided to shoot my PCC gun after I finished shooting limited, reason behind it was trying to finish up fast for the others to get done and headed back home before the weather got bad. After the second stage though the weather broke and it was getting a little nicer. I got to say I love shooting my Mpx. offhand rifle has always been my strong suite. And shooting that fast is what I'm good at. This was the first time I shot this thing in any real competition and did not disappoint! At the end I shot a 87.54 sec match. I haven't even shot one steel stage this year for practice, so I'm super ecstatic about my performance. pcc is for me and I will welcome the master division on July 1St

[DocMedic]

Yesterday I decided to come out of my cave and shoot a local USPSA match in Pueblo, CO. This was a good "stress" match for me before I shoot the Mile High Showdown on Saturday, and Sunday. Since after He-Man nationals last month, I've been doing quite a bit of live fire practice with my CZ-75 LTS, focusing on Accuracy drills mostly at 25 yards, some dot drills at 7 yards, and doing some 2/2 body head shots at varies distances to see what type of target vs sight focus I can get away with. At home I would dry fire a little, mostly reloads and draws without pulling the trigger all the way through the double action. With this type of practice it helped me focus on other things that I don't get to practice and that is movement, IE getting the gun up, ready and If possible Shooting before I get locked into a shooting position, which I felt like a had a pretty good attempt on, I kept light on my feet and I didn't feel like I had any wasted movement at the match, I'll post Match video later when I get home, but I'll discuss what I think went well;

-First I kept the gun up and pointed in the direction of the target ready to shoot just before I entered a position when a barrier is used to block next set of targets.

-focusing on trying to be light on my feet helped me kill some time that I normally lose out on a stage, I kept my center of balance low and was able to get out of shooting position relatively fast after shooting the array of targets.

-Reloads were mostly on point. I don't remember having any fumbles outside of the classifier.

-I finally figure out the whole "double-action" thing, I don't remember once were I thought my draw and shoot was hindered by working through the trigger.

-Shot placement was good. There was 5 headshot only targets through-out the match at various distances. 3 of which I chose to go headshot only for which I think gave me a leg up at least in production. Of all 5 targets I only dropped 1 Bravo, the rest where A hits going at a good pace of shooting.

Now these are the things I need to think about and try to work on before the Mile High Showdown.

-Reloads... because I shoot production and I have a tendency to wiff them.

-As stupid as it sounds, Shot placement on far and tight shots! Every live fire practice session I start off doing 25 yard head shot groups to warm up, so this one was surprise for me. There was one target at 25ish yards that had a no shoot in front of it a yard or two, You probably had 50% vertical Azone that you could realistically hit. I don't know if I got over confident or what, but I was trying to go for A hits on it regardless if the No-shoot was in the way. The first shot went well, pretty much a well aimed shot and execution of the trigger, second shot I rushed, sending it low left. If the no shoot wasn't there it would have been a A hit regardless but with the no shoot in front it was a good ole Alpha, mike, no shoot.. I don't think this was a visual sight issue, I had a good alignment of sights to where I wanted to shoot. I think it had more to do with the follow through of the trigger, I just remember the gun dipping just before the trigger press after the shot broke. Could be a good chance I rushed it because I needed to transition to the next target, but It did kinda blow that I ended up hitting that No shoot since All I've been live firing is super tight shots.

-Go a little more Sight focus when no-shoots are in the way, stage one had a no shoot splitting 2 shoot targets requiring 3 shots each but at 5 yards. I ended up breaking the perf on one of those targets on my 3rd shot fired on the target. I had a good sight picture on the first 2 shots, and I think I went completely target focus on the 3rd shot.

-Stay low if and when I need to. This is something I need to work on, as I have a tendency to shoot upright a lot, because that's usually how I practice, so it takes more movement to start moving, costing me un-needed extra time. I think I did well at it at this match but its something I need to really think and focus on.

I'm going to Chrono my loads this week to make sure everything is good to go in that department and I'll probably spend a practice session on checking my sights at different distances to make sure nothing "funny" has changed. Looking over the MHS stages I don't see anything to crazy that might require me to practice for, though I know they have small steel knock down plates at that range so I'll still work on my accuracy drills throughout the week. Honestly this is the most prepped I've ever been for a all pistol match in a long time, I'm thinking of just practicing instead of going to shoot as many local matches has helped me more then I thought. Lets see if I can keep that going for me at the match, there are some great shooters that will be shooting Production, unfortunately 2 of them will be shooting in a one day format since they are match staff, so I hoping there shooting performance doesn't take a ding because of that, because 12 stages in day is quite a bit. The squad I'll be shooting on has all but 2 production shooters, and quite a bit of them will bring the heat.

------------------------------------

I wanted to separate this section from the above as I feel that's the stuff I needed to work on for MHS. I was going to shoot production at Pueblo, but at the last minute a email was sent on Friday stating they would allow PCC unofficially also! I got ahold of the staff and asked if it was ok if I could shoot two guns for that match, else I would just shot production since MHS is a week a way. We ended up having 4 PCC shooters for this match. I ended up shooting my SIG MPX with one modified mag that allows 35 rounds.

While the focus on production was to get ready for MHS and shoot the match like I would like to shoot MHS, I shot PCC for the pure thought process of going fast, and because of that I made sure I shot my production gun first on every stage so I didn't let my "bad-habits" transition into my production shooting. Also I wanted to do a fair comparison of PCC to Open. John Arenas aka Glock26Toter was also shooting the match, and its safe to say that If three years ago I decided to stick with USPSA instead of 3-Gun, he'd be the one I'd be competing with today. At the match finish he ended up beating me by less then 1% with his Open gun, also shooting a little less then a second faster then me for the match. He shot a 81.75 match, and I shot a 82.31 Match. Points are a little skewed as Cha-Lee won the match with his limited gun putting John at 96% and me at 95%.

Now that I've shot Open and PCC, it gives me a somewhat of a better picture on how PCC should be approached in USPSA. I shot PCC with the mindset of going fast, dis-regarding trying to get the highest point total per stage, as July 1st approaches my tune will probably be different as points do matter from Major vs Minor scoring. I could had shot about 4 to 5 seconds faster on one stage then I did, but I was using my production plan vs using that on what a open shooter would do, the two different plans cost me at least that much on a stage, I actually beat my PCC gun HF with my production gun HF.

So lets discuss the advantages vs disadvantages for PCC and Open.

Magazine capacity - Open has a 170mm limit where as PCC as of now has no limit, I was able to easily modify one of my MPX mags to hold 35 so I don't have to reload on any stages except for the classifier. This is a bonus for PCC on 32 round stages where reloading will be needed to be done for open shooters.

Reloads - It's more natural to load a open gun fast, large mag ports, mag well is under the shooting hand. On PCC they do feel slower, the MPX does have a somewhat of a flared magwell but not enough I would consider like a open gun. I'm hoping over time since PCC is a real division we might start seeing Magwell kit, specifically for the MPX. But one of the nice things in reloading a PCC is that I've found is that you don't have to get off the gun and off the sights and off target.

Movement while shooting. Both are easier to do due to having a dot, but I find a PCC gun is easier to stay on target better moving faster as it has 3 points of contact while moving instead of one. (shoulder, hands, and face)

Starting positions - this is a given, low ready will always be faster then a normal draw. Although there is little benefit that PCC has over Open, if the shooting area is away from the starting position, IE run to position and start shooting. Only benefit is you already have the grip you want on your gun.

Leaning shots - Easier with a open gun since it only makes one point of contact on the shooters. Shooting PCC as a right hand shooter I had to lean Way more left to engage target around the left side of a wall.

Dot Offset - Plaques both division, more so with a PCC gun, but a lower mount reddot could fix this depending on setup. my Open gun I believe there is a 1.15 inch offset, on my PCC its closer to 2 inches.

Major vs minor scoring - No dought Open wins here, this a good comparison to limited minor vs limited major. Unless you are going for points in PCC, your going to need to speed up at least 10% faster then the open shooters if you want to beat them without slowing down for better hits. at the Pueblo match I had one stage where I can do this, ended up almost being 2 seconds faster then the Open shooters and still getting away with OK points. I had two stages where speeding up faster wasn't possible due "180 Check" targets. Those stages I felt like I needed to get better hits then go faster as it would be more beneficial to my HF. When going for points though, you can't be Production slow you still got to move.

Some great things to think about as PCC moves forward to being a new division in USPSA. My initial thoughts of PCC if your competing to be at the top is; You'll need to be able shoot on the move anytime there is a advantage to it. If you have to post and shoot, go for the points but do it fast and get ready to transition out of position as soon as possible.

[DocMedic]

So I typed this nice long post yesterday about my experience at the Mile High Showdown, but Internet Explorer decided that my backspace key decided it would go back a webpage vs deleting the word I was trying to correct. Oh well... Short notes:

Mile High Showdown was a blast! a Level 2 match with Level 3 quality shooting,

-It was hard match.

-I shot to reserved the first day (great points but, times were slow), second day I tried to speed up too much dropped to many points, finally found a good pace on a few stages to think about.

-60 points in penalties, 3 misses and 3 NS. 2 misses came from my first stages where I was the first shooter on the first target Array....

- Took 3rd place overall in production in a deep field of shooters.

-Was surprised of skill of shooters that are "local" but I have never shot with before.

That basically sums it up.

With July 1st approaching, I'll be switching to PCC as my Main division and using production as a secondary division when PCC is not offer if I attend more local matches. This weekend I help run the NSSF rimfire challenge in my area, outside of sighting in my iron sight guns I'll probably not going to put the same amount of effort in training before the match like I did the month prior of MHS.

I have 3 Major matches left in 3-gun this year, SoCo 3gun championship match, RM3G, and then Resurgence. SoCO will be on July 9th. the transition to PCC will help with the rifle training for that match as all but 1 bay might have long range rifle targets so it be more offhand rifle style shooting. I'll be switching the CZ-75 LS-P for my STI 9mm tactical, but the training that I did for MHS should transfer over to SoCo well, i'll probably try to do live fire at least once or twice a week with my pistol to keep them up. Rest of time will be focus on rifle offhand training and dry fire shotgun reloading. I will also need to check zeros for slugs. Also I need to get into the mind set of Lolli Pop spinners... This unfortunately I do not have time to physically train on before the match so I'm going to need to examine some old videos.

I'll post video of MHS when the opportunity arises.

Edited June 21, 2016 by DocMedic

[Husker95]

You shot a great match. Interested to see your video - I still think you shot that target twice on the stage Nick and I were ROing!

[DocMedic]

You shot a great match. Interested to see your video - I still think you shot that target twice on the stage Nick and I were ROing!

Nope Shot it only once

Edited June 23, 2016 by DocMedic

[DocMedic]

This past weekend I helped ran the NSSF rimefire challenge in Pueblo CO, stages where being setup at 6am on Friday morning and we started to shoot the Friday shooters about 9am. With just finishing up Mile High last weekend I didn't put anytime into practice the past weekend, all I did was take the .22 pistol indoors and checked my zero, sure wish I checked my rifle zeros too.. The day prior of the match I realized I didn't have enough CCI's to shoot at the match with my sti 2011 .22 conversation so I took a chance and shot some Aquia .22 ammo, I ran a mag through the gun before hand to see if it work and I had no jams, but unfortunately during the match I didn't have one pistol stage where the ammo didn't choke on me at least once, and since of the 9 stages 5 of them where pistol so I pretty much pissed my match away at the point. I wasn't to motivated when I got to the rifle section either as the ammo also hits about 4 inches right at 25 yards, causing me to "over swing" on my first rifle stages a few runs, after the stage I went to verify zero and that's when I found out I was off.. Oh well live and learn, I did end up finishing 4th Limited Irons for the match but my time wasn't great, winning time was 96 seconds and I shot a 110.

I have the Colorado 3Gun Championships here in two weeks, I need to get my head out of the clouds and start training to get ready for it, I'll be shooting limited/1x for the match. I still feel like my pistol shooting is strong after MHS, I was doing stuff with the pistol at the NSSF match that I normally wouldn't due thanks to the training I was doing for MHS. Yesterday was the first time I picked up my shotgun since May, I'm still debating if I want to put a Match savor on the shotgun and up the shell count to a 12 round mag. The Benelli has been sitting at 10rnd tube for a while now without a match savor and I'm starting to understand the benefits on having one, the smaller mag tube makes the shotgun easier to point but from hearing form the MD, the match will have a all shotgun stage, these seem to always benefit longer mag tubes. I don't know I'm going to have to play with it a bit this weekend during some live fire practice to see if I'm going to do that setup, but for right now I need to get the LM choke back in the gun. For rifle I hear we're going to have a 100+ yard, lolli pop spinner, as of now I have no way to practice this but I do have previous experience from Iron Man with this target at rifle distances, I did find a bag full of 75's that I had loaded up for Iron man so I'm going to see where they hit at 100 yards and end up using them for that prop.

Goals before Co3GC

-Dry fire both rifle and pistol, work on transition drills, both target and weapon

-Dry Fire reload for shotgun nightly at least 30 minutes

-Check POI/POA for 75gr at 100 yards also check my zero's on 3gun rifle with my 55's

-Live fire practice either Saturday or Sunday prior to the match, maybe both days if I can swing it.

-Get FOCUSED!!!

At lunch I'm going to stop by the local range and see where my reloads are hitting with my 9mm STI, also I rebuilt a couple mags this weekend with new TTI springs and bottom metal, I want to see how they'll run.

[DocMedic]

The Colorado 3 Gun championships is in the books and it was a great match, Kevin the MD tried to incorporate 3GN style stages at the match of "pick and choose". It was a tight race in Limited, which I unfortunately lost by one stage. I had a rifle ejecting a magazine issue at the most critical time and I was having one hell of a issue spinning a rifle spinner target, that I'm not a huge fan of. But more on that later. I took 3rd Limited with 3 stage wins out of 8 and 1 stage win being a overall stage win. (Gotta be happy about taking those from the OPEN shooters ).

While I've shot optional targets stages at other matches in the past, I haven't experience the 3GN extent of it. And to be honest I don't know if I like them or not. Its nice to play into your strengths on a stage, but to completely skip over a gun makes me feel we are not balancing the trifecta of 3-gun sport, which in my opinion is that you have to do well with the tools presented to you on the stage. But with that said I did get a Overall stage win because I knew I could miss a hell lot more with a pistol then I could with a shotgun on the move. I was with the "super squad" if you would to call it that, and we pretty much all shot the stages the same, and if not it was usually a 50/50 balance of strategies, and even with different strats the time between them were only a few seconds depending on shooter. But on stage 5, a very heavy optional stage, the stage winner who placed 5th Limited blew everyone away by almost 5 seconds... I'm not sure where the hell he was able to make up 5 seconds from the rest of us, at least not using my strategy or the 1st limited shooter's strategy. I'm actually hoping he puts up a video on that stage, there must had been something we missed that he saw.

Overall though except for one stage it was a close race, stage 2 that had a rifle spinner at 100 yards ended up sealing my match though. Its been over 5 years since I've shot a rifle spinner and top that with a magazine jam / fumble that allowed the spinner to almost stop. It took me 140+ seconds on a stage the winner did it in 75+... Live and learn.

And just like ALL THE TIME, I'm having issues again with shotgun. Out of the 8 Stages I had issues with at least 6 stages where it will not load the next round onto the liftgate requiring me to mortar it on the side of my thigh to get it back running, each time I had to do this it cost me at the very least 1 second. Only one stage it ran 100%, the other stage I choose to not use it as I feared it would jam up on me costing me more time then its worth. I'm not sure what is causing the issue, and I might have to take video of it but I thought I finally figured out what the problem was before the match and put at least 300 rounds in practice without any hiccups before the match. After my first two stages, I dissembled my whole shotgun LUBED EVERYTHING, and changed out mag tube springs, still didn't fix the issue. When I took it home, I stripped it down completely and clean and re-oiled everything, I also had a thought of putting a counter weight that helped compress the spring a little more thinking that it would help get the round to chamber on the lift gate during recoil, I went to put a box through it and it ran fine. On the second day it only jammed up twice and those times were when the shot changed to a different load, ie bird to slug, or bird to "heavier" bird. still not expectable. That M2 has been a problem since I had the port work down on it. The reloads have been spot on specially Quad loading but the shotgun is costing me a second every time it jams. I'm not sure if it likes the 12 round tube or not, but I'm going to see how it works with the 8 Round tube since I have to get it setup for the Resurgences 3-Gun match late September. I'm glad I'm shooting Heavy Irons at RM3G, at least I know the nova runs 99%... Maybe its time to look at other options for shotguns.

Speaking of which RM3G is just around the corner (Less then 5 weeks) and I need to figure out gear again. I'll be shooting He-Man Irons, so it will be the NOVA and XDM .45 again. The rifle is what I'm unsure of. The Gap-10 shoots bug holes but also weighs 14 pounds and does not like to be shot "fast". The DPMS is light, loves to shoot fast but I'm unsure if its accuracy past 300 yards, and is not currently setup for "limited". I hate stripping scopes off of zeroed guns but I'm going to have to take my Spitfire off my .223 gun and place it on the DPMS just so I can run them side by side.

One day I'll figure out these gun games

Edited July 12, 2016 by DocMedic

[DocMedic]

This past weekend I shot a USPSA match with my SIG MPX for the first OFFICIAL time! For the match there was 3 of us and we were all on the same squad. I kept the "best PCC practices" with me incase someone that didn't know to much of PCC or Rifles in general wouldn't start us in a position that was subjective. Overall it was a very fun match, while I shot the classifier fast I did not get very good hits and with PCC being scored minor that one will be a low B classification based on Open HF scores.

Scores can be found here: https://practiscore/results/23115

Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/docmedlc

I will upload video later but I did upload some 3rd person vids on my youtube channel. I'll change my signature to reflect the channel, but once I get a free moment I will upload 1st person view of the match.

For the match I wanted to focus on one thing, and that was shoot on the move when I could get away with it and when it was a clear advantage. The match did have some really tight shots so in the videos you'll see me kind of tip-toe walk on some targets, I don't think they gave me any advantage and slowed down my actual second shot sight alignment. I'm going to need to revaluate if it would had been better to get planted and shooting in those spots or was it better shooting at targets as I was getting into the position and out.

Points... On stage one I had the fastest time. 8.86 seconds, but I ended up dropping a crap ton of points, 1C, and 6D. And was marked for a Miss on my last target that was a full Metric at 5 yards away... I'm going to need to watch the video, but I remember getting middle of the target with my reddot and getting 2 fast hits on it and only seeing one hole, I was squared on the target. In my mind I thought "oh perfect double." it was not scored that way... I didn't argue it when it was called a miss, but it really made me wonder.

This match I'd say at least 90% of the targets were in 5 to 10 yard range minus the steel and classifier, so it ended up being fast stages. Unfortunately I couldn't compare my score with the winning open shooters times... because the Winner of open was actually shooting his limited gun and limited setup, . I can't wait to see what Stein does once his open gun gets built.

I have 2 more Major 3gun matches to prep for this year, RM3G and the Resurgence. After I finished those I'll probably lay off 3gun Majors in 2017 minus a few favorites and really work on PCC. I had no idea that Area 3 was honoring PCC already as I just found out this past weekend! A 6 hour drive isn't to bad but I'm going to have to past as I don't have the correct ATF paperwork filed to take my SBR out of state just yet, and I dought I get approval in 2 weeks! lol, next year.

I do feel like I can really push PCC at the highest level of competition. Maybe its the "new GF" ideology. But everytime I get behind the gun everything just feels right, and yet I know there is so much more I can do to become even faster and more accurate.

Right now I need to make sure that the PCC gun stays running a 100%, which it has so far. I'm hearing reports that the Timney triggers are taking a bit of a beating in PCC's (not sure if this includes MPX) due to the heavy bolts violently slaming the trigger hammer down despite the initial reports saying Timney triggers where good to go for PCC, I know they just released a new "PCC" trigger that is a 2 stage. Not a fan of 2 stage triggers unless I'm shooting a majority of my shots past 200 yards. and really I do not have the money to go blow it on another $300 dollar trigger when SO FAR my Timney hasn't failed.. IF I see excessive wear I will switch it out with a Geissele S3G trigger as Geissele has officially put out that their triggers will work in PCC guns.

Also I'm trying to do my best part to help clubs around here to adopt PCC and letting them know if they have question they are more then welcome to come to me and I'll try my best to get them answered.

[DocMedic]

Welp! I had a little practice session with my PCC gun yesterday I was practicing some speed stages seeing how much "aiming" I can get away with on a 60 point stage with 4 of 6 targets where past 15 yards, 10, and 5 yard target. Nothing special, small wall the separated 3 targets on both ends, my best HF's is when I put priority on speed over points, best HF I was able to get was a 4.25 sec dropping 1'c and 2'd. As long as I was getting OK hits my HF was always better then it was going for points, best I could do when going for points was 5.2secs dropping only 2'c. My next practice session will be a stand and deliver style stage, I wonder if going for points then would be better then. Anyways on my last run of the day the Timney trigger I was mentioning in my last post finally went full auto, it was at my 5 yard target, putting a nice tight pattern of 6 shots in the A zone. I went to test fire it after it went full auto and it fired just fine. I heard reports on these triggers giving out in PCC guns about the round count I have in them so last night I took out the Timney and replace it with a Geissele S3G trigger, I'm going to try to get on the range this weekend to see how it runs, but so far I'm liking the smooth engagement of trigger pull.

Edited July 22, 2016 by DocMedic

[thermobollocks]

The S3G is a little bit different. I'll be curious to see whether it treats you better than a 2-stage on the really tight shots. But "tight" in a pistol context is still going to be better than those nasty 40y headshots CRC sometimes makes you do

[DocMedic]

Last night I had a chance to run the Sig MPX with the S3G trigger in match settings. I forget how fast this trigger can be and I feel my splits are even faster then they where with the Timney. I also put in a Seekins 60* Safety, I don't honestly feel it makes it faster to switch from safe to Semi but its Red, and Red means fast, so I'll keep it on there

On stage one I did hit the one piece of line hard cover there was... it was on the 2nd target I've engage. What sad is I've always seem to remember when ever I get this type of target presentation I always put one in that small hard cover. I'm not sure if its target focus on the distraction or what, but I know this happens to me enough were I'm aware of it now. Also on the stage itself I didn't really put any emphasis on Aiming outside of the first target since it was hugging a no shoot, as you can see in the video I'm blazing as fast as I can once I get past the first target. This caused me to only have 7 A hits, and lots of C and D's. Even if I did ended up shooting the stage clean I would still had not won the stage.

On Stage two, with the targets being so close I wanted to focus on getting good hit AS FAST AS POSSIBLE, You started seated so I wanted to get shooting while im going from the seating to standing position, I did not want to waste any extra time even if its just so little. In the second box there was a bit of lean around do to the wall and I did slow a little for the no shoot partial, but overall I felt strong once I started to get the gun going. In the 3rd box I didn't stop moving and shot the last 3 target array almost at full movement speed carrying me out of the box almost a good few feet when I broke the last shot. I only ended up dropping 4C's

Stage three, was basically the same thing as stage two with one extra target in the middle and the whole left array removed. I tried to focus on getting the best hits as I could as fast as I could and I walked away only dropping 4C's again.

Stage four, was CM 13-08 Disaster Factor. The only go was to Hero or zero it, since shooting PCC division the stage doesn't have the turn and draw expect of the stage. Unfortunately I flubbed the reload causing me to slow down a hair. Hit's were ok I did ended up dropping 2D's. HF was 8.82

I'm coming to the conclusion that I'm just never going too shoot classifiers well (with any gun...) and I shouldn't expect too for PCC. The strength of the division isn't represented in 95% of the classifiers anyways. Some classifiers worked out better for PCC rankings then others, anything that requires a reload isn't one of them. But with that said It doesn't mean I'm not going to put in some work into them, I want the rankings but I want the wins more.

Points are still important, stage 1 taught me that. However how long you wait to get good points is the question. If you ask most people about production they'll say you need to be shooting 90% of the points to place well, that's pretty well accepted ideology. When I shot production though that wasn't my goal, I wanted to shoot as many A's as I could the percentage didn't mean so much to me as the A counts matter more, and unfortunately it has put me in predicaments where I would risk a high penalty shot for the sake of getting better points causing big gambles that I sometimes lost. I'm going to need to do more testing in PCC and get more data, but I'm hypothesizing that on field courses that have lots of movement if you can stay above the 80% points shot mark going as fast as you can move your doing good, and on stages that have quite a bit of stand and deliver you better be hitting that 90-85% mark on points if you want to do well. Minors score is no joke it will eat away at your performance if you get too sloppy no matter how fast you are.

Edited August 2, 2016 by DocMedic

[thermobollocks]

Those jailbird targets are a total cluster because they force you to do something completely counterintuitive. With other partials, you at least have a "center of exposed mass" to work with.