kimel

I saw this thread start up earlier this week and I have pondered it for awhile and think I have something to add...it's worth is up to you the reader. "when a new shooter shows up at a match..." Hmmm... Back up a bit. How did that new shooter come to actually show up at the match? How did they know the match was taking place? How did they learn about this sport in the first place? What advice (if any) did they pick up before they showed up? I am probably an odd example but here is my story anyway: I have been shooting handguns for about 35 years (I am 40...you do the math) and was tired of having to constantly find new places to shoot. About a year ago I found a "local" range (okay, it is one state over, about 25 miles one way) on the web. They had "action shooting". I wondered what that was so surfed some more. Found the USPSA website and read everything there. Even ordered a rule book and read through it. Seemed to be some pretty neat stuff. But all these rules...this is gonna take some studying... Then I figured I had better practice a few things before showing up at the first match. Draws, reloads, etc. Is my pet load major or minor?...better develop some loads too (I don't shoot factory ammo. The only firearms I have that have ever seen factory ammo are the 22s and the .357 and .40 that I carry). Kept coming up with excuses until my busy time at work caught up with me and the next thing I know summer is gone and so is a lot of November. So, I finally go to my first match in December and I am HOOKED. So what if it was 30 degrees and foggy with a breeze? I didn't care...I was too busy having fun! The two days I stayed home sick the next week may have just been coincidence but they did give me an opportunity to work on my dry fire stuff. Am I going back in January? Oh yeah... What can be learned from this tale? 1) If "we" can get new shooters to a match and they have a good time they will probably come back. 2) People can shoot for a long time, even belong to the NRA etc and not really be aware of IPSC/USPSA or, more importantly, that they can participate. Heck, I knew who BE and TGO et al were I just didn't know about their sport(s) enough to know it was something we mortals could participate in. I watched BE and TGO face off in some event on ESPN (I think) 15 or 20 years ago (Bianchi cup?) and thought that was cool but had no clue that I could get involved in that kind of stuff without major sponsors and several kilobucks worth of hardware. 3) All the rules and other assorted "stuff" is intimidating. Somehow, "we" need to get to the interested people before the rules beat them down. Get them out to a match while their interest is really high or, better yet, get them to the range with a couple "old hands" who can set up a stage or two and run them through an orientation. Pick fun stages and give them a good taste of what it is all about. Don't try and feed them *all* the rules during orientation. Just make sure they are safe and having fun and generally following the rules. Then get them to the real match and set the hook. 4) If your local club has IDPA/IPSC/Bullseye/SASS "factions" which will beat these new guys over the head with trash talk get to them first. Be honest about what IPSC/USPSA is about and don't participate in the trash talk against the other factions. Most importantly, get the idea across that they can probably participate with the handgun(s) they already own. Within days of joining the "local" club I was hearing "I would do IPSC but I can't afford a racegun so I can't participate but you should try cowboy..." stories from other members. Major intimidation here. How many people are staying away because they don't know production division exists? 5) Get them to the Enosverse...fast! I didn't find this place soon enough. 6) Play down the competition aspect a bit or at least stress that the competition is only what you want it to be about. 7) Mentor the new guys (and gals) when they show up the first couple times. Make sure they understand what is going on. The guys I shot with on my first match did a great job of this. They didn't even laugh (too hard anyway) when I made some really dumb mistakes. Hope that helps. Questions? Ask away. Cheers! Kevin

ROTFLMAO Brian! I'm not dead yet! How does a person know they have found a great forum on the internet? When there are a lot of guys who spent at least as much time watching Python in their youth as you did and who are still exhibiting the effects. The wife says I got DirecTV just for BBC America so I can watch Python all the time. She may be right. Hey...Python did "Life of Brian"...BE was that about you? (wink wink, nudge nudge) "Let's all look on the bright side of death...." Great...now I have THAT tune stuck in my head for the next three days....oh well...."life's a piece of shjt, when you think of it...."

Hi everyone, Caliber should not, by definition, make any difference in the amount of energy that is delivered. From physics we get F=M*A where F=Force, M=Mass (bullet weight) and A=Acceleration (~speed). Note that there is no diameter/caliber/surface area in this equation. Yes, if we are talking longer ranges (50 meters or more) the diameter of the bullet does have an effect because the terminal velocity will change. However, we measure velocity as defined on the chronograph which is typically 3-4 meters from the end of the barrel. We calibrate poppers typically at 10 meters or a bit more but we do not require the chronographing of the popper calibration round at the terminal end. Besides, we are talking 9mm vs 38 Super vs 40 vs 45 and the terminal velocity difference between these rounds at popper calibration ranges just isn't going to be that different. Diameter of bullet at impact only really has relevance when discussing terminal ballistics when shooting into soft, deformable targets such as animals, people, etc. which we are, by definition/rule, not discussing here. Think also back to the days of the ballistic pendulum. Were there different pendulums for different calibers? I wasn't in IPSC shooting back then but I kind of doubt it. Thus, at least in theory a calibration round in .25 Auto that makes 125 PF should have the same effect on a popper as a .50 BMG loaded to 125 PF (if either was actually possible to load to this specification). Another way to look at this whole conundrum is temperature. The amount of force it takes to drop a popper, especially one that has lubrication on the hinge, will change rather dramatically given changes in temperature. Yes, velocity changes over temperature range as well but I rather doubt that the change in viscosity of axle grease/machine oil between 0 degrees C and 40 degrees C is equivalent to the velocity change over the same temperature range as your calibration rounds. Yet, the rules say nothing about temperature when calibrating the poppers since we shoot outside and don't have control over the weather (yet). I would encourage IPSC/USPSA to drop the caliber requirement for popper calibration guns. It just doesn't make any sense. Any competent handloader should be able to easily come up with a range of "calibration loads" with minor variations in power factor between batches. Then, simply chrono these different batches to find the one closest to 125 PF at the temperature/altitude/etc of the venue in question and use that load to calibrate the poppers. Cheers! Kevin

I would just go look for a Pelican case that is big enough to do what you want to do. They make those things in just about ever size you can think of up to foot locker size and a bit higher. Any good camera store will stock them. They can also be found online in various places. I have one where the foam insert in the lower section is actually three layers. I can easily get four full size handguns plus ammo plus other junk in there. Picking it up and carrying it is another matter altogether of course. Hope that helps. Cheers! Kevin

Back when I was taking a lot of math classes (blech!) any number divided by zero was equal to infinity. Cool! Win the match without ever firing a shot. ;-) Now, zero divided by zero is a conundrum. This all depends on whether zero is a number or not. Believe me, there was an entire semester course (Math 412, Theory of Numbers) devoted to this discussion, which I did not take. I had math major friends who did take it and would get very animated when discussing it, especially after a beer or three. I think that the suggestion to include the words "and zero score" is a good one because it eliminates any question as to what the score is. Unless there is a way to have a score and still have zero time...why not? Cheers! Kevin

Hi Guys, First match was wayyyy too much fun. No one was shooting 38 super so I just used my muffs without plugs and had no problem at all hearing the timer. There is one particular timer brand that I have heard once where the tone is quite high pitched. That is where my hearing loss is. All the timers in use last weekend were lower in pitch like my CED 6000 so no problems. Made a couple silly rookie mistakes (two reloads means coming to the line with three mags...doh!) but had a lot of fun and learned a lot. I had expected to get started last, being a rookie and all, but they started me 4th on my first stage so I didn't have time to psych myself out too much. I will definately be going back! Cheers! Kevin

The freedom of speech thing only gives you the right to say what you want to say. It does NOT give you the right to say it anywhere you want to say it. You must still obey the rules of the road. For instance, we are free to talk about hijacking, bombs, terrorists and whatnot just about anywhere except in an airport or on a plane. But then I suppose there are those that will protest as the Sky Marshalls are hauling their butts off in manacles that their freedom of speech is being denied. Just ash can his posts. He is certainly welcome to get his own forum started somewhere else and spout his opinions there. You (BE) own this forum and you pay for its upkeep. Therefore you can set the rules and we all have to play nice or we get to take our toys and go elsewhere. Even newspapers reserve the right to not publish every letter to the editor that they receive.

Meditation, thought control, whatever you wish to call it is a powerful tool. John Cabat Zinn has written a couple very good books on the subject of using meditation to control pain, stress, etc. He works at one of the large medical centers on the east coast using mediation to help patients deal with pain including burn victims and cancer patients. I discovered meditation as a way to deal with stress. During exams in college I would get so stressed that I would become physically ill, unable to sleep and had really rotten grades. I started using meditation exercises and started sleeping and controlling the stress and the GPA jumped a full point the next semester. Now I use these same exercises to control stress at work. Without this tool, I would probably be a basket case somewhere. The mind is an extraordinarily powerful tool. 99.9999% of us haven't even begun to tap it.

See if you can find an optomiterist in your area that served in the military as an optomiterist. Mine regular guy was Navy and actually got a lot of experience doing prescription lenses for the Navy pistol and rifle teams. He had a lot of good suggestions for me to think about.

A gun is an inanimate object incapable of reacting without being given an external stimulus. This despite what the anti-gun contingent would want the populace to believe. "Shoot" is an action word (verb) and therefore defines an action or a reaction. Thus, it is the shooter which provides the stimulus to provoke the reaction and therefore it is the shooter that shoots. The reaction being, generally, how the H3LL did I miss that one? You might alternatively ask if it is the shooter or the gun that misses. In this instance I think we will all agree, unanimously, that it is the gun which misses since we, as shooters, would never actually miss unless it was done intentionally in which case the shot, while appearing to be a miss actually was not a miss since it followed through as intended and failed to hit. However, we might take this another step further in a rather different direction and blame the bullet itself for the miss since it obviously was defective and its course of flight, even though aimed true and square at an A did indeed become a miss. Thus, it is the shooter that shoots but the bullet that misses. This also helps us justify all the misses we are getting with our new blasters since ammo is considerably cheaper than a blaster. How's that for taking things a bit off track?

Thanks everyone for the encouragement and good suggestions.

Hi Guys and gals, The issue here is that I have a significant (ie: near total) hearing loss in some frequency ranges on my right/shooting side due to a ruptured ear drum when I was 6 years old. Theory is that the RO should hold the timer near the shooter's ear on the shooting side. At a quiet range with nothing else going on I will "probably" still hear the timer on my left side. Can I ask the RO to hold the timer near my left side to assist me with this disability? Alternatively, I don't have a problem with some brands of timers where the tone is lower. My CED timer is fine (which is why I bought that one)...could the RO use my timer or someone else's timer? No, I don't own electronic muffs...yet. I tend to use foam plugs plus good muffs which really cuts down on hearing sensitivity. What accomodations are made for totally deaf shooters? Has there ever been one? I went through the rule book (USPSA) and didn't see anything about accomodation of hearing impairment but that doesn't mean it isn't there...I just didn't see it. I haven't even shot my first real match yet but that is coming Sunday (yippee!). I don't want to ask for accomodation that is outside of the rules. Cheers! Kevin

Great drill idea! Thanks! One question though... On drill #1, what are you setting your par time at? Or, more to the point, where did you start setting it at and how agressive were you with incrementing the par downward over weeks/months of practice? Also, do you use the same par time throughout a session or do you have a method of adjusting the par time? Now if only Santa will bring me a Dillon so I can increase loading speed....this 100 rnds an hour off a single stage is killing me...load all day saturday to shoot half a day sunday...blech. Cheers! Kevin