Phil

The original question was not what the difference was between cover & concealment but does the SO have to call cover before assessing a penalty? I understand cover is not the same thing as a safety violation but I did find an example of a SO having to Call a command before giving a penalty. "Any contestant moving with a loaded handgun in his hand but not actually firing will keep his finger out of the trigger guard unless engaging targets. If a SO observes a contestant moving with his finger in the trigger guard, he will sound off with the command "Finger". Failure to immediately comply will result in a 3-second procedural penalty. The BoD is discussing the change of this penalty to a FTDR, since safety issues simply can't be taken lightly." Rumor control has it that IDPA is re-writing the rule book and maybe they will address this along with a host of other questions

I shoot both, and there are some top level shooters in each. We now have the womens IPSC world champion living and shooting in Housotn. Athenal ?, I forget her last name But she is fun to watch and a nice person. You can shoot IDPA or IPSC or several other typs of action pistol, plate or pins pretty much 4 nights days a week and every saturday. Attendence runs any where from 30-50 We may not have the number of Grand Masters & Masters as Phx but we have the oppertunity to shoot as much I think and our number of higher level shooters is growing. Phil

Does the So have to inform the shooter of cover before giving penalties? or is this only a courtesies for new shooters. Phil

Smoney you hit it on the head, I have a hard time with the far right target when shooting from the left side of the barricade, and it seems that during a match I'm allowed to shift as long as I'm staying covered to target I'm shooting, but i'm not allowed to do it during the classifer? whats up with this? Phil

I have a few classifier questions. It states in the So's instructions that when shooting strong hand that the shooter may start turned sideways towards the targets, as in a duelling stance does this apply to weekhand also? when shooting the barricade portion is there a box behind the barricade that the shooter must stay in or can he advance around the barricade exposing himself to targets he has engaged but not to the target he is engaging? Phil

Tightloop, Where do you shoot in Houston? & where and when is the next classifier. I plane on re-shooting it and bumping myself up to master after the WHIDPA match tomorrow night and the Trophy race for the year is over, LOL Missed master last time by .12 Damn 7:am on a Saturday morning is to early to shoot for score, probably a good thing the SO wasn't giving breathalizer's. Maybe they shood when they hold them that early on Saturdays morning and them deduct your BAC from your score? Better yet from each string. Phil

Funny I had a post I wanted to make and didn't' know where it would fit, i guess this is as good as any. I use a Wilson/Novak rear sight with a semi pyramid blade and I just switch to a fiber optic front sight. I shoot it well and it's as fast as any other type of iron sights i have shot in the past. but the one thing i found tonight while dry firing on the tv was, with both eyes open I see the fiber optic dot very clear, but when I close my left eye I lose the fiber optic and have a plain post front sight. I'm sure this has to do with the lighting in my den but it sure made me think? Phil

See Rule #1 #1. All gun are allways load all the time! note: If not loaded is has no use as a firearm.

If I"ve got the chance to make a reload on the move and it not cost me any additional time, then I do it. Not because of a buffer for droped shots but as a buffer for malfunctions. I Figure if you have a dud round and you clear it and continue you are then going to have to make a slide lock reload on top of it to finish the COF , Double Ouch. Most times I'll go with B and roll the dice if there is a question of time on the reload.

4.5 of WST & Win LP under a 200 gr SWC OAL 1.250 and a heavey crimp. gave me 825-830 FPS out of a old colt barrel, need to re-chrono now that I have a Briley that shoots the same load GREAT! Shot a 8 round 2 inch group @ 25 yards goofing around with head shots yesterday. Was a little surprised to walk up and find one large hole.

Tried the strong hand and dropped the head shots.... was warned afterwards that at a big match because I had left my week hand close to my pocket while firing I could have been taged with firing while holding ammo. One SO could see that I had released it before firing the next shot but I might not be so lucky at a major match. As I understand it you are only going to get one 3 second for dropping ammo, reguardless of how many shots you fire afterwards. That is when not clearing a malfunction or if it drops while moving after it has been stowed. Tightloop I'm confused on your 6 shots x 2.5 = 15 seconds, if that was the case than you can bet I'll pick it up and stow it. I think I'll time it tomorrow and see what pays off the best. Idealy the thing to do is not fumble the tac-load but it's nice to have a plan to over come it with the least amount of self imposed penalty if you do. Phil

I have missed the pocket, I have missed the drop, and I have missed the belt. My tac-loads are in the 2.5 range, and I make them part of my normal dry-firing pratice. It's not often that I miss one under the clock, but when it dose happen I want to make the best recovery possible, score wise.

Whats the best way (score wise) to overcome a dropped mag during a Tac-Load? On more than one occasion as I'm sure many of us have, I have fumbled my tac-load and dropped my mag. My first reaction is to retrieve & stow it to avoid the 3 second penalties, After doing so I always seem to rush the rest of the stage trying to make up lost time and in turn drop more points (tuff habit to break). On top of it I seem to always forget in the heat of the moment that I can finish the stage from a knee after stowing the mag and save the time of standing back up. I know that would be the thing to do and would be in the spirit of the game, But from a practical view point the ammo I really need at the moment is the ammo in the gun not on the ground. This happened to me the other night and on the way home I thought I'd have been much better off time and points wise to mentally except the penalty, and finish the stage shooting for points. As it was I wasted a good 2.5 seconds trying to retrieve and stow the mag then rushed the next 6 shots and dropped 10 points (2 missed head shots) Any thoughts on this? Phil

If i remember right DT is a 8" plate 3 feet above a 10" at 10 yards? or is it a 12"& 10" plates?? my personal best was at a state match I had one run in 1.02 I lost that match by.6 Boy that will piss a guy off, don't think I could have made it up on DT though. Phil

??? why not shoot a left hand twist 45 barrel and have it twist into you grip instead of away??? Just a thought Phil

Kylel, I did it last night after the match they had a little fun shoot 7 yards one shot tac-reload one shot. I pulled the pocket trick for fun as it wasn't for score and ran it in 3.48? clean, The SO almost droped the timer & wet himself he was laughing so hard at how smooth it looked. Shooting naked, God I hate the thought of a relaod with retention. LOL It's all in fun till someobdy gets their eye put out Phil

I just did this yesterday and my 7 yd times ran avrage 2.10 - 2.20 clean I think my best for score during a classifier was 1.98 I like to practice this drill @ 2-3 yards instead of the old speedrock and I incorporate a step backwards into it. I started doing this about 20 years ago after I spent a day with a retired 4 time world champion kick boxer. That day I came to the awful realization very quickly that I was facing a distance problem, and the problem was there was not enough distance between us even at 3 yards. my average for 3 yards is 1.33 and best is 1.25 no concealment Phil

Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocre minds. The latter cannot understand when a man does not submit to hereditary prejudices but honesty and courageously uses his intelligence. Albert Einstein Two things come to mind when I first read this, one is thank god we have had people like Brian E and others who refused to submit and honestly used their intelligence. Boy has it made a difference in how we train and shoot over the last 20 years. Second is I think I'll use this definition every time I'm called a gamesman or gamer. Phil

Thanks "game guys" for the support, I'll remember it when i'm looking at that 20 second FTDR LOL. To be honest my first thought was to place a 20oz speaker magnet in my front pocket LOL but that got shot down right away The COF called for reload as necessary, there was never a danger of covering anything with the muzzle, no more so than during a normal draw. I'm more worried about that, then getting a FTDR. I try to remember that it's only a game and all in fun, and in order to play we may have to do some things we wouldn't normally do. Some times to remind myself of this I will look at a course asking myself, if the 3 bad guys on the other side of the barricade where any of the 3 shooters standing around me how much of a chance of survival do I have shooting it the way the COF reads? I think you'll find for the most part that your pretty much toast regardless of who you are or who your shooting with. So you might as well have fun!

I like your idea of a blind stage, wish we had enough SO's to volunteer to run a match and not shoot. I did shoot a course once that had a par time to compleat a building search, and it went fairly well requiring only one SO to build it first and not run it, the others would SO after they had shot and understood the course. I really liked it and did tac loads before continuing or leaving cover. Need more of those courses in this Game. I totally agree my reload was gaming, no doubt about it, I was looking for an advantage and found one, one that was not necessarily unavailable or even advantageous for that matter to others, but it sure took time off my tac loads, LOL

I've been shooting IDPA the last several months and my biggest pet peeve about IDPA is the tac load or reload with retention under time. I just don't' see the rationale in doing a tac load as fast as you can. Maybe because mine suck so bad? So necessity being the mother of all invention I found a way for me to do them, that is slicker than fresh deer guts on a door knob. I tried it last night in a local match and it worked so smoothly the SO couldn't say anything but laugh at how simple it was I'm sure I'm going to get a FTDR or some other penalty for it from another SO even though I can't see why at the moment. I'm just happy I got away with it once. Maybe you guys can tell me if it's legal or not. I started behind a wide barricade with 3 targets on the left and 3 on the right, I engaged the 3 on the left with 2 rds each, then at the same time i was reaching for my spare mag and moving to the right side I stuck the mag well of my pistol in my vest pocket, and dumped the mag then brought the pistol forward at the same time as my spare mag came up, loaded and engaged the 3 targets on the right side. Then I placed the mag well again back in the vest pocket and advanced 7 yards toward another barricade (keeping the muzzle down range) while reaching for my next spare mag, I got to cover and dumped the mag again in the pocket while bringing the pistol up to meet at the same time with the spare mag, seated it and engaged the last 3 targets. I was laughing at myself for how smooth it went, I ran the course in 11. & small change with 5 points down. Now it being the first time I had done it in front of any one much less during a match. I was being very aware of my muzzle and not to dump the mag before I hit cover. I don't have any special pockets made for this. Now am I right that a tac load is when you retrieve your spare before removing & storing the partial mag and a reload with retention is when you remove & store the partial mage first? So I guess I could do this either way? Any way it was funny and it got people laughing as well as thinking. I may try it again being prepared for that FTDR. Hell I may even adopt this method in IPSC just to keep my mags out of the dirt?

John T, thanks for the welcome, this is a great form. It's funny when they have a shoot (IPDA) with shirts on the targets I dont' drop as many points as when they are just buff? Phil

I just got back into competitive shooting this year after several years off of IPSC and got into IDPA. Boy did i have a hard time with the penalties in IDPA having cut my teeth on IPSC but after a while I figured it out. Now in order to get more trigger time I shoot IPSC once a week followed by a IDPA match the next night. What I do is to shoot the IPSC matches the way I would IDPA for the most part. Tactical order and may even do IDPA tact loads. It hurts my IPSC times but my hits are better than ever. I think it's a matter of being abel to walk up to a COF and shooting it the way you plan on instead of just doing what you know how to do. Being abel to develop that skill I don't think will hurt your abilities in either sport. The main difference I find between the two that hurts my scores is that I tend to shoot center mass on a IPSC target and that's still in the A zone where as on a IDPA target I have to hold a touch higher. In IDPA most of my dropped points are just low of the A zone. Phil