motorcycle5

Some people will do whatever it takes to own the most expensive Ducati motorcycle, just to relish the glow of owning such a projectile. It doesnt matter at all that a japanese litre bike has equal or greater horsepower at a fraction of the cost. I just looked at the 'open class' picture thread and what can you say? Just owning such a dedicated piece of hardware is in some ways its own reward. And having crashed at the racetrack on my motorcycle more than once I would say that owning a fine pistol is probably even safer than owning a fine motorcycle. Go figure. What gets my goat is that I bought audiophile stereo gear back in the day. I could buy the beginnings of a great pistol for what I paid for a damn $$$ CD player that I dont give a spit about anymore! :-)

A few years ago I discovered the pleasure of shooting steel, and at that time it was virtually all I did for 12 months. Mind you, I'm talking small caliber, and my local welding shop sourced targets werent much to look at, but I shot 100k rounds that first year, easy (mostly using steel challenge layouts.) But then certain things cropped up and I stopped. For the first time in a couple of years, then, I'm getting back into shooting steel again. Today I bumped into someone at the range who knew all about steel and practical shooting (and when I say range I really just mean an unimproved berm setup on BLM land.) When he mentioned Brian Enos you could have knocked me over with a feather. I bought Brians book years ago but never ran into anyone who had also read it. In fact my copy has a slightly mocking personal message from Brian written in it (done at my request when I ordered it over the telephone. It always makes me smile to see his derogatory reference to my pistols caliber.) Anyway the guy I met today turned out to easily be the most experienced practical shooter I've met. Handling his STI race gun made realize what a quality piece felt like. And he's part of a crew that is organizing a steel competition in the near future. So he mentioned this forum. And the above two paragraphs were just a long winded way to introduce myself and say hello. He said a picture of his gun is up here someplace so I'll have to look around (I think he said he had 3 race guns, actually.) As for me, I like shooting too much to move up to one of the bigger calibers. I would prefer it, but the ammo is just too dang expensive. Thats especially true when 'berm central' is just a 5-10 minute drive from home. So hello to you all! Looking around I see there is a ton of info in these forums. And I noticed too that Brian hasnt altered his philosophical stance (what with the daily koan, and the meaning of zen threads.) Dont get me wrong-- I like it. I have a image of meeting Brian and him telling me, "when you can snatch the 9mm case from my palm, mark, it will be time for you to leave" or, paraphrasing that bald headed spoon bending kid from the movie The Matrix, "there *is* no front sight." Indeed.