Schedule 40

You're a very rare breed of shooter if you are able to guarantee a major match victory within the nex year. Best of luck!!!!

I'll tell ya' what I know.Predicting that you will get promoted through the ranks via "match bump" simply doesn't make any sense. If a shooter is not a Master, then he/she will have to shoot the classifier at least once every year. If you were to just barely fall short of your "bump" year after year, while at the same time developing into a better shooter, then are you trying to tell me that you would "sandbag" your classifier run simply to stay in your current class and not be promoted through your annual/mandatory "skill test"? I can not see where this line of thinking makes any sense. Any shooter who has the skills to promote their current classification during their annual classifier run and then purposely fails to do so in an attempt to only be promoted through a "major match bump" is simply doing IDPA and all of it's competitors a major disservice.

I'm not assuming anything. I simply gave an example of what could happen in some situations. There is roughly a 20 second difference between an "almost made MA time" and a "barely made EX time". Therefore, the possibility exists for a major match to be held in an area where every competitor in EX is in that "barely made EX" group. The winner of this group of shooters should certainly be happy and proud of their victory, BUT their new Master classification will probably soon make it very evident in upcoming matches that they were not fully ready to me in the new class. This example, obviously, could be used at any level of classification in IDPA. This is my reasoning for not understanding all of the hype of a "match bump". I don't believe that it's always a good thing. 20 seconds is a very large amount of time in IDPA!!!!

I know that I said that any shooter who makes Master either way should be proud, but I simply don't understand all of the hype about a match bump. Think of it this way......You're shooting SSP Expert at a major match against 12 other competitors in your class. Each of these competitors, including yourself, barely classified as experts, having ran the classifier with only two or three second to spare. The winner of this group of shooters will automatically be thrown into "Master Class". Congratulations on the achievement, but it will soon be obvious that the happy victor is in over his/her head.

A shooter should feel proud of making Master no matter which way they earn it. If you are not a Master, then you are forced to shoot the classifier at least once a year. If you give it an honest attempt and "make the grade", then no one else should be able to tell you that a match bump would've "meant more". Fact of the matter is that there is not a very high percentage of IDPA shooters that make Master; so any person who accomplishes it by either of the two ways should feel very good about their progress.

Striker springs (Wolff reduced power only if you shoot Federal primers) and a bag of "stock" trigger springs. The trigger springs are, in my experience, the weakest part of an otherwise excellent design.Might not hurt to keep another recoil spring handy while at matches either. The only other thing that I've seen fail on a Glock 34 at matches is when something crazy like an improperly installed front sight goes flying off during a stage. I guess it wouldn't hurt to have another one of those in the range bag too, along with fiber optic pipe, if your sight is equipped with one.

I've spent a lot of time shooting the 30 and 21. They're both big guns (very thick). The 30 is a sweet shooter, but for my money the 21 is the best feeling 45 Auto that I've ever shot. I've never owned the 30 (it belonged to my shooting buddy), but have carried my 21 extensively IWB with an untucked T-shirt and have never been "made"; so, the 30 is workable for a carry gun. I will not try to tell you that it will be comfortable though. When you take it off at the end of the day, it will be imprinted into your hip and look like you're still wearing it. I recently acquired a G26. I will never carry the 21 again. This gun is awesome. Inside of 7 yards, I'm able to shoot it as fast and as accurately as my G34. It's noticeably thinner than the 45 Glocks and far easier to conceal. I was anxious to see what the recoil impulse was going to feel like. I've shot a G27 (.40) and a G33 (.357 sig) in the past. They are the same exact size as the 26, and although I won't say that the recoil was painful or terrible, it's definitely snappy. The 26 is "night and day" more pleasant to shoot than either one of those pistols. Go with the 26. You'll love it!!!!

Game gun: Glock 34 Carry guns: Glock 21 and 26 depending on how I'm going to be dressed. The 21 is actually easier to conceal than most would think, but there are some occasions when I just don't feel like dealing with that giant stuck to my hip all day. I find that by keeping the basic platform the same that the skills transfer nicely from game gun to carry rig regardless of the size of the pistols.

I'm open to that idea...rehearsal dinner could be switched to a rehearsal lunch on the range I'd attend..... as long as you don't wear any of that "Buckeye Gear" that you always have on when I run into you

Take the time to get "good" hits. You don't want to be wasteful with it, but .5 seconds is a long time to ensure a center hit. No sense in giving away too many seconds due to sloppy shooting. If you're running with EXP guys, then I believe that you have the skills to shoot "down zero" on the first two stages if the proper amount of time is taken to collect the hits. Pulling that off would be "huge" because stage 3 is what sinks most people. I have seen so many "points down" here that could have easily been avoided by shooters who should've just taken a few more seconds to get the hits. Those few "real" seconds would've been far less that the 15 to 20 that many of them suffer in penalty time.

I'll definitely be there. This match has been a ton of fun the past two years. Just curious though as to why it got changed to April. That is a huge transition from the first two matches, which were held in late October. It seems like we all just finished shooting it. Actually, this was my last of 5 majors last year, and this year it will be my first.

Hey, Bruce! I'm confused by the title of this post. I didn't know that we were supposed to stop shooting. How come I'm just now hearing about this? I'm glad that I never got busted shooting last winter. When should it be safe to do some live-fire outdoors again? Just messin' with ya!!! It's nice to finally hear from a familiar face that I recognize. You're far more "hardcore" than I'll ever be if you're willing to travel 10 hours to shoot club matches all winter long. I wish that I could find that kind of time and devotion. Good luck with your search, and I'll see you next March at SKSC. Safe shooting, Mark S.

Most of us could have identified your "inner conflict" simply by looking at your user-name and profile-icon. Just listen to the little red guy with the pitch fork on your left shoulder, and shoot the Glock. Otherwise, you should change your name to Shadow.

Thanks, Flex. I was starting to feel like I accidentally ran a lawn-mower over a nest full of ground hornets. It was certainly an interesting conversation that was taking place, but my question was answered after the first few replies. Politics, finances, match management aside...... this sport is all still somewhat new to me, and I'm just happy to be a part of it. I plan on attending the Production Nationals regardless of where they take place, and I'm sure that all of those involved will do their best to make sure that the event will be held at a location within the best interests of our organization.

Thanks for the update. This will be my first nationals, so I've been quite anxious to know exactly where we'll be attending them at.

Is it officially written in stone, yet? When you go to the "Find Matches" page on USPSA's website, they only have dates and locations for Single Stack and Revolver. The same for the actual USPSA Nationals website; still no mention of the other 4 divisions. From what I've been hearing, it's Lim-L10-Open in St. George and Prod in Tulsa. Has anything changed, or should we start making plans for these locations.

1 a month from March to October at my home club. That's if a nearby major doesn't land on the same weekend. This year I managed to shoot 7 locals and 5 majors. I personally see a greater advantage in spending most of my shooting time on the practice range trying to polish up the ugly areas of my game that get exposed during the big matches. I'd rather spend my precious time and ammunition focusing on drills and scenarios that I struggle with instead of shooting the rather simple and straightforward stage designs found at most level 1 matches.

I quite honestly have never shot 124s. I've always had a steady supply of the 115. After about 8,000 of them, I gave the 147s a try with many different powder cominations. I gave them an honest attempt (approximately 2,000), and then switched back to 115s. The difference in recoil impulse is quite noticeable. I dare say that the heavier bullet was definitely softer but also felt very sluggish compared to the quick, snappy behavior of the 115s. I also had a hard time finding a 147 load that was as accurate in my pistol as the 115s. Don't let anybody fool ya'. You can have great success with any of the 3 bullet weights. The real key is just picking one and start sending bullets downrange.....lots of 'em.

Welcome to the club of mis-fits. There seem to be very few of us that like using the lighter weight bullets for competition. I actually prefer the 115 FMJ from Zero. My G34 pet load: 115 FMJ (Zero) 4.6 grains of W231 This typically makes 131-132 power factor whe chronoed at major matches.

Maybe somebody should have told Vogel that he could have shot something "way better" than his Glock 24 when he competed and won the USPSA Limited-10 Nationals two years straight. I don't know why he would put up with such a mediocre platform. My guess is that he's probably just too busy putting rounds downrange with the pistol that he loves instead of trying to find a reason not to love it.

Awesome match!!!! Last year's match was great; this one was better. Thanks to all of those who put it together and gave their time to work the event. The staff, the stages, the late October weather.....couldn't ask for more. This will definitely be on next year's schedule. Also, congrats to all of the winners.

A big thanks to Dale and the gang at South Kent Sportsman's Club in Dorr, MI. The Open, Limited, L-10 Sectional was a fun match. The stages were very deceiving. Straight forward without much variation in which to approach them, but they definitely tested a shooter's temptation to go blazingly fast since the designers plastered no-shoots and hard cover on a majority of the targets. Obstructing all of those Alphas with so much potential for penalties made it really difficult for those of us that were crazy enough to shoot this event with a "minor" power factor. That being said, it didn't seem to effect the winner of L-10 who did exactly that. Congrats Micah Barcello. I was also squadded with Open winner Chris Keen. Simply amazing to watch what he was able to do with that race-gun....as long as you didn't blink!!! Thanks again to the staff, and congrats to all of the winners.

Hats off to the folks at Livingston Gun Club for a great match over the weekend. Thanks to the R.O.s for a job well done. It was obvious that they could have used more, but those that were there did a fine job. The stages were great; especially the "dark house", with many ways that a shooter could aproach each one. Congrats to all of the winners. It was quite humbling to shoot Production with such a talented field. It was obvious that many of this areas best shooters from other divisions pulled out their stock guns. I was glad to see this. It made for a quite a challenge. Hope to see many of you at SKSC for the other half of the 2012 MI Sectionals.

Yesterday, I was loading up some Hornady 185 XTPs using 231. Starting at 5.2 and working up to 5.8 grains. The starting load felt so soft that I started wondering how many shooters have developed a favorite load for using .45 in Production. I have heard of many shooters who use .40 minor for Production, but I've never heard of it being done with .45. Any suggestions would be much apprecitated.

Superdude, thanks for the quick reply. At what velocity do you have to start worrying about getting bullets lodged in the bore?