Carmoney

I guess I still don't see how maintaining a separate division for Revo is costing USPSA anything. Take the USPSA Nationals, for example. We shoot alongside L and L-10. Last year there were 20 of us (this year there will be substantially more, I'll wager), so that's about five grand in entry fee money. What did it cost to have us there as a separate division? Four plaques, a fairly lame prize table (where only the top two guys even recouped their entry fee), and a couple minutes' worth of statistician time to print off and post our scores on a separate sheet of paper. That's it. I shot a lot of major matches last year (Nat'ls, two Area matches, and a whole slew of state/sectionals) and thinking back I can't come up with a single one in which it was unprofitable to have us around. As a distinct and separate division. I don't think it creates any meaningful expense, from the club level to HQ, to have Revo as a separate division in USPSA. Whatever the rationale (or rationalization) may be for those who wish to dump the division, it's not monetary cost. Somebody tell me if I'm wrong here.

I agree with Mark wholeheartedly. I primarily shoot Revolver in USPSA (although I love shooting Single-Stack also!) specifically because it is the greatest challenge I have managed to find in nearly 20 years of handgun competition. The last thing I want is to shoot stages that are revolver-neutral (except classifiers, that's a little different story...) And I know most of my wheelgun compadres feel exactly the same way. If I wanted to make it easy on myself, there are other games I could play and other organizations out there I could join. True-hearted Revo and SS IPSC/USPSA shooters want the same thing the hi-cap shooters want, a varied mixture of nice big fun stages and plenty of bang for the buck!!

In a few concise sentences, Jeff has captured the real essence of this whole issue. If we don't have our own division, we truly have no place to go in USPSA. With the semi-auto divisions, you generally can move a holster or change mags and still have a place to play, and if you're good, you'll still be competitive. For example, a good shooter can take a stock Glock and still run with the wide-bodies in Limited. A skinny L-10 gun with different mags can work just fine in Single-Stack--and vice versa. We Revolver shooters though, perhaps more than any other division, need to be sorted out separately and scored against each other in order to have a meaningful match. It just won't be any fun otherwise. I don't really care about all the classification stuff. I just really want to keep on competing and having fun in Revolver division with my son and all my friends. I guess that's the bottom line for me.

Bruce-- In its very first year as a provisional division, Single Stack brought in 238 competitors to its official Nationals, and expansion of the Single Stack Nationals is planned for next year. More than enough to constitute a meaningful national-level match, and proof positive that there's enough interest to warrant a stand-alone division, according to your own parameters. Revolver has never been given this chance. USPSA should put together a real stand-alone Nationals for Revolver, announce it way ahead, build great stages, bring in a full match staff, award slots, fund a real prize table, make trophies, cultivate sponsors, etc....i.e. do everything that's done for the other divisions....and see what happens. Bet you'd see all kinds of great shooters coming out of the woodwork, not just the revolver regulars, but the big names from other divisions, too. Leatham just shot the IRC, he'd show up for a real USPSA Revolver Nationals--and that's just the first example that comes to mind. I gotta disagree here, Bruce. Where in the world does a S&W 625 fit in here and have any remote chance of being competitive? Remember, it's not just the 6-round capacity, it's the completely different manual of arms in completing a timely reload that is also a big issue. If you think about it, Production is much closer to Limited than Revolver is to Production. Look at the Glock shooters that are very competitive in Limited against the wide-body 1911 variants. If we wanted to pare it down to three divisions, and truly want to keep the game inclusive and competitive, those divisions should be Open, Limited, and Revolver. Thanks for participating in the conversation.

That information is available on the USPSA website (click Additional Content, then Classifiers by State). The percentages vary somewhat from division to division. The highest is Open, where 2.4% of the total number of classified shooters are GMs. The lowest (by far) is of course Revolver, where only 0.1% of the classified shooters are GMs. In other words, it's historically 24 times easier to make GM in Open than in Revolver. (Ya think maybe the system is a little skewed? Hmm?)

So is this one of those "tongue in cheek" comments or is this guy just a tool Nah, Mark's a good guy, he's just screwing with me! Just to clarify, I'm pretty sure Gary Stevens is on our side of this issue. He's the same guy who offered to take our proposed division equipment rule changes back to the full board. I agree with Merlin's point that the tone of any discussion with the BOD needs to be civil and positive. Dave, I'm not suggesting that we water down the classification system for Revo. In fact, I started another post on that very topic, expressing concern that somebody might game the local classifiers and make himself a Revo GM, even though he could never compete with many of us at major matches. What you may not realize is that right now we don't have our own high hit factors, we're measured as a percentage off Limited. With so many of the classifiers non-revo-neutral, it makes GM an almost impossible goal for us. Even Jerry has earned his GM card (which he certainly and unquestionably deserves) not by shooting classifiers, but by winning major matches. We can agree that the GM should be reserved for the top few in each division. I'm just saying that the Revo high hit factors should be calculated the same way in Revo that they are in the other divisions, leaving it a very difficult goal, but a goal that is still attainable by the highly-skilled practitioners in the division. Just like it is in every other division.

For those of you who haven't seen the thread about the provision single-stack division, you might want to take a look: http://www.brianenos.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=37004 My concern arises when Area 5 Director and USPSA board member Gary Stevens says: [T]he eliminate L-10 train was on the track prior to the SS division. It is still on the track and moving right along. I wouldn't be surprised if Revolver was riding along in the caboose. Just my opinion though. Flexmoney then says: Folks... I talked to Gary this past weekend...face-to-face. What he is trying to hint at (rather bluntly) is that Limited-10 and Revolver, from his understanding, don't have much support from the USPSA Board Of Directors. And, that he is not a part of that... If that doesn't sit well with you...don't waste your energy and time venting about it here, get in touch with your Board Of Directors !!! Guys, if this were just the standard gossip mill stuff, I wouldn't have started this thread. But when the source is Gary Stevens (whom I believe has demonstrated his support for our division in the past), I do think we need to be worried. And I think we need to take action. It's obvious that Revolver division, although still small, is experiencing a very real growth trend. We are seeing more and more wheelgun participation at major matches. There were more revolvers at the 2006 Kansas Sectional than Production or L-10! Last year there were 5 revolvers at the Summer Blast, this year we'll have 5 or 6 times that many. The '06 USPSA Nationals will see more wheels than ever before. The official USPSA calendar for this year includes the first-ever sanctioned Revolver-only match (Iowa, October 8) and there is plenty of interest already. It's also obvious that we are still the forgotten step-child of USPSA, at least from the perspective of some of the current leadership. That was all too apparent at the awards ceremony following the '05 USPSA Nationals when our president literally forgot to present the plaques to the top Revo finishers. But that attitude is not truly reflective of the USPSA rank and file. I continue to be approached by other shooters, newbies and long-time USPSA shooters alike, who are interested in getting started in Revo. I continue to hear positive comments from ROs and staff at major matches ("man I love watching those revolver guys shoot"...."I need to get me one of them 625s"....etc.) I continue to see more and more coverage of Revolver shooting in Front Sight magazine. We are heavily represented right here on this forum, with more and more wheelgunners chiming in all the time. Having a separate and distinguished Revolver division is important to the membership of USPSA. We are not comparable to L-10, Production, or any other division. With our 6-round limitation and completely different reload requirements, we cannot be wrapped into another division as a "category" and stay alive. Whatever issues the BOD may have with regard to L-10, those issues do not apply to us. If the concern is that L-10 and Single-Stack have too much overlap to remain independently viable, that concern certainly does not apply to Revolver. There is truly no other place for us to go (within USPSA) if our division is dumped. There's absolutely no downside to keeping Revolver as a separate division. We don't whine, we don't hold anybody up at matches, and we certainly don't bleed off resources from the organization. What USPSA should do is give us the support we deserve, and then sit back and watch participation in the Revolver division grow. Fund our prize table at the Nationals at an equivalent level. Support the US Revolver team that goes to the World Shoot. Straighten out the mess in the classification system that gives everybody the wrong impression that Jerry is the only one who can really do this stuff. Groom industry support, advertisers, and sponsors for Revolver. In other words, be fair to us. Revo is real-deal. Look at the popular gun magazines out there....we're seeing more articles about DA revolvers than we've seen in the past 20 years. Look at AH--even Clint Smith has discovered how cool and useful wheelguns are, and Roy Huntington's encouraging him to talk about it! I see more revolvers on the shelves at the local gun stores, and under the arms of gun-show purchasers, than I have seen in many years. We are in the midst of a revolver renaissance not just within the competitive realm, but with respect to shooters and gun-owners in general. But until USPSA sees what's going on right under its very nose, we need to point it out to them. Talk to your Area Director, and let him know it's important that Revolver be kept as a separate division. Drop an email to Michael Voigt, and anybody else you know who is a mover and shaker in USPSA. Make sure you keep it polite and positive. Now is the time.

Well, since most of the BOD tunes in rigth here, I will use this forum to strongly urge them to consider trends in participation. I dunno about L-10, but Revolver participation is unquestionably on a major upswing. As one example, here are the number of shooters at the Kansas Sunflower Classic Sectional Championships, held in Topeka last month: Limited 22 L-10 11 Open 20 Prod 14 Revolver 16 That's right, boys--Revo was the third most popular division, with more shooters than L-10 and Production at a major sanctioned match. Another example--last year at the Summer Blast there were 5 revolver entrants, the last I heard there were 29 wheels signed up for the '06 Blast next week! I know this is some major-power-factor thread drift. So I'll throw in the comment that I think single-stack is a great idea, and if properly supported by USPSA's leadership it will become quite popular across the country. The exact same thing is true of Revolver division.

You mean like the "Performance Center Guns" the S&W guys laid out on the table at the 2004 Steel Challenge (about 15 feet from Randy Lee's table, ironically)?....judas priest I've seen Swingline staple guns that had better actions than the stuff the factory thinks is good.

well then you're right back to even. cosmic justice. I just realized something....... I didn't find the Hearthco clip. It found me. You stay away from me Keith.

Careful now. There is one GM in Revolver division only because nobody has ever bothered to set up realistic national high hit factors for Revolver. Participation in revolver is growing fairly dramatically, even outstripping some other divisions at several major matches this year, so USPSA needs to address this issue quickly.

Wow, that's great to hear that we've reached the point where somebody's actually doing something like this. (Strange that it would be SIG, of all people, but what the hell!) No question about it, the revolver renaissance is clearly well underway. The northeast is actually a pretty strong area for wheelgunners, you should have no trouble filling up the class. Let's make sure it gets written up for American Handgunner, etc.

OK, OK, Keith.....I already have one of your moonclips for voodoo use. I'll give you back your Hearthco.....dammit. Remind me.

Are stage diagrams available yet? Any idea which classifier(s) are included in the match?

Only problem shooting a 9mm in the Single Stack division is that you can't take advantage of the 10+1 capacity that the rules allow for minor caliber pistols. If you're gonna be scored minor, you might as well shoot a .38 Super and have the 10+1 available.

I've broken two and my son Sam has broken one. All in about one year's time. And we're not even serious auto-pistol shooters! No more tungsten for the Carmoney boys.

Now Dan, I already sent back a Hearthco clip to you after you carelessly left one on the range last year....this time I really don't think it's yours because the brass is full-size, not that crazy cut-down stuff you and Cliff use. Besides, I already hired a guy to make a special velvet-lined presentation case for it.

It wants to take the preciousssss............

So I'm walking down through the woods at the club, trying to plan out some interesting stages for the upcoming Iowa back-to-back Single-Stack and Revolver matches, and lo and behold, what do I see down in the creek but a .45 moonclip. So I fish it out, and although it's a little rusty, my heart skips a beat when I realize it just might be a Hearthco moonclip. Back home, it cleaned up pretty decently, but still has a little pitting. I'd call it a shooter at this point, rather than a collector moonclip. So I'm wondering....is there a private authentication service to determine whether I found a genuine Hearthco moonclip? Or can I send it in for a factory letter?

Good job, Steve!!

HEY!! I resemble that remark.

Actually it's not all that unusual for me to shoot a major match with fewer rounds than the official round count--that's what happens when you take no make-up shots, and you don't engage one of more disappearing targets. (I'm not bragging, by the way--I shoot revolver!)

Hold up now....I've actually been able to whittle away the old-style hammer to make it weigh substantially less than the Randy hammer. And yet I have not managed to get the ol' 25-2's action down in the same range as my new-style frame-mounted FP 625 with home-carved factory hammer. So there's more to it than just the weight of the hammer. I think the old-style hammer might use up some of its energy trying to align and jam its nose through the frame, whereas the new-style guns have the FP all nice 'n' lined up and ready to go. That's my theory anyway....

And don't forget, Brownells is one of the rare companies that actually supports our game by generously contributing to prize tables at major matches. I competed in a bunch of matches last year that had at least one of those big brown range bags on the prize table, even managed to pick one up off the table myself at the MO Fall Classic. This has been the case for a long time....I have a full Brownells gunsmithing screwdriver set downstairs that I picked up off a prize table at a bowling pin match probably 12 or 14 years ago. This is one of the main reasons I go out of my way to make my purchases from Brownells whenever possible.

Des Moines is definitely the closest "major" airport (45 minutes). KC is not too bad a drive (2.5 to 3 hours), and sometimes can be much cheaper to fly into. Osceola has several decent motels, as well as a bona fide casino/hotel (Terrible's).