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As for mags......can't go wrong with PMags! My Larue mags are nice an allow a longer COAL load for long range, but I'm not dumping $80 mags in a match like I would a $20 PMag. ;-)

I've owned a factory CMMG .308 and built my own .308 with a CMMG lower and parts from Rainier Arms. I spent around $1400-1600 on the build, it was 100% reliable, and it would have definitely done everything needed for 3-gun! I've shot an LWRC REPR and went back and forth between a REPR and LaRue OBR. I own both a 5.56 OBR and LWRC M6A3, and love both brands. If shooting 3-gun, I prefer the OBR with its DI gas system. The piston system recoil is noticeable to me. Even with that tho, I'm considering shooting my M6A3 SBR (12.7") at a match that I expect distances to be in under 250yds......bc it sounds fun. You can't lose with an OBR, REPR, JP, or building your own. Just weigh all the pros and cons of the rifle for what you intend to use it for. I bought my OBR to shoot out to, and beyond, 1000yds, and can make it work for 3-gun. I'd want a PredatAR or PredatOBR for 3-Gun personally. With ammo costs and availability, and the fact I do not load .308 yet, my OBR has high magnification FFP glass sitting on it in the safe.

I've often wished I wasn't required to fill out at 5320.20 for every state I wanted to take my SBR to. You would have to have a rifle for free states, and a different rifle for states like Illinois. A buddy shot his 11.5" BCM SBR at CMMG's monthly match and was able to hit the 385yd gong on his 2nd or 3rd shot, and ran the long range stage faster than he did with my 3-gun rifle.

As an RO, I try to only give reshoots if I personally yelled "stop" for something I felt was going to be a safety problem...like maybe the muzzle brake unscrewing and possibly leading to pieces of copper and lead coming back on us. If something about the shotgun follower (not sure how) made it unsafe in my opinion, and I stopped the shooter where he could have single loaded the chamber for each shot.....I stopped him earlier than he would have, therefore I personally set his time and caused his FTE's to be what they were. If the shooter points it out and wants to stop....the clocks running, if you're done, empty and show me a clear weapon. ......and I could be completely wrong in giving a reshoot when I stopped the shooter. I haven't been in this game long and haven't been required to RO a ton yet.

you had me at "party" It all makes sense. Was just curious. I'm hoping the match is everything everyone claims it to be so that next year when I sit down and decide where to go, I'm still ok with only working 40% of the work week again.

Fallen Brethren was my favorite match last year. Lots of long range, rules that allowed a single hit on paper with .308, and changing terrain that allowed shooting acrossed a field in one stage and from a cliff onto a distant hillside on another. The OBR really helped it's amateur shooter on the long range rifle stage, a pistol/rifle stage that ran from 60-400ish yards shooting from either the trunk of a car or prone on the ground behind the car, and a stage shooting from VTAC type barriers. The handguard fits your hand perfectly, is rock solid when handling and when resting on rocks and barricades to shoot out to distance. The accuracy of the gun is unreal, and a nobody like me was capable of beating some great shooters on the long range stage. I use the CTR stock with LaRue RISR and it was comfortable and fast to get on target with my scope (Bushnell 1-6.5 FFP). I run an AAC muzzle brake silencer mount and the recoil was reduced nicely. Reloads were quick and easy. The gun is solid enough that I had no reservations tossing it into abandonment barrels. While the gun is a bit heavy, the weight helped with recoil when pushing 168gr SMK's, but wasn't enough to slow transitions on targets in close.

You can definitely get a JP sooner. I still love my LaRue OBR, and loved it even more shooting it at Fallen Brethren last year.

Since I've never been to this match or this range....can anyone give me an expectation on a few things? 1: Terrain. Will New Balance's with heavier lugs be okay, or should I bring boots? 2: Bays? Woods? Open fields? Bring DEET? Shorts ok or need pants for ungroomed terrain and pests? 3: Rifle distances possible? (bring cheap 55gr, or need some heavier stuff for far targets?) 4: Worth bringing 3-Gun carts, or drive to stages?

Private range behind the house on the farm. Range can stretch to almost 400 yards, but you're shooting downhill a little if past 120 or so yards. It's only about 50-60 yards wide and 120 yards long for the flat part of the range at the bottom of the hill. Pistol/Rifle can be shot straight on or to the right, birdshot it any direction. Jeremy and Gateway teammates have had an open invite to come practice on the range and go with me to eat the best BBQ they will have (Wabash BBQ is only 5-10 minutes away).

I thought I was catching up to the curve. Last years purchases were 15-20 knockdown targets, a texas star, a plate rack, and a spinner. This year has been MGM auto-poppers, MGM poppers and MGM flippers, and 20 more knockdown steel plates.

I'm really hoping this match moves to Nebraska, Kansas, or Oklahoma. I really enjoyed this match this spring and was really looking forward to shooting it next spring. For the record, I would be willing to pay more than $150 for this particular match!

it's all down hill from here! Time to order a XXXL jersey for 2014. haha

My Benelli M2 shot about the same amount high and around 3-4" to the left. Without my mag tube extension or a barrel clamp on the gun, I put the end of the barrel in the ground, receiver in my left hand, and right foot on the side of the barrel....a little pressing with weight, trying to not overdue it. Did this once and the left to right was hitting dead center now. I added a HiViz Tri-Comp front sight and it brought my POI down to dead on at 50 yards. I harmed no trees in this experiment and filled the dent in the ground per golf course rules. Disclaimer: I am not a trained gunsmith, just someone who couldn't afford to send my M2 to someone who is. Do what I did at your own risk......although the front sight was a little screw and some gel type superglue, if you screw that up...put your helmet back on and go back to your padded room, an orderly will bring you your medication.

I liked the clays as well. I had never shot skeet or sporting clays and thought they were a good test of shotgun skills that I may need to work on. I've had brand new clays that seemed to break constantly out of my thrower when the next box didn't have a single one break, and I've had old clays that came out of my grandfathers basement that had white tops and only seemed to break with good hits on them. The brand new box of white flyers I picked up from WalMart last night didn't fair so hot on my MGM flippers last night. Clays broke about 25%-30% of the time it seemed.

RO'd this year...will RO next year to help out as well.

I hadn't heard about anyone getting injured, only that clays were coming up broken on Stage 4. I think the way Jesse is laying out the the Zoned stages may be the best route to go. Everyone runs zones A & B on Day one, then Zones C & D on Day two. RO's stay with their stage, then RO a different stage on day two that they stay with. The problem still exists with having RO's who don't shoot, or trying to get everyone through early enough for the RO's to shoot those stages in the late afternoon after everyone finishes. I just can't imagine leaving stages set up for a week after an RO shoot without them getting moved, tampered with, other disciplines needing to shoot on the same bays,......the range appears to be a massive undertaking and I can imagine it being a very popular place to go. Reducing from 20 to 10 stages may make the match easier to run, but I start to lose interest in next year if it's 10 stages......and I'm guessing a lot of other people would do the same. With 20 stages and the price for the match, I thought everyone was getting enough shooting for their money. I could see a compromise down to 15-18 stages, and making the match have 2-3 more LONG stages with high round counts, but simple to reset clays and steel targets like Kevin made for this match that just have to be flipped back up. As for guys with the same jersey RO'ing each other. If it's the Gateway 3-Gun team members, that is going to be hard to avoid, since ALL of them were RO'ing the match. If there was an RO match the weekend before (or somehow crammed into Friday), they would still have been RO'ing each other....but wouldn't have had the other shooters there to help keep them honest. I know that everyone HAS to know that the RO's police themselves in RO matches at big matches....we did it when I RO'd the MW3G last year, and know others did the same at the big matches they RO'd. That's nothing new. If it was another set of jerseys, I couldn't be sure as to how that happened, but did hear of some pushier shooters essentially taking over a squad who had a quieter RO who was non-confrontational, and was able to bend some rules that other squads didn't (i.e. when targets are painted, changing the start position,...). These things make small to large differences on fast stages like stage 1 and stage 7. I didn't see this personally, and do not know those particular shooters or the RO well, so I'm not going to point fingers as to who a RUMOR was about.

No matter how you try to score it...someone isn't going to be happy about it. Personally, since trap/skeet/sporting clays did not have time restraints I felt the percentages and points should be based solely upon how many the best shooter hit. So if the best guys hit 24/25 and I hit 12/25.....I would be within 50% of their score and receive 50% of possible stage points. I know the charcoal stage had a time restraint, but thought it easier and that it would make more sense to score it based upon the number hit....so if someone hit 14 to win, and another hit 7...the person who hit 7 could receive 50% of stage points. To me that seems more in line than to assess time penalties on a stage that had no par time or scored times for any shooter. As for Stages 4 being thrown out, I can imagine for a Match Director that's a tough call to make, especially after spending the time and money to buy the targets, design the stage, and put it together. For stage 4, at the matches I've been to, if a clay comes up broken and you shoot in its direction...you get it! While I like the popper/flipper parts in stages, they can be prone to breaking clays when they toss them up. My squad did not get to shoot stage 4, I wish we would have now, even if the scores were thrown out. As for stage 10, we ran with one hit with a slug on each target, which is how I remembered one stage out of the twenty I had to RO, was to be run. I can definitely see a massive change in scores if it is run with some having to score two hits, while another squad only has to score a single hit. When all of us RO's went through the stage briefings, we went through specific rules on stage starts, hits required, how/when things can be shot, when targets could be painted...for twenty stages... apparently some did not hear things the same way or forgot everything for all twenty stages, as it seemed some things changed by the time my squad got to a stage, and some things changed after my squad had already shot a stage. Some RO's allowed shooters to change when steel was painted, stages were thrown out, and people had to reshoot stages. Consistency WOULD be improved with static RO's, especially static RO's that are strong and strict about the stage rules. I don't think anyone can argue that. The difficulty is going to be finding 20 RO's willing to RO the match, most likely without being allowed to shoot it if the match is at that particular range. Being the first year for this match, there will be learning experiences that lead to a better match next year. I know Jeremy and Aaron busted their butts to put one fun match on, Kevin Stewart (Gateway 3-Gun team member) put in a lot of time, money, and effort into welding up all those 6x6 flip up targets that made things so easy to reset some of the stages, and I know there were a lot of us RO's that put some extra time in to try to make it a good match. There were 20 great stages setup, and as it sometimes happens, stages don't run as seamlessly as expected. The scoring didn't go well, and with skeet/trap/sporting clays (IMO) was unfairly punishing to those that didn't win the stage or come VERY close to winning it, but when changed it made some other shooters upset about what the way it was scored. I personally think the best way to score those stages, and IMO the charcoal stage, was to score it like I wrote above in this post....I understand that some may disagree with that. I can't wait until this match comes next year! I have confidence that Aaron and Jeremy will have these first year glitches figured out and ready to run the 2nd Annual Gateway Shotgun Challenge alot smoother. I know that I'm noone important and my opinion is worth what I'm charging you for it, but here would be MY recommendations for next year... 1. Score trap/skeet/sporting clays/charcoal purely upon the number of hits or percentage figured from hits/possible and percentage based upon the class leader with points based upon percentages. 2. Skeet and Trap could potentially all be shot at the same time with all squads....that place had enough bays to run 5x the number of shooter we had! The number of bays allowed was more than sufficient as is, but skeet/trap/clays could all be shot by all groups on Sunday as finals stages on Sunday. 2. On all stage descriptions, include how the stage will be scored, and rigidly stick to it. 3. On all stage descriptions, include instructions clear enough that any shooter could be an RO. Don't leave room for people to decide if they can start standing/sitting/prone/port-arms/low-ready...or state the shooter can start however they like. 4. On stage descriptions, include if steel can be painted every shooter or between squads only, include that barrels have to be back on painted circles before starting,...small details. 5. If possible, find enough volunteers for each stage to work as RO's that are stuck to their stage for the match. 6. Consider having everyone shoot stages 1-12 Saturday, and all shooters shoot stages 13-20 on Sunday, so that you could cut the required number of RO's in half without sacrificing consistency on stages. 7. Offer a vendor the chance to charge for cold pop/water and warm food near the stages from 11am-1pm for lunches, more if they want. 8. Make the long stages as far apart from each other as possible, regardless of what stage you start on. skeet and trap were fine together with all the bays, but the jungle run and running through the field huffing and puffing should have been 5-10 stages apart. Again, I'm already looking forward to next year's match and I hope noone is discouraged!

makes sense. First time out and looking forward to the match, but will make it a little rough being gone that week than at work.

Curious mind at work here, it's my first time for this match.....but is there a specific reason the match is scheduled Thursday through Saturday instead of Friday through Sunday? I'm self employed, so it means an extra day off work. Still planning on making it, I just have to make sure finances are set well in advance with the extra day off.

only 6 weeks......not enough practice time. Looking forward to this match!

RO'd for squad 5. FUN match that was humbling on several stages. Stage 12....the spinning/swinging clay holding contraption....Jeremy, that was wrong...wrong wrong wrong....and I loved it! :-) I may have found some new interests in sporting clays and skeet. Having never shot them before, I really enjoyed those stages, shooting 28/40 on the sporting clays and 17/25 on the skeet range was good enough to make me want to go do that again. The stage points weighting may have been a bit off for my liking, but with the mistakes I made, I expected myself to fall in the standing to around where I fell. Stage RO's (instead of, or in addition to squad RO's) at each stage would have kept things more consistent, but I can't imagine how it would be done if the RO's were going to shoot the match too.....and to be honest, I can't afford the drive from KC to pay for a hotel, fuel, food in order to RO without shooting. Considering the range and how busy I imagine it could be, I can't imagine the stages being left out for an entire week between an RO shoot and regular match to keep things consistent, and I also can't imagine shooting all 20 stages Friday and being able to walk (let alone RO) for the match the next morning. Not sure if there is a great fix to that one! I think Jeremy and Aaron did a good job with the match, and from what I was hearing and seeing from the shooters, it looked like most everyone had a blast.

6am, 7am meeting, 8am pew pew time

I'm planning to bring most of a case of Rio low recoil 00 buckshot and some (30-40rds) low recoil 7/8oz Fiocchi slugs if anyone needs spme and couldn't buy it elsewhere. I also have two 80rd ammo cans of Fiocchi 00 buck that isn't low recoil if any needs it.

Any opinion on Vinci vs. SuperVinci??? I have a SuperVinci that sits in the safe all year long until Dove season starts. Wouldn't be all bad to have a backup to my M2, or maybe to have my M2 as a back up.

I started hitting the gym to prepare for the Tough Mudder this fall. I typically do 3-5 miles each morning, followed by weight training. I try to do similar things for 2-3 weeks, then change things up. I'm a Chiropractor, so balance in my workouts, posture, form,....is all at the top of the list to me over how I look in the mirror or what my weight is currently at. Currently, I work opposing muscle groups out on the same day. So I will work out biceps and triceps, then shoulders and lats, then traps/rhomboids and pecs, then legs on its own day. I will do that for 2 weeks, then work out complimentary muscles together, and their opposing muscles later in the week....like chest/tris today, traps/rhomboids/biceps friday. I have to be careful with core exercises due to a disc herniation, so I use an exercise ball a lot more than I am on the floor. I noticed a BIG difference at my first Gateway 3-gun match, Midwest3Gun, and local 3-gun matches after starting at the gym....especially when having to sprint during a stage, I wasn't breathing hard or out of breath at the end of the stage or while shooting.