Tengu

My company TAC-SCI makes a product called Elite Focus that is specifically designed to help shooters with focus and energy. It's a blend of amino acids, vitamins, minerals and antioxidants that helps prevent eyestrain and keeps you sharp, even late on a match day when a lot of people start to hit a wall in the afternoon. It also helps a lot with jet lag and hangovers or general lack of sleep. It doesn't contain any caffeine, so even if you are sensitive to caffeine you don't have to worry about jitters. We currently sponsor Max Michel, Travis Tomasie, Dave Sevigny, Brooke Sevigny, and Jim Gilliland. You can see what they have to say about Elite Focus and learn more about our product here: http://www.tac-sci.com/ My brother Elye and I worked together for almost half a year refining the formula to provide a nice, even mental boost on match days.

I recently picked up a used Witness 10mm Compact, and out of the box it's a great gun with lighter handloads (180 gr Montana Gold CMJ and Rainier 180 gr Plated HP, both at ~950 fps), very accurate and reliable. The problems started when I tried out some hot Doubletab loads (165 gr listed at 1340 fps in Glock 29 and 180 gr listed at 1238 in Glock 29, haven't chronied them yet through my Witness) and started getting failures to feed every 2 or 3 rounds, the bullets hanging up partway into the chamber. I would like to try some heavier recoil springs to see if that would correct the problem with the hotter loads, but this pistol has dual coil recoil springs, and the Wolff site says that their recoil springs are not available for models with dual coil springs. Does anyone know if there is a supplier that could provide replacement dual recoil springs in a heavier weight, or would it be possible to install a new guide rod that would accept single coil springs? I love this pistol, but I want to be be able to enjoy it with full-power ammunition as well as target loads!

I just wanted to recommend a friend of mine who's been working really hard on a new career as an MMA journalist. She's a very sweet and knowledgeable young lady named Giada Esposito, and she covers breaking news in the UFC and other MMA organizations as well as writing editorials and conducting fighter interviews. If you enjoy MMA and want to read some good news stories and get some inside information into what's going on in the sport, you should check out what she's doing. This is a link to all of her published stories, and she has new pieces up regularly: http://www.fiveknuckles.com/mma-writer/giada.html I've shot with a lot of the members here, and you know I would never recommend anyone lightly. She really is a good writer, and I hope you'll check out her work. Thanks. Ben Alexander

I've had great success with both CCI standard velocity and CCI Blazer. I really don't think you can beat the Blazer loads for economical practice with above-average accuracy, and the priming is top-notch- misfires are practically non-existent (haven't had one yet in many, many thousands fired). As for other brands, the lube on Federal 22s seems heavy and they have never fed very reliably for me. Remington Golden Bullets feed and shoot well, but with bad primers every few hundred rounds. And watch out for the so-called Ely-primed loads made for Remington in Mexico- I tried a brick, and mucho misfires! At least one failure every 10 rounds!

A small square of blue electrical tape numbered with a sharpie. It holds up well, can be retouched when necessary, and is not permanent if that ever becomes an issue.

I haven't had the pleasure of shooting the Nationals the past two years, but three years ago when I competed in Tulsa the weather was beautiful (maybe a bit cold in the morning). My earlier joke about the Mud Bowl aside, I think that foul weather can be a problem at any match venue; snow in Bend and 110 degree heat in Barry at past Nationals come to mind. Two years of rain in a row is probably more coincidence than anything, and holding a major match anywhere in any season can be a gamble. I know that Tom Fee and his staff at USSA have worked extremely hard to put on great matches, and hopefully in the future the drainage issues can be resolved. As far as the weather goes, that is in more competent hands than ours, and we'll just have to hope for the best wherever the match is held

Congrats to Dave and Chris! It looks like Ted shot a hell of a match in L10 as well as Limited, too. After this year, they may have to rename the Tulsa Nationals the Mud Bowl!

It looks like the bad weather is going to continue tomorrow. What's left of Hurricane Ike's going to be heading up through Tulsa sometime in the afternoon...

Does anyone know who the current leaders are in the L10 match?

Open- Max L10- TT... although, I think Dave Sevigny's going to be awful motivated

What a match! Congrats to all the "new" winners! Travis, I knew it was your year! Way to go! GO ARMY! And Bucky, thanks for getting an "Old School" thread going- I've been missing it! Let's keep it up for Open/L10- and what a match that should be, too

Way to go Max! Here's to another awesome year

"2001: A Space Odyssey" has to top my list of books that I couldn't get into... thank God I never saw the movie "The Scarlet Letter" is another one for which I have painful memories. "Atlas Cut the Cheese" is a modern classic waiting to be written

That's a sweet looking pistol! I was thinking about getting one of those myself, but I kind of got turned off by the pic on the EAA website, which looks like some kid in highschool shop class welded 2 inches on to the end of a Witness and didn't bother to blend it in. Obviously they've refined the design since then. Have you had a chance to shoot it yet? My only prior experience with a 10mm Witness is the compact model, which performs great.

Thanks for the info! Interesting mix.

This rumor is untrue. John Amidon and Jay Warden (RO for stage 9) decided that there was a misinterpretation of the stage briefing which led to the option of a reshoot. Lee, congratulations on winning M class! Great match! Ben

Were Ben S. and Bob V. both shooting Glocks?

TGO really defines perfection in our sport. Hats off to him, again. And kudos to TT for such a great match as well. Six stage wins at a Nationals with a field as deep as this year's is just amazing.

Gun problems have been his Achiles heel. It doesn't make sense to have skills at his level and gear that doesn't perform.

The ROs I talked to in this case said it was raining too hard when they were settting up to shoot anything. Edited to add: Watched the 3 stages the super squad shot today, TJ's pistol was a jam-O-matic on 2 of the 3. From listening to the banter going on, sounds like he was fighting gun issues most of the match. That's unfortunate about TJ. I'd love to see him shoot a match one day with a gun that actually worked.

Wow! Amazing finish! Congrats to both of them

Phil, Thanks for helping to clarify the situation. We all know how hard the ROs and staff work to make a match like this possible, and they have our respect and gratitude for it. It certainly seems like the issue on the two stages in question is one of stage design rather than any failing on the part of the match staff running them. I do hope that at the end of today everyone will feel that the final match results have been decided by superior shooting skills rather than a test of prop handling on one or two stages. Best of luck. Ben

Exactly. It's a shame to see stages like this turning up at the Nationals. Apparently the lesson of the squirrel has been forgotten...

Phil would be right there in the hunt right now if it wasn't for his 0 on Stage 18 (TGO 38 match points on that stage, Phil 0- only 44 points overall separate them after yesterday). I think that makes my earlier point that it would be a shame if the final match results were decided by a "subjective" call. And it certainly calls into question the safety of a stage if so much attention has to be focused on the positioning of a prop rather than the competitor's handling of his or her pistol. Who exactly is watching what, and are they doing it from the same position each time so angle and perspective don't influence apparent hand position? Have the same RO and scorekeeper run every shooter through that stage?

Max has had the gun less tha 2 weeks!!! Less than two weeks?!? Max is incredible