Conner

Was there any actual proof of this whatsoever? Because the BoD certainly didn’t provide any.

The public temper tantrums Troy has thrown at major matches has made me wonder, what are his actual qualifications to be DNROI? They must have some good reason for keeping him around this long despite his character, right? From what I can tell his résumé basically consists of being a B-class shooter who relatively frequently gets bumped to Open. I’m definitely not hating on people of any classification, or who have been bumped… I’m just failing to see why Troy is even a good fit for the position, even aside from his emotional issues? Particularly being bumped to Open, he’s supposed to be the authority on the rules, but he can’t follow them himself?

Bringing attention to problems is doing something. Match staff may not know better, or may just not be aware of the problems. If someone gives me a valid criticism of my ROing (or some other match staff duty I do or have done), it benefits the match for me to listen to them and not just say “fix the problem by doing the job yourself”. On the other side, as a competitor, if I bring a problem to the attention of match staff, and they just blow me off and have your attitude about it, that doesn’t make me decide to volunteer for the match. It just makes me not want to come back to that club. I get it, it’s not fun to volunteer and have people criticize you. I’ve been there. The culture is shifting in the wrong direction - when the org treats members like customers, it’s not surprising that they start acting that way (if I have a problem with a business I don’t offer to fix the problem for them, I’ll just take my money elsewhere). I think the ideal scenario is competitors nicely bringing up criticisms, and match staff listening. If the shortcoming at the match is related to being short staffed, a genuine explanation and request for the competitor to join the volunteer group is usually well received in my experience.

This type of attitude is a cultural problem in USPSA. “If you aren’t match staff/RO/setup crew/whatever, we don’t care about your complaints, even if they’re legitimate.” I show up early and stay late to volunteer at most my local matches, as well as being an RO (actually certified, not just running the timer). We should strive to put on the best match possible for all the competitors (including ourselves), regardless of whether they are ROs or not. If we are going to volunteer to do something and then do a bad job at it, we should just not volunteer at all. Saying “if you don’t like my way of doing it then do it yourself” to competitors is a disservice to the sport. The sport doesn’t exist for the ROs. The ROs exist for the sport. That’s not to say the ROs aren’t appreciated, they get thanked by almost everyone at every stage at a major match.

I’ve seen all 3 of them interact with members on various forms of social media enough to know that emailing them and hoping for improvement is laughable.

I liked the match in general. The stages seemed a little “easier” / less technical than the other times I’ve gone (2019 and 2020, both in Frostproof). I didn’t personally see or hear about any scoring problems due to RO incompetence like last year. I didn’t personally have any popper issues, although I agree the rules for them should be fixed. Every popper fell for me on the first hit (148gr bullets at 134.7 PF according to the match’s chrono). The awards ceremony was very unprofessional. I’d be embarrassed if I were them. They held it on the club house patio, and not only was there no where near enough seating/tables, it also started pouring partway through. I think less than half the people there got food. My small group waited in line only for them to run out. I think they didn’t order enough, and also didn’t have anyone serving the food, so people took way more than they probably should have. The prize table situation was also a mess. Just a huge swarm of people standing in the clubhouse hallway. Eventually it seemed to work out, but it was completely disorganized. The whole thing felt like they forgot about the awards ceremony until Sunday morning and then just threw it together last minute. The matchbook having many changes was also a little annoying. To add to it, they didn’t have WSBs posted on the stages on Thursday, so it was a little bit of a guessing game when walking them. Not a huge deal but just adds to the overall amateur feeling of the event. On top of being inaccurate, the matchbook looked like someone at HQ had their kid put it together for them. About middle-school project level of quality. Any of these things by themselves wouldn’t be a huge deal. But all of them together really reinforce the fact that USPSA is focused on increasing revenue rather than providing value to the membership. All the shooting related stuff was enjoyable, but the rest of the event was amateur hour.