111 shooters... for a local IDPA match

[GForceLizard]

Offer a discount on the next match if they help tear down.

[RickB]

The First Come/First Served option would apply to advance registration; we'd never have a policy that actually turned-away someone who showed up. We'd just like to limit matches to maybe 80 shooters, rather than 100-110. It's possible that the situation will become self-limiting, with 15-20 shooters deciding they can't spend that much of the weekend at the range, and the numbers will drop. I'm afraid the problem may extend to the staff, more so than the "customers", since staff is often at the range two hours longer; we can't afford to have set-up, tear-down, and officiating take a hit due to the length of the match.

[Aristotle]

Rick, here's another solution.

Seems as though that your more primary concern is losing staff, and that is totally understandable. Raising match fee's will either turn people off and give the perception that the 'club' is getting greedy, or, won't work all together.

I sure hope you don't take this the wrong way, but, I think you should be fully comping your staff for the match.

- Give Greg another helper.

- Add a third person, dedicated to stats.

1. You will have happier staff, and may feel more open to staying a little later/working a little harder.

2. You can make up the money very easily from the increase in shooters.

The pain with having a "big match" is felt on the administration, but other than that, why would we want to "limit" our field. I personally think it's pretty awesome to see that many shooters. The expectation of leaving early certainly has not affected enough shooters that it's changed your head count.

Keep the field deep. Let people know that WA is a strong IDPA competition state. Bigger field will brew better competition, which will keep the seasoned shooters around that sometimes drop off the IDPA game from lack of competition.

win/win

cliffs: Beef up your staff, give them a little more "incentive" and keep bringing them in. My perception has always been, the more shooters we can get, the better we all are for many many reasons.

just my .02

Edited April 19, 2010 by Aristotle

[Steve Koski]

We have each squad tear down the stage they finish on before disbanding. There are some dorks that take off without helping at all, but the teardown goes very fast because most help.

[Victor_R]

We have each squad tear down the stage they finish on before disbanding. There are some dorks that take off without helping at all, but the teardown goes very fast because most help.

This also happens at the club Ricks talking about. Rick even though I'm not a offical SO yet I still try to do my part in helping out and I've also seen other's that were on my squad do the same. Would starting at 9:00 instead of starting at 10:00 help any?

[Aristotle]

Here's another wild idea, simply because I truly believe this "issue" is more of a blessing, but has there ever been a club that has hosted a "match weekend"? A match Saturday AND Sunday. Then again, this is not an issue that is rampant in most parts of the country.

Have a staff of 10-12 SO's, an MD/RM, etc. And have them do the set up on Saturday. Run the match, limit it to 60 shooters. Keep the stages up, and have another set of staff run the Sunday match, and they are responsible for tear down.

Stats would be done Sunday night.

This would give folks, who normally don't have Saturdays off, to shoot it Sunday or vice versa. And your not burning out the staff with set up and break down. Saturday folks can leave as soon as they are done shooting, and Sunday guys don't have to come too early to set up, but are responsible for break down, and everyone goes home early AND you don't turn anyone down and you continue to grow the sport.

Also my unsolicited opinion, and this could be the fatigue from being up until 3:30am, and flying all day, but you should also open up SO training to anyone that's interested. There are so many people I know that would jump at that opportunity, let people be involved. The more the SO's, the better, I can't see this being a bad thing. The regulars can take a break, not everyone has to work every single match, etc.

Edited April 19, 2010 by Aristotle

[bisdak]

Rick, I go to your match and Ari is right, this problem is more of a blessing. Your club is having a tremendous success. You have a successful IDPA organization right now in Renton. So you say some people are grumbling, definitely not in our squad last Saturday. Everyone had fun and everyone took care in breaking down the stage after the match. Raising the fees would definitely turn people off and think the wrong way. For every success, there's always a change and this change happens to be the match ending a little later. But from what I see last Saturday, shooters were happy. Just my $0.02.

[Duane Thomas]

Silly question perhaps, but would it work to have more stages? Are there any bays that aren't being used? That could get down squad size a bit, and maybe make the match go faster.

In the last couple of matches I've noticed we've had at least one stage - this month two - where you have two stages in one bay, with a mandatory, off the clock reload in-between, and that's always a choke point as far as having one squad standing around waiting while the previous squad finishes up. Maybe make a policy against such stages?

I have to wonder from whence comes this sudden surge in popularity. Any theories on that?

[Nik Habicht]

Couple of thoughts -- can you expand to 8, 9, or 10 stages? That might help a little -- and folks would at least be shooting more and waiting/working less.....

The other thing that Central Jersey did a long time ago, when they were running 100 shooters on a single (common firing line) pistol range was to have a.m. and p.m. sessions with capped attendance. Still a long day for staff, but a shorter day for shooters. If you go that route, plan on buying a good lunch for your staff, as well as beverages -- and if necessary adjust your entry fees to cover that....

Last but not least -- Advance sign-up with a cap. I know of one club that implemented that -- and they had a dual stage sign-up system: Match contributors (Stage designers, builders, ROs, folks who had a track record of working) got to sign up for ~ 1 week before general sign-up opened. Once the match hit it's cap, that was it.

If folks sign up and don't show -- they might get one pass; on a second offense in a year they wouldn't be allowed to preregister for the remainder of the year, and would have to take a chance on walking on the day of the match.....

[DWFAN]

What about dual staff? Encourage/sign up new people to staff each match. Run half the staff on set up, then let them shoot and leave. The others can shoot and tear down. Might save an hour or so on each end for some of the people. The weeknight club I shoot at has a hard time getting help, so I doubt we could even do what I suggest.

Maybe stress to the 100+ that show up, that unless more people step up to help out the burned out staff, then the match will be limited and people will be turned away.

[RickB]

Silly question perhaps, but would it work to have more stages? Are there any bays that aren't being used? That could get down squad size a bit, and maybe make the match go faster.

In the last couple of matches I've noticed we've had at least one stage - this month two - where you have two stages in one bay, with a mandatory, off the clock reload in-between, and that's always a choke point as far as having one squad standing around waiting while the previous squad finishes up. Maybe make a policy against such stages?

I have to wonder from whence comes this sudden surge in popularity. Any theories on that?

We're already using all seven available bays. We already "discourage" multiple strings and off-the-clock reloads, but like anything that's merely discouraged, they still happen. I've gone as far as to suggest having no steel, or anything else that requires resetting, or that might break and cause a hold-up. Not surprisingly, there's little interest in de-contenting matches as a method for speeding them up.

No clue about the sudden uptick in attendance; new years resolutions?

[Duane Thomas]

It is puzzling.

[SteveZ]

No clue about the sudden uptick in attendance; new years resolutions?

Many shooting oriented programs these days (TV/podcast) encourage new shooters to seek out competition as a means to improve their skills....IDPA seems to be the game most frequently suggested perhaps because the equipment requirements are a little easier than USPSA Production and the stages seems to be a bit more "constructed" (i.e. go here...shoot these)....so I think this maybe a factor why we're seeing new shooters at matches.

[Aristotle]

I have a good idea, it's called the power of the internet. Ask how many of them saw videos of our club match on Youtube. I get close to 2000 hits on my videos alone a month. For the most part, people are visual creatures. Which explains why more people would rather watch a movie, rather than read a good book. You can explain things to them, but if they see it first hand, you have a better chance of "selling it" to them.

I'm not the only one now, there have been a huge up tick in folks recording and hosting their matches online. Certainly, if they see a little rolly polly asian guy with a camera on his head running and gunning, they can do it.

Edited April 23, 2010 by Aristotle

[Greg Bell]

Ari posted this earlier and the USPSA club on the other side of our range does this. They shoot multiple times over the weekend, twice on Sat and Sun. You would just have to spread your staff out over the weekend. A few IDPA clubs in Michigan have multiple start times for the day with limited squads to spread the load. You end up with smaller squads so shooters must paste, reset steel, brass, etc or it doesn't work. I always drove long distances in MI to shoot so I usually would ask if I could shoot again for no score or another division, I wasn't the only one we had several doing this.

[1973]

Holy smokes, my club just hosted it's local/monthly IDPA match and we had 111 shooters!! It's likely a record for our club. With the exception of one stage, there wasn't too much of a wait for our squad. But here's the kicker, we were in our cars, driving off the range by 2:30!!

It was another gorgeous weekend here, dry and sunny, and it seemed everyone wanted to come out and play. Had a good day, wasn't my best match, but I had a good time.

What's the most you've had at your local IDPA match?

I am pretty sure we had less shooters at the Coastal Bend Challenge regional match in Corpus a couple of weeks ago.

[Victor_R]

Holy smokes, my club just hosted it's local/monthly IDPA match and we had 111 shooters!! It's likely a record for our club. With the exception of one stage, there wasn't too much of a wait for our squad. But here's the kicker, we were in our cars, driving off the range by 2:30!!

It was another gorgeous weekend here, dry and sunny, and it seemed everyone wanted to come out and play. Had a good day, wasn't my best match, but I had a good time.

What's the most you've had at your local IDPA match?

I am pretty sure we had less shooters at the Coastal Bend Challenge regional match in Corpus a couple of weeks ago.

There were 90 shooters if I'm not mistaken.

[oldfrank]

We (Gadpa) broke our record Sunday with 86 shooters. We had seven stages. One standards, One weak hand static target stage and a fairly quick 6 targets stage in the shoot house.

The other four had combinations of static targets with pneumatic movers. Some stages had three or four different movers, fairly complex stages.

We got a late start at 10:45 and My squad finished breaking down our stage at 3:15. A few squads ran another fifteen or twenty minutes to finish.

We had everything down and stowed and the range clean by 4:30. I think that is pretty amazing in itself. It looked like a herd of ants moving barrels!

We had some new shooters, I don't know the exact number and a good blend of fairly new and experienced shooters.

We did have seven experienced SO's keeping everything moving.

Round count was probably somewhere around 120.

I am glad to see the sport growing and luckily we still have three bays we are not using so if the crowd grows we can add a stage or two to keep the squads manageable.

I don't know if we will ever see 111 but it is a possibility.

[Sullie]

As far as I know we (Renton, WA) have had 100+ shooters at every match this year. Isn't that right Rick?

[Trail3]

We just had 125 shooter at our August match at Sacramento, CA. IDPA club.

Of course it was the end of year pizza and prize feed match.

[lawboy]

We just had 125 shooter at our August match at Sacramento, CA. IDPA club.

Of course it was the end of year pizza and prize feed match.

Yup, I was there. Pizza was tasty too!

[PBA2]

Most I've seen is 30 and it all goes pretty well when everyone is good about helping set up, tear down, and tape. But even with 30 it's slow going when no one wants to help. I pride myself in my taping, I'm actually a faster taper than shooter at this point

[Kali]

With that many local shooters, it may be a good idea to encourage some other gun clubs (if there are any in your area) to host IDPA matches. I have 3 clubs all within 1 hour drive from me each hosting an IDPA a different Sunday of the month. Some shooters go to all 3 but many shooters only do one a month which helps disperse the total amount.

Edited August 15, 2010 by Kali

[Aristotle]

With that many local shooters, it may be a good idea to encourage some other gun clubs (if there are any in your area) to host IDPA matches. I have 3 clubs all within 1 hour drive from me each hosting an IDPA a different Sunday of the month. Some shooters go to all 3 but many shooters only do one a month which helps disperse the total amount.

There are, we have 5 IDPA clubs, and 7 USPSA clubs. Renton, happens to hosts the biggest turn out's for both USPSA and IDPA in our area.

[robot]

Well the surge in attendance could also be attributed to the increase in concealed carry permits being issued and uptake by people who want to protect themselves. Ask any shooter to recommend a fun shooting exercise for new concealed carry owners and most would say "Try IDPA. it's fun and gives you some practice".

As to why Renton is more popular? I guess all the top shooters in WA state shoot there, we like to shoot with the best and get humbled every single time

and I will continue to do my part to spread the word around to other folks via videos and social media channels.