practice range

[ErikW]

I hate it when I go to the range to practice and all the bays are taken, and there's a couple of non-members on one range, and the bays are supposed to be for members/range officers only, and I paid $200 plus $50 per year and do RO duties for the privilege to use the range, and then I go to the nationals and shoot the worst match of my life, and the non-member, non-RO who had no right to practice on the bay gets in the top 16.

I hate it when that happens.

[BSeevers]

Erik

I know Exactly how you feel. Just think of me, range is 1 hour drive, 1 bay and every time I get there a guy is slow firing a .22 rifle so I have to wait. Then I get on the range a yoho comes up and says Can I practice with you?translation: Can I cover you with my muzzle and shoot too fast, and get in your way? The annual fee is $20 so I guess its not all that bad.

PS Sorry about your bad match.

[sfinney]

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Quote: from Erik Warren on 5:31 pm on Sep. 3, 2002

I hate it when I go to the range to practice and all the bays are taken, and there's a couple of non-members on one range, and the bays are supposed to be for members/range officers only, and I paid $200 plus $50 per year and do RO duties for the privilege to use the range.......I hate it when that happens.

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Sounds like you need to ask the nonmembers to leave the bay, if they are unsupervised.

You're right, I wouldn't stand for paying that much and not being able to use the range due to someone else whos not even a member.

[Patrick Sweeney]

Non members on the range?  At our club, there are two conclusions:

1) A member brought them, and left them unsupervised while he went off to another range.  Result: his range priviledges are suspended.

2)  A member didn't bring them, and they somehow wandered in.  (The gate is supposed to be locked at all times.)  Result: They are told to leave.  If they want to join, they can come to a monthly meeting and apply.

We don't put up with non-members, but we are lucky enough to be the masters of our own fate.  No Bullseye, Silhouette, High Power, Skeet & Trap, etc.  Just IPSC.  Don't like our rules, there's plenty of other places to shoot.

Sounds like you need to be getting noisy at monthly meetings.

[John Thompson]

Closet range 25mi away, $350 to join and $85- a year, NO pistol bays.  You have to shoot on the rifle bay and if anyone is there shooting rifle your lucky to get a few pieces of non falling steel set up.

[lonegunman]

At my range its also a campground for RV's and a boat launch into the river so we get all kinds of people.  We have 2 pistol, a 200 yds. rifle, 50 yds. .22, and a trap range.  All ranges unless there are santioned matches going on are unsupervised, so it not uncommon to see cans, bottles and virtually anything that shatter into a million pieces left behind.  I have complained to our IDPA club president who also sits on the board of directors of the main club and has brought it up at the monthly meetings only to hear the rest of them say "We can't do anything unless we catch them and revoke their club membership".  Well you can't revoke something that they didn't have to begin with, for the most part these morons were either sneaking into the club or somebody is letting them in.  In the last month about half of our rifle benches have been shot up.  

Another thing that I see often are parents shooting on the range with their little kids running around without ear or eye protection.   You mention this to them and the get offended.  For the most part I avoid these people like the plague which is why I practice weekday mornings.

[John Thompson]

I forgot to mention that the BOD has denied letting us have a pistol bay time and time again.(80yr old guys who hate us IPSC/IDPA people).  The one time they agreed to it we bought the dirt and had it delivered.  Then some of the BOD intimidated some of the other directors into changing their minds and the dirt was taken from us(club) without any payment.  The dirt was used to re-do the old rifle back stop.

[Nolan]

Careful Erik or you'll be in the doghouse with me.

I was told that if I badmouth that particular club for that issue or for any other issue I'll be kicked off the RO list and my range privileges suspended.

But yes, I've had that problem many times before.  Just before the Nationals I wanted to chrono my match loads and do a little practice so I drove the 50 miles up to the range on Wednesday.  The San Rafael police dept. had every bay occupied.  I found the top cop and basically told him that bay 2 was specifically reserved for chrono by club members.  He very grudgingly gave me 30 minutes to do my chrono work, but no practice.

By the way they had about 12 cops spread over 5 bays.  

[GWS]

I've had similar experiences there.   Once I was asked by a club officer to vacate the chrono range so a non-RO could use the chrono.  I was trying to shoot steel plates after an hour drive up to the range.  As all the other practice bays were occupied I shot a few rounds on the practice line and left.  The Chrono bay was still being occupied by the Non-RO.

Another time, the RO crew working didn't have the energy to build a practice stage even though they had a full crew, but had time to come over to the chrono/plate rack range and crowd me off.

I know my work schedule kept me from putting in as many hours working there as some of the others, but I did my share and helped as much as possible.

Sounds like the situation has gotten even worse since I resigned as an RO there.

Gene Smyth