The Early Days of IPSC

[latewatch]

Any of you guy's know a fella by the name of Jeff McDonald I think he just turned 70? He is a friend of mine here in Georgia that I shoot IDPA with sometimes he is still in decent shape and wide open when he is shooting and very competitive. He has not shot IPSC in twenty years probably but he enjoys telling me stories from when he CROed at the first five nationals and how much he enjoyed shooting IPSC back then. When I go to his house he always enjoys showing some pictures or plaques he won in the 80's. The one he was most proud of was 1990 nationals match results where he shot 74% of Jerry Barnhart who was the match winner. I think I have him talked into comeing out to a club match at Cherokee Gun Club soon. {OLD GUY'S RULE}

Although I have seen him in over 20 years, I used to shoot with Jeff when I was stationed at Ft. Benning in the mid-late 80's. I always enjoyed shooting with him at Flint River, Macon, Ft. Valley and a few other clubs that were around at the time.

[Patrick Sweeney]

Speaking of "real world" stage descriptions, I was cleaning the shop and came across a file of paperwork from the club in the mid-1980s. Included was a parody of ourselves, a little exercise a few of us worked up, called "the Ultimate IPSC Stage." the stage description was;

Start position; kneeling in front of the woodburning stove, in the clubhouse. Stovewood piece in strong hand. On buzzer;

Remove shotgun from rack, open front door of clubhouse and engage all poppers. Rack shotgun next to door, and proceed across driveway. Use provided rope to rappel down embankment to 100 yard range. Remove rifle from rack and engage all targets from available cover. Rack rifle, and low-crawl over berm between 100 yard range and bowling pin range. Put on scuba gear and swim length of "rice paddy" at the other end draw handgun and engage targets. Re-holster, and follow track into woods. Locate radio, and call in airstrike on former positon, then haul radio and "wounded" dummy to exfil point. Pop smoke for incoming helicopter.

All competitors who are not trained in rappel will be required to sprint down driveway to 100 yard range. All competitors not certified in scuba will be required to shuttle six sand-loaded ammo cans the length of the "rice paddy" two at a time.

Due to the cost of M-18s, the entry fee will be $50.

And you know the best part? We had members asking for months afterwards. "When will we be doing that stage?"

Edited March 8, 2013 by Patrick Sweeney

[benos]

I posted this w/o looking through the 16 previous pages to see if the "Early Days" pic was posted. In those days, you may notice I hated having my picture taken. But Robbie sure does!

[Patrick Sweeney]

Brian, where and when was that? Oh, the days of the appendix and crossdraw holsters. I still have a box with some Gordon Davis holsters and mag pouches in it. [sigh]

We were young and had small waists, but god, those foam hats didn't age well, did they?

[benos]

I can't say exactly, but I'd guess around the '82 Nationals.

[outerlimits]

cross-draws? got 'em. plaxco model on the right...

[ROY NEAL]

Patrick,

Every time I come to Gun Abuse Central and you pull out stuff like this just makes me appreciate you for letting me look through the old stuff and explaining how "we got from there to here". Maybe you should add another job to your not very busy lifestyle......USPSA Historian. That would be a fun book to read. C'mon, pitch that one to the powers that be and get started asap.

Roy

[Ross Carter]

I can't say exactly, but I'd guess around the '82 Nationals.

I think that picture was taken at the 1983 World Shoot. It has all the team members and some other famous shooters, the Gold team shirts had blue trim and the silver team had red trim. I don't know any other place everyone would have been together for that pic.

[benos]

I can't even remember where that match was Ross?!

[Ross Carter]

I can't even remember where that match was Ross?!

Virginia, Brian, I remember it was a two week match.

[BillChunn]

Virginia, Brian, I remember it was a two week match.

A TWO WEEK MATCH.... wow.... I thought the current Nationals format was a marathon....

BC

[Patrick Sweeney]

A Bruce Britt story, and a look into the world of pin-shooting.

I arrived at the club on an ealry Spring day, for some practice. (SC was in June, and the club was busy from the first snowmelt, until the frenzy of practice the week before the match.)

Bruce is plinking on the 100 yard range with his noew stock gun, a 1911 from either Ed Brown or Les Baer. The muzzle blast is a bit sharp, and the time to steel is brisk. "Say, Bruce, what load are you using?"

"I've switched to 255sw, and I loaded tem up until the pins moved the way I liked." Hmm. "Say, I have my chrono, care to run some over it?" So we do.

255 grain, hard-cast lead semi-wadcutters, at 898 fps. A 229PF. No wonder he was getting good results on pins.

And good results later that year up at Central Lake.

[ArturoJ]

Here are some 80's shorts! LOL

I think this was the 86' AZ state champs. in Douglas AZ. I am the big, tall, dumb kid in the back, I must have been 16 or 17 in that pic. I got this image from Ian Martin, he is standing in front of me. Sure was fun growing up in Phoenix, shooting at Rio and chasing Rob and Brian every week!

Gone are the days ...

:-D

Familiar faces for sure.

most names have faded cept Doug B. and I think Tim C.

Yes, that is Tim Copperstone just in front of Doug. I was over at Tim's house on Monday borrowing some 3gun gear for SMM3G.

[Steve RA]

The one on the right - 2nd row - looks like a guy named Richard Zapperoli I used to know - maybe??

[JKSNIPER]

Not just Browning Hi Powers, but MAB 15s, P-38s, Lugers (god's honest truth, a guy showed up with a Luger once)

My understanding is that Bob Shimek once wrote an article about shooting an IPSC match with a Luger. I've never seen that article though I've always wanted to read it.

You know someone wrote an interesting article when it's decades later and people still mention it occasionally.

There was a guy years ago who showed up to a sniper match with a shiloh sharps rifle...and didn't do half bad.

They wrote about it in a magazine that I THINK was called "Tactical Shooter" at the time put out by the same people that put out "Precision Shooting" magazine.

I can't remember what year it was...I MAY have an old copy lying around in, to quote my wife, "junk that should be thrown out". I'll dig through my "junk" and see if I can find it.

[StraightUp_OG]

Back in the day (86'ish) when CCML club in Phoenix was shooting at the National Guard Armory my buddy brought his AMT Automag and shot a Thursday night club match with it. It was unbelievably obnoxious!! You would hear the pop pop pop of the other shooters and then BOOM BOOM BOOM of the Automag. Good fun those days were.

ETA: He had Ernie Hill make him a custom rig with mag pouches and everything. Very cool!

Edited March 27, 2013 by StraightUp_OG

[Patrick Sweeney]

OK, however many pages back it was, where I described my epiphany, stepeing away from .30, to embrace dinky black rifles? That's where I got my butt handed to me, usign my M1 Garand, by a club member shooting his unversal M1 Carbine.

Well, seeing this video reminded me of that time, but this would have been much more satisfying;

Even after all these years, Jerry still leaves me slack-jawed.

[Flexmoney]

Even after all these years, Jerry still leaves me slack-jawed.

Gotta love that excitement!

[leas327]

Jerry seems like such a cool guy.

Its like he knows he is living the dream and is totally cool with just going along for the ride.

[rangedog]

I started shooting IPSC in Australia the mid 80's and we had some pretty wild times.

One "funny" incident comes to mind.

Back then , we had a rule(not sure if it was local rule only)that police officers and security guards could use their issue rig, many of which exposed the trigger....

So this particular day we had a little speed shoot set up, and security guard Mike makes ready, with a 38special revolver in an exposed trigger holster, set just behind the hip and raked rearwards.

I was standing about 10 ft behind Mike and had a good view of what happened next....

The buzzer sounds and Mikes hand flashes to his revolver, there's a boom a bit earlier than expected.....Mike has managed to shoot himself in the bum!!

The projectile went in the top of his bum cheek and came out the bottom(same cheek...) , Mike had a decent size bum so most of the force was spent by then and the projectile rattled down his trouser leg and was later found in his boot...

Immediately after shooting himself, Mike loudly observed "I've shot myself", and collapsed faintly into the arms of the R/O, who caught him beautifully.

Mike patched the hole in his jeans and wore them proudly to shoots for years afterwards, always ready to tell the story to any newcomers who asked about the patch.

His main regret was that just before entering his bum cheek the projectile had ploughed it's way through his favourite tobacco pipe, which he had stuck in his back pocket just before fronting the line.....

[Dr. Phil]

OUCH!! I would definately NOT want to shoot myself in the pipe! Nor the bum either...

[Patrick Sweeney]

Good news along with the bad. My father passed away recenlty, and we've been cleaning out the house.

Apparently when you do this, things long-lost re-appear.

I just came across a package of photos from the 1983 Nationals, in Moline. So, scannners do not live in vain.

(Quick, who gets that reference?)

No telling what else will appear (I also found a carton of 10mm reloads, Dad didn't even own a 10mm) but relevant photos will get scanned and posted, alogn with stories.

Edited July 11, 2013 by Patrick Sweeney

[Les Snyder]

I've submitted this photo before, but it is at the Manatee Gun Club (Fla) in 1983... yours truly negotiating a wall with trusty 1911 in hand after completing a Cooper tunnel.... plywood ramp down the other side... I shot with the "outlaw" Tampa Bay Combat Pistol League, and didn't get a USPSA number for a year or so... IIRC A2365... now L747 regards Les

%5BIMG%5Dhttp://i825.photobucket.com/albums/zz180/LesSnyder/DSC00255.jpg

[DrRosenRosen]

Patrick,

Spent most of the afternoon and early evening reading this thread and as usual, your wit and insight thundered through! You brought back MANY great memories of early IPSC and SC shootings, especially the early Michigan days.

It was tough to learn about Bruce's passing. You may remember that back in 91 or 92 at DSC's first 3-gun, you and Bruce conned Susie (my wife) into shooting the whole match rather than just the pistol portion. The rifle course was 12 or 15 PPs at 150 -200 yards and started next to a table. At the start, grab rifle, go prone on the table and engage PPs until down. She had to borrow your AR and went one for one on the poppers, something NOBDY else did that day. She wasn't fast, but she was damn sure accurate! The two of you were pretty encouraging and pretty much let everyone know that they needed to step up.

It was fun reading about some of the characters and history of the LGC guys, especially the unidentified people that I know who you were talking about!

Good times were pretty much had by all back in those days!

[Patrick Sweeney]

'92? then the rifle (if she used mine) was probably my Colt HBar, with a comp on it, that was my loot from the 1991 Steel Challenge.

Still have it, now with a McArthur comp on it.