The Early Days of IPSC

[Patrick Sweeney]

In two places, no less. He is a dedicated test-shooting volunteer who has consumed much ammunition in the search for truth, justice and the American way.

[pcschwenke]

Patrick, I miss that shoot too. A lot of great people and prizes. Just when I started to get into the good prizes, he closed the shoot down. Word is Richard misses it too. He's still in limbo after the firework incedent and now a divorce.

Your stories bring back a lot of memories. I ran the PEE and the other steel event the final year along with several buddies. Felt weird in the mornings driving to the back range and picking up a pickup truck load of fully automatic guns and driving to the front range. One other thing I remember is BE driving around in that old pick up and camping on the hill.

Everyone I know wishes that match would re-open.

Paul Schwenke

[tightloop]

I shot with 3 clubs in the Houston area for almost all of the 80's and never had trophies after the '79 yr....we always shot for either cash or guns as the year long club race was tallied....usually all the class winners got a new Govt Mod or the equivilant in cash...then there were the side wagers on the Natl Qualification matches...Not enough pressure to shoot well enough to get a slot, when you had to shoot against Chip McCormick, John Dixon, Jeff Wasson, Brad Butler, Tom Jester and the like, but then we had the side bets of who would beat who in each match and on the overall finish....that was when you prayed for the other guy to have a malf, but it hardly ever happened...

I still have a new Ser 70 Govt mod in the vault I won as B class champ in '80 from Sugarland Sportsmans Club....

[Patrick Sweeney]

Ahhh, prize guns. The gun that got me started on gunsmithing, the one that pushed me over the edge, I still have. I was working radio and as a retail clerk in a gunshop (not at the same place, that would have been too much to ask!) and went off to the Targetworld National Championships, January (as I recall) 1981. Targetworld was an indoor range in Cincinnatti, and they held a match they called the Nationals. Sort of like drag racing, where every event that drew people from more than three States was a "Nationals."

There were two categories (no comps in 1981) Pro and Amateur. I saw the long list of names in Amateur, and signed up in Pro. On the strength of my score in the Standards, I placed well enoguh to win a gun. (One stage was controlled by lights. When the lights went on, you could draw and shoot. If you wanted to finish your string after the lights went off, you could. but any miss or no-shoot penalties you shot would still count against you.) My same score in Amateur would have had me well out of the loot. Now that's gaming.

My prize? A NIB Colt Series 70 Government, in .45 ACP. Blued. Out of the box, it would not reliably feed, fire, extract or eject factory hardball. I would get one or two failures of some kind per magazine. Magazine, not box or thousand rounds!

My friend Dan McDonald managed to get it working 100%, but it was still casually accurate. As in, factory target wadcutter would not put five shots on an IPSC Option target at 50 yards over sandbags. I bought a Ransom rest, and tested it. With Remington 185 wadcutters, the Colt could barely keep five shots on a piece of typing paper.

I sent it off to Steve Nastoff for a complete accuracy package; tighten slide to frame, weld barrel, fit match bushing, all the usual 1981 stuff. When it came back, it would shoot five shots, barely onto a sheet of typing paper.

I came to two conclusions that day: welding barrels was a crap shoot and a waste of time, and I could do work as good as what I'd paid for. So I started work as a gunsmith's apprentice.

As I said, I still have the gun. By dropping a Bar-sto barrel into it I turned it into a tack-driver. It later got it Mag-na-Ported and installed a mercury guide rod, for pin shooting, where it still qualified as a Stock gun. That gun ended up winning me a bunch more guns, besides putting me on the path that lead right to here.

[diehli]

Cool story, but this part particularly caught my eye:

I... went off to the Targetworld National Championships, January (as I recall) 1981.

I was anywhere between 3 and 7 weeks old when you won that gun. Cool!

[shred]

Now, now, be nice to the elders.. I was in hmm... grade school..

When I took over by-default one of the oldest TX IPSC clubs many years ago I inherited a box full of 3x5 plaques. Real brass-on-wood plaques. They all had stickers with names I'd mostly never heard of on the back and were things like "Top C", "High Master", etc. I asked and was told they were the awards from the monthly IPSC match that were never collected. Back when it was 3 stages, 60 rounds and scored by hand & calculator at lunch after the match.

Now we're lucky to give out $0.50 ribbons..

[rhino]

Did any of you guys ever shoot in the Golden Eagle match near Evansville, Indiana? My brother and some of our friends used to do that one. I know one who won a Springfield M1A that turned out to be a sweet, sweet shooter out of the box!

The only "big name" that I know used to shoot the match was Mr. Barnhart. There had to have been some others!

[Duane Thomas]

He's still in limbo after the firework incedent

"Fireworks incident"? Okay, I know there's a story there!

[JD45]

This could be a book in the making. Man this is good stuff!

[Carmoney]

Duane, there is definitely a story on the "fireworks incident" but it's not a funny match story, unfortunately. In addition to the personal and financial losses suffered by the parties involved, the fireworks incident was probably the single moment in time when the wonderful sport of pin-shooting--left without a real "national-level" match sponsor and venue--began what sadly appears to be an unrecoverable decline. Here's the story:

December 11, 2004

"Tax return to help pay off fireworks victims"

By KEITH MATHENY

Traverse City Record-Eagle staff writer

CENTRAL LAKE - Victims of a 1997 fireworks explosion at the Charlevoix Venetian Festival will get a cut of a $380,000 federal income tax return next year expected by Second Chance Body Armor president and fireworks launcher Richard Davis.

Davis' bankruptcy attorney, Timothy Fusco of Troy, filed a motion on the tax refund in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Grand Rapids, where Davis filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2002.

A committee of Davis' creditors, including Venetian fireworks victims involved in nine lawsuits against Davis, agreed to have his tax return placed in a interest-bearing fund for dispersal to creditors as the bankruptcy court later deems appropriate.

The tax refund agreement does not resolve Davis' bankruptcy, said Traverse City attorney Frederick Bimber, who represents the creditors committee. Earlier court filings indicated individual fireworks victims may seek millions of dollars in settlement.

A large fireworks shell exploded prematurely in its steel launching tube on July 26, 1997, during the Venetian Festival's fireworks show over Charlevoix's Round Lake. Shrapnel hurtled into the crowd of thousands of nearby spectators, killing Charlevoix resident Mark Yager and seriously injuring up to 15 others. Among the injured was Charlevoix restaurateur Tadeusz Dobrowolski, who lost his leg and arm.

The only defendants remaining in the fireworks lawsuits after seven years of litigation are Davis; Second Chance; the fireworks-launching enterprise Davis headed; and three Second Chance employees involved in the pyrotechnic show preparation or launching.

Second Chance is one of the nation's leading manufacturers of soft, concealable body armor for police officers. Davis' court filing indicates he was paid $500,000 per year by the company, as well as annual pay to cover tax liabilities arising from company operations.

Second Chance officials also filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy for the company last October, in light of more than a dozen lawsuits nationwide alleging some Second Chance vests prematurely lose their bullet resistance.

Second Chance has spent millions on warranties, replacement vests and vest supplements for police officers. Company officials in October laid off 56 workers from the Central Lake factory staff of 250.

Second Chance's woes will have an as-yet-undetermined impact on Davis' ability to satisfy his creditors in his personal bankruptcy case, as his shares of stock in the company are his primary asset, Bimber said.

"Obviously Richard's life in many ways is connected to Second Chance Body Armor, and it has some problems now," he said.

The Venetian fireworks lawsuits are scheduled for a mediation session in Charlevoix circuit court later this month, at which time the parties, with the help of a neutral mediator, will attempt to reach settlement without a trial, court administrator Melinda Morgan said.

[Patrick Sweeney]

The Golden Eagle. I shot that. I won a bunch of loot there, too. Funny story there. We had been going for a few years, and had an expedition of guys from our club. We'd rent a Winnebago, pile in, and drive down. Then one guy would stay in the Winnebago keeping an eye on the guns and stuff, and we'd stay in hotel rooms. That way we'd have the full panoply of guns, ammo, cleaning gear, spare parts, etc we needed. (Old IPSC hands, we were always prepared.)

One year, one of the guys, who was starting his commercial reloading business, has business commitments, and can't make the Winnebago. But he can make the charter plane that some of the guys have arranged. (What can I say, our club traveled in packs, in style, ravaging matches in the Midwest for loot, glory and women.)

One of the guys described the scene for me: "Paul drives his car out onto the tarmac, and hauls his gun bag and suitcase to the plane. Then he goes back and pulls a dufflebag out of the trunk. He can't carry it, so he drags his dufflebag, full of clients ammo he's delivering to the Golden Eagle, towards the plane."

While Paul is driving his car off to the parking lot, the pilot does some quick re-packing and weight calculations, to make sure the plane is correctly trimmed, and not over total weight for takeoff. Apparently the flight was smooth, for they didn't have to jettison any weight due to turbulence.

The Golden Eagle was where I discovered that Mountian Dew strips blueing off of guns in less than a minute.

[Patrick Sweeney]

We like to think that IPSC shooters are the Kings and Queens of the Earth, able to shoot anything and teach the locals how to do it. We forget that the strength of what we do is our having learned to figure out the basics, and apply them. I much prefer to learn from the mistakes of others, as it is usually a whole lot less painful.

Robbie, of all people, taught me a lot. I've never taken a class from him. I've ridden with him in vehicles being driven by lunatics, talked at matches, hung out around the match hotels, etc. We aren't friends, but we've been running onto each other at matches for nearly 25 years. As Casey Stengel once said "You can learn a lot just by paying attention."

Did you know Robbie once shot at Second Chance? At SC, it was "Richard's Game" and Richard's Rules. One was that regardless of what you'd done, or who you were, you were an OSS (Ordinary Standard Shooter) your first time at SC. The loot was divided between MB (Master Blaster) and OSS. The real friction arose on the teams. No team was allowed more than a single MB, so each year's hot OSS was vigorously courted by the MBs looking for someone to help them win more loot. (Two-Man, Mixed Double, 3-Man, each with its own pile of loot.)

Robbie shows up, and the wailing starts. This was in the late 1980s, and Robbie was well known. And everyone could imagine what he'd do in OSS in the Main Event, and what he could do matched with Brian, either Jerry, or one of the other killer MBs.

But it was not to be. You see, SC wasn't like an IPSC match. You're on the line with anywhere from nine to 29 other shooters. You all start at once. The commands proceed with or without you. "Timers Ready? Shooters Ready. Guns on the Rail!" If you weren't ready, you stood down and the line proceeded without you. The first few times, there'd be good-natured ribbing about not being ready. After that, the good natured-ness left the ribbing. In an IPSC match, if you take a few extra seconds before starting a stage, no one notices or cares. No one is directly delayed. But at SC, if you weren't ready you held up the line. And the bleachers were full of shooters waiting their turns. And if you weren't ready when the start gun went off, and shot anyway, you could really get yourself in trouble.

The nature and pressure were greatly different. As I recall, Robbie won one gun. The process of shooting at SC was so alien, so different, from a match, that it was difficult to make the switch.

Learn the lesson: not everything is like an IPSC match. And not all matches are the same. A clever stage designer will try to take you out of your comfort zone, or dangle enticing stage shortcuts in front of you. Know what you can do, and what you cannot. And if you go to shoot some other match, learn what the basics there are, and how it works. Else you might be in for a lesson you hadn't planned for.

[Patrick Sweeney]

OK, let's get into the wayback machine, and go back to the days before Dillon. We had various loading machines to work with, mostly single stage presses. At the top was the Star, a progressive machine we all aspired to. The guy who taught me gunsmithing, IPSC and a bit of bowling pin shooting, Dan McDonald, had one. While we all worked like devils on our single-stage machines to produce enough ammo for a weekend practice session and the monthly match, he was making buckets of ammo for two PPC leagues, IPSC match and practice, and pin loads.

The first progressive I struggled with was the old RCBS in-line. Instead of rotating, it shuttled rounds along a bar. It was very sensitive to handling variances, and if you weren't careful you'd be slopping powder all over the bar, gumming up the works. The next machine I tried to get to work was an RDP owned by a friend. Built like a KoenigsTiger tank, and nearly as heavy, it had a very irritable primer delivery system. It was so strong, however, that my friend had missed a Blazer case mixed in with his brass, and he'd deprimed and reprimed that .45 case without noticing any change in the press feel. We found it while inspecting that latest production batch.

The Dillon 1000 was a miracle machine, but ferociously expensive unless you compared it to the Cadillac, the Star. The less said about Lee, the better. Some tried turret presses. The turret was a bizzare concept: one shell holder, and three, four or five die stations. If you were as dextrous as an octopus, you could put a case in place, and shuttle it under each of the dies in turn. Shooters who tried to press a turret loader into service for IPSC volumes tended to have occasional squibs.

The Dillon 450 was an interim step, a "progressive" that still required manual primer feed and powder drop on each step. The Square Deal was what broke the logjam. You could have a true progressive, with automatic powder drop, primer feed, and advance, in a mahcine anyone could afford.

You new kids don't realize the impact it had: all of a sudden, regular, consistent practice sessions were not just for the sponsored shooter or the guy rich or one lucky enough to have a Star or R-1000. It was the progressive for the masses. I used mine enough (even after getting a 550, and access to a pair of 1050s) that it needed to be rebuilt twice.

Now, ammo is simply something you produce to deliver the desired velocity/accuracy/recoil feel and not something you have to budget time and effortin order to produce barely sufficient quantities.

[mcoliver]

Hey Pat, I'm curious how far back the likes of an Ed Brown, CMC, Wilson, etc quality parts were available for your guns then. I'm guessing these may not have been available yet. If so, did your guns tend to break more with your heavy round count?

Thanks.

[Patrick Sweeney]

As I recall, reliable magazines from Bill Wilson started showing up in the early mid-80s. Like 1983 or so. Reliable, and prevalent custom parts took a few years more. By the late 1980s you could get all the reliable parts you needed, but they weren't common, they were expensive, and you still had to find someone who could build a gun.

The guns themselves were a problem. Your choices for a long time were Colt and Springfield. Colt was sure to be well-made even if the dimensions were off. Just not completly finished. Springfields were rough and tough, and even if they took a bit more to make them "acceptable" competition guns you could have a base gun for not much more than half the cost of a Colt.

The real improvements in guns came when the custom/production guns started showing up, in the early 1990s. When a competition gun could be had ready to go, and your choices were mostly cosmetic, then we entered hog heaven.

[Patrick Sweeney]

The Browning High Power project got me to thinking about 9mm ammo I've shot through the years. Those of you shooting Production love it that you can get all the ammo you need down at Wallyworld for a nickle more than it would cost to reload. It used to be cheaper. Then again, it sometimes was a risk.

Once upon a time, all 9mm shooters shot surplus. Not the contract-overrun "surplus" you see today but stuff left over after real wars were done. Or surplus because there'd been a change of government, and the new guys were selling off ammo for cash to deposit in their Swiss bank accounts.

It wasn't all good. For a while, the gun shows were awash with Egyptian 9mm. It came in these little pasteboard boxes of 32 rounds each. (magazine capacity of an SMG, doncha know) The boxes were practially falling apart, because this ammo had been stored in one or another warehouse deep in the desert for decades. It was reliable, if you could overlook the occasional pierced primer. It was also as corrosive as the hinges of hell. Anyone who shot it, and didn't do a full Marine Corps clean ("scrub the bore on three succesive days") would end up regretting it.

Then there was a few boatloads of Chinese 9mm a decade ago. It was non-corrosive, made Minor, shot decently, and was crap for reloading. On the second or third loading, primers started falling out wholesale. We learned to shoot it and leave it, and if you reloaded 9mm you sorted that stuff out of the batch.

For a while there was a batch of German WWII 9mm, made entirely of steel. As in steel case, steel core and steel jacket, or even the sintered-steel bullets. (Sintered bullets are steel powder, pressed into bullet shape and heated, to cause the aggregate to bind together.) This was "WWII MP-40 ammo." Designed to shoot through seventeen Soviet infantrymen back to back, for sure. Except either it wasn't, or time had taken its toll. I chrono'd some, and it wouldn't make Minor. Not even close. Something like a 100 grain bullet at just under 1,000 fps. And it wouldn't get into cars. I even had a sintered bullet bounce off a Buick I was using as a test subject, and nearly caught the bounceback in the shorts.

Enjoy your white/yellow/whatever box 9mm, for the times are better than they've ever been.

[wlktheduk]

Memories of the "good old days" of reloading on a single stage press.

At the time (Mid-80's) I was primarily shooting PPC (there was an IPSC club locally, but it was just starting up) For the monthly match with the usual couple of 1500 matches (150 rounds each), a Service Revolver 480 match (48 rounds) an Off-Duty match (40 rounds) you'd need between 400 and 500 rounds of .38 special wadcutters. So....with at least 500 brass cleaned and ready...put your sizing die on the press.

Day 1) resize 500 cases (the carbide sizing die was a "MIRACLE" of science) Change die to case mouth expander die.

Day 2) flare case mouths. Then prime each case. Either use a hand-priming tool, like a Lee, or use the primer arm on your press. Both meant you had to pickup and put the primer into the tool, one primer at a time. Change die to the bullet seating die.

Day 3) put primed case(s) into loading tray, 50 at a time. Set your powder measure. Dump a charge of powder (usually the classic 2.7 grains Bullseye powder) into each case. Set a wadcutter bullet onto the flared case mouth. One at a time, put the case w/bullet (if the bullet didn't fall off while you were moving it from the loading tray to the press) into the press, and seat the bullet.

Put loaded round into box. Repeat, and repeat, and repeat......

On a very good day, with no interuptions, I could finish about 200/250 rounds, SO, DAY 3 usually became DAY 4 And that was just enough ammo for the monthly match And that did not include the ammo that the MemSahib was shooting with me....reloading became a chore.

So just keeping up with match ammo, let alone practice ammo, used up a LOT of "SPARE TIME"

Since I also had these extra obligations like work, wife, family, etc....keeping ammo on hand became a real strain.

When She Who Must Be Obeyed blessed me with a Dillon Square Deal (not a SDB, the very first model) suddenly I found that I could reload lots and lots and lots of ammo, and not spend all my spare time in the gun room reloading. HAPPY DAYS !!!! Of course, She did have some plans for all that spare time.......

Patrick Sweeney: that Egyptian 9MM surplus ammo caused a shooting buddy to ruin a nice Marlin Camp Carbine in 9MM. As I'm sure you know, that 9MM carbine had a very powerful ejection pattern, tossing empties 10 to 20 feet away, in almost every direction. Bob got very tired of trying to find his brass, for reloading purposes, so when he got a very good deal on a case of Egyptian 9MM ammo, he thought he had the perfect throw-away ammo for plinking. He'd fired quite a few rounds of the Egyptian 9MM ammo through his S&W Model 659 9MM autopistol with no problems, so Bob figured it would be no problem in the Marlin.

BUT...the S&W Model 659 was made of STAINLESS STEEL, and the Marlin Camp Carbine's barrel was blued steel...er, it was blue. Bob fired a couple hundred rounds through the Marlin one weekend, and fired another couple hundred rounds the next weekend. Then Bob put it away in a gun case after cleaning it....one time. A couple of months went by, and Bob took the Marlin (in it's case) to the range.

The barrel was not blue any more...it looked more like a length of old iron sewer pipe...red/gray rust flakes, DEEP PITS, so much crud in the barrel that a cleaning rod would not drop freely through the barrel, stuff that looked like the junk you see on car battery terminals after a little corrosion. Even after a lot of cleaning work, the barrel and chamber were ruined.

Wallyworld White/Yellow/Green/Red Box is truly great stuff

[Nik Habicht]

Memories of the "good old days" of reloading on a single stage press.

At the time (Mid-80's) I was primarily shooting PPC (there was an IPSC club locally, but it was just starting up) For the monthly match with the usual couple of 1500 matches (150 rounds each), a Service Revolver 480 match (48 rounds) an Off-Duty match (40 rounds) you'd need between 400 and 500 rounds of .38 special wadcutters. So....with at least 500 brass cleaned and ready...put your sizing die on the press.

Since I also had these extra obligations like work, wife, family, etc....keeping ammo on hand became a real strain.

When She Who Must Be Obeyed blessed me with a Dillon Square Deal (not a SDB, the very first model) suddenly I found that I could reload lots and lots and lots of ammo, and not spend all my spare time in the gun room reloading. HAPPY DAYS !!!! Of course, She did have some plans for all that spare time.......

I guess it all comes down to perspective ---- I started reloading for IDPA matches in 2000, on a Square Deal B. When I started shooting USPSA in 2001, reloading took up too much of my time, so soon after I acquired a 650 with casefeeder. In 2003, after shooting more big matches, and getting busier at home and work, a 1050 finally arrived. I don't remember how I managed without a casefeeder........

[Patrick Sweeney]

OK, a blend of IPSC and gunshop culture. Back in the early days, we'd shoot anything to see if it had an advantage. Or we were poor students/bachelors, etc. And every gunshop I was ever in, worked at or talked to someone who worked there had loaded guns lying around as "shop guns." (Maybe its different where you live, but in the Detroit area, in the old days, it was not less than two loaded guns per employee.) Shop guns were often selected because the shop bought them cheap, or they were common and had a good reputaiton for reliability.

The guns at my station were an 870 loaded with Brennekes (My field of fire included a table display of shotgun ammo. I wanted to be able to reach through it to a bad guy.) and a chopped and channeled 25-2. The other side of the back room entrances had a crusty old S&W M-10 and a Winchester M-97, and an S&W M-19, and.... well you get the idea.

Another shop in town, one that had an indoor range, held a league for many years. One year they decided to have three categories; Open, Stock, and Revolver. I looked over the course of fire, and determined that speed of reloading was the key. Two strings called for tight times with a reload, and many wheelgunners would be lucky to get two shots off after the reload. I figured a fast reload would get me all six, and the points gained would put me well in the lead.

So I took the M-10 with me. Now this gun had history. The original shop owner had bought it, rusted from blood or a soft drink. (My bet was always on blood.) It was so crusty many customers would not touch it. (It is on page 113 of my Glock book, for those who have a copy.)

The first group on league night I shoot was high-right, six inches. Well, that explained the newer-looking barrel. It had obviously been re-barreled, and not sighted in. So I held off to get good hits, and when I got back to the shop tweaked the barrel. I spent the first three league nights getting that barrel turned just right so the gun shot to the sights. I won the revolver title, using a crusty 2" M-10 against guys wth 686 6" with adjustable sights and custom trigger jobs. I never missed a reload, and never dropped a shot, and as a result their score was based on the 38-40 shots they got off each night, compared to my 48.

The real scream was that that gun had been on the wall, waiting its turn at glory, for twenty years by then. And had been un-zeroed the whole time. Once the league was done, I took each and every shop gun in turn to the range, to make sure they worked and hit to the sights.

[Flexmoney]

Once the league was done, I took each and every shop gun in turn to the range, to make sure they worked and hit to the sights.

Music to my ears...especially seeing how these guns were choosen as "dependable".

(And, great job at the league...figuring out the shooting problem...and solving it. )

[Patrick Sweeney]

Duane's "Not a Match Story" reminds me of one of my more interesting brushes with potential violence:

My brother Mike and I had gone to Gunsite for the 499 class. That's the advanced handgun class, for the high-speed guys who did well in the 250, or who had caught up by doing a 399. We had spent the afternoon doing "draw to kneeling, 3-yard head shots" and I had whacked my knee on a rock (and AD'd in full view of The Colonel) and wasn't walking well. My knee had swollen so much I couldn't bend it, and was dragging my leg around like the Deputy on Gunsmoke.

We get to the Motel 6 (anyone who's been to Gunsite knows it well) and were unloading. Parked in front of the office was a huge, scruffy old Cadillac, with three generations of a hispanic family inside and out. One member of the family, a teenaged kid, was leaning against the office wall at the corner. Its just after sunset.

My brother picks up an armload of stuff and walks to the stairwell. We're carrying openly, 'cause that's what you do when you go to Gunsite. This kid stares at Mike's gun as he walks to the corner towards the stairs, and as Mike walks past the kid, the kid (nearly six feet tall) turns and follows. Me, I'm like 15 feet behind Mike, and the kid hasn't a clue I'm even in the same zip code. Various tactics and scenarios rattle through my head, as I access my mental rolodex. I take a quick look over my shoulder, to make sure I'm not being boxed in.

Mike gets to the bottom of the stairs and pivots and stops. He has his gun side away from the kid, and he looks coldly and calmly right at him. Then he flicks his eyes towards me. The poor kid nearly dislocates his neck trying to swivel around, sees me, and practically sprints down the walkway in front of the ground floor rooms, the only direction open to him.

Afterwards, Mike tells me "I could hear you dragging your leg, but I also heard other footsteps as well. So I figured you had me covered, but I wanted to see what was up." For all we know, the kid wanted to ask about Mike's nickel-plated Colt 1911. But we will never know.

[tightloop]

Been to that same motel....

[Ross Carter]

at the same place, that would have been too much to ask!) and went off to the Targetworld National Championships, January (as I recall) 1981. Targetworld was an indoor range in Cincinnatti, and they held a match they called the Nationals. Sort of like drag racing, where every event that drew people from more than three States was a "Nationals."

There were two categories (no comps in 1981) Pro and Amateur. I saw the long list of names in Amateur, and signed up in Pro. On the strength of my score in the Standards, I placed well enoguh to win a gun. (One stage was controlled by lights. When the lights went on, you could draw and shoot. If you wanted to finish your string after the lights went off, you could. but any miss or no-shoot penalties you shot would still count against you.) My same score in Amateur would have had me well out of the loot. Now that's gaming.

I remember that stage with the lights very well. It was one of the best I've ever shot. Indoor range with the lights out and a series of spotlights behind you to illumnate each target which included some no shoots. A computer was hooked to the lights to randomly light up the targets. You could get 2 shoots and 1 no shoot or all no shoots or any combination but every competitor got the same amount of shoot targets for the stage just in a different order. IIRC they gave you like 2 seconds per target which seems like a lot but you had to keep your gun loaded and be ready when the lights came back on. There was a short interval between illuminations during which time you had to reholster and be ready before the next illimination. The targets were absoulutely in the dark at the back of the range until they were lighted up. Kinda hard to describe this stage but it was really cool.

[Ross Carter]

Good trivia queston, who won that match and who covered it for CSR?

[Patrick Sweeney]

I think I still have that issue somewhere in the archives.