Limited optics strong early showing

[RJH]

I was just glancing at the match breakdown for area 4, and limited optics is the fourth largest division. They are still allowing entries so it could become the third largest division and pass limited.

 

I thought there might not be a strong of a showing this early at an area match because people would still be unclassified, but 37 unclassified shooters decided to go ahead and go with limited optics. There's already a master and a grand master signed up as well. I don't know who the master and grandmaster are, but it looks like people are not just signing up in limited optics to dodge heat and carry optics.

 

Carry-ops is still the biggest division at that match, but I'm already wondering for how long

[Bigzona]

I believe Tim Herron is the Limited Optics G.  It'll be good to start seeing the data come in for the various Area Matches. 

[RJH]

13 minutes ago, Bigzona said:

I believe Tim Herron is the Limited Optics G.  It'll be good to start seeing the data come in for the various Area Matches. 

 

I definitely think the area and level two matches will tell the real tale. I expect there'll be a big bump early on at locals just because of people getting classified, but that many signed up at area 4 3 weeks after the start of a provisional division kind of surprises me

[llamasabound]

I’m curious when the first time the winner of LO will beat the winner of CO — someone like Herron would be lucky to be 85% in the combined, but at some point a genuinely good shooter will contest a match in LO, and I think that’s when the flood will begin.

[Dazhi]

16 hours ago, RJH said:

Carry-ops is still the biggest division at that match, but I'm already wondering for how long

 

Good to see LO is doing well early on. 

 

Follow the top-down approach everyone is using for driving competitors to a specific division:

The top CO competitors are mostly pro shooters.  What incentives do they have to ditch CO to compete in LO?  If they don't switch, I don't see how large percentage of current competition in CO will shift to LO.  I am referring to area and national matches where you get to pick only 1 division.  Besides, CO qualifies for IPSC world shoot while LO does not.  For pro shooters, that is a key driver.

 

I suspect the most likely route to bring in more competition to LO is the Open/Limited pro shooters switch from Open/Limited to LO.   We should see in few years. 

[Racinready300ex]

23 minutes ago, Dazhi said:

 

Good to see LO is doing well early on. 

 

Follow the top-down approach everyone is using for driving competitors to a specific division:

The top CO competitors are mostly pro shooters.  What incentives do they have to ditch CO to compete in LO?  If they don't switch, I don't see how large percentage of current competition in CO will shift to LO.  I am referring to area and national matches where you get to pick only 1 division.  Besides, CO qualifies for IPSC world shoot while LO does not.  For pro shooters, that is a key driver.

 

I suspect the most likely route to bring in more competition to LO is the Open/Limited pro shooters switch from Open/Limited to LO.   We should see in few years. 

 

The incentive for Pro shooters will be titles. And right now LO is a much easier title to win than CO. 

 

Area 6 a few weeks ago Luke Coa won LO with a performance that would of barely been top 10 in CO. I bet that win looks better to Walther then a 10th place finish in a stacked division would look. 2nd place was Travis Tomasie who would of been 20th in CO. But, in his case at least his sponsors gun isn't legal in CO. 

[shred]

How many of the top 20 CO shooters actually get paid real money by a gun company to shoot a specific pistol?  Five?  The rest can flee to wherever the wins are and nearly all the skills transfer.

 

At the local level I think it'll pick up for a while because every CO gun is currently seen as reasonably-competitive in LO and there's no screwing around with decocking, DA first shots and magwells and thumbrests. 

 

Maybe once the raced-out custom LO guns take over things will drift back to CO, although the new crop of cheap 2011s (Prodigy, 2311, RIA, etc) might stall that.

 

 

[RJH]

9 minutes ago, shred said:

How many of the top 20 CO shooters actually get paid real money by a gun company to shoot their thing?  Five?  The rest are going to flee to wherever the wins are.

 

People say that, but nobody is fleeing to single stack, revolver, or production. And I'm sure any top shooter could walk into one of those divisions that basically any match and win the match

 

It would be interesting if somebody like Christian sailor showed up to shoot limited optics. Wonder if something like that would draw other competitors in or just scare them all off

[shred]

They're going to go where people care about the wins.  That's Nationals in a big division.  Nobody cared about L-10 ever, but when people cared about Production, there were enough specialists that it was tough for a top pro in another division to win it.  They'd be top-10, but not so much on the wins.  Single-stack nationals there's only a few of the top pros in the running to win that too. 

 

Sponsors don't care about Area match wins unless you win all of them like Sailer did. 

[MHicks]

It looks to me that with how big CO has become, LO will draw enough shooters to warrant having the two divisions. Some may move from CO and some, like myself, will shoot LO because I already have several LO legal guns but only one CO gun without buying another.

[RJH]

One more thing there is interesting about this area 4 match in particular, is that the majority of the shooters are willing to shoot this division heads up apparently, as I don't think there's enough in any class to warrant any classification awards. I'm sure some of the guys will get classified before the match starts, but that is pretty promising for the new division

[Racinready300ex]

19 minutes ago, RJH said:

 

People say that, but nobody is fleeing to single stack, revolver, or production. And I'm sure any top shooter could walk into one of those divisions that basically any match and win the match

 

It would be interesting if somebody like Christian sailor showed up to shoot limited optics. Wonder if something like that would draw other competitors in or just scare them all off

 

Two words, Team Ruger ...lol Kidding, sort of.

 

But seriously those guys shoot L10 and SS and hit tons of IDPA matches where they rack up the wins. Look at who all shot PO Light at world shoot. Remember when walther was giving people money to win, and everyone and their brother was buying walters and hunting out easy wins?

 

There are lots of examples, it's certainly a thing but not super wide spread. I'd guess, most guys who are really good are really good because they're super competitive by nature. And someone like that is less likely to shoot for a easy win.

[RJH]

43 minutes ago, Racinready300ex said:

 

Two words, Team Ruger ...lol Kidding, sort of.

 

But seriously those guys shoot L10 and SS and hit tons of IDPA matches where they rack up the wins. Look at who all shot PO Light at world shoot. Remember when walther was giving people money to win, and everyone and their brother was buying walters and hunting out easy wins?

 

There are lots of examples, it's certainly a thing but not super wide spread. I'd guess, most guys who are really good are really good because they're super competitive by nature. And someone like that is less likely to shoot for a easy win.

 

I definitely get that it happens occasionally, but I also think you're right and the competitive people want to compete. 

 

All I was getting at was that if it was really just about fleeing the really good guys, there's plenty of places to do that already. I honestly think it's more about people shooting what they want to shoot without penalty.

 

 

I'm not going to that match, but it would be interesting to know how many people are shooting it with Sao guns versus their carryops gun with a MAG well. I've seen pictures of Tim Herron's guns online and they are definitely 2011's

[Thomas H]

13 minutes ago, RJH said:

 I've seen pictures of Tim Herron's guns online and they are definitely 2011's

 

...which makes sense as his normal division is Single Stack.  It would be odd for him NOT to use an SAO 2011.

[Bigzona]

5 hours ago, MHicks said:

 Some may move from CO and some, like myself, will shoot LO because I already have several LO legal guns but only one CO gun without buying another.

 

 

 

 

4 hours ago, RJH said:

 

All I was getting at was that if it was really just about fleeing the really good guys, there's plenty of places to do that already. I honestly think it's more about people shooting what they want to shoot without penalty.

 

 

Putting aside caring or not about what top shooters do, I think the points above are simply the bottom line. I'm a year and a half into the sport. I delayed joining the sport given that my collection was predominantly 9minor 2011s. Eventually joined CO with a shadow 2 and then made the investment for Open since I love the platform so much.  Had LO existed, I would have joined the sport sooner and never would have invested in Open (which I do love btw). 

 

This past weekend, I saw plenty of Limited and Open shooterS opt to run LO and dust off their 9minor 2011s from the safe.  

[CC3D]

Given time I think LO is going to make the DA/ SA game mechanic go away for the most part. I have a few CO shooting buddies who stay away from the CZ platform entirely just because they are turned off by the double action mechanic. I agree that a lot of people coming into LO will be CO shooters running their exact same set up but foregoing the admitidly bizarre hammer down mechanic the guys shooting DA/SA guns in CO have to deal with

[ColoradoNick]

1 hour ago, CC3D said:

Given time I think LO is going to make the DA/ SA game mechanic go away for the most part. I have a few CO shooting buddies who stay away from the CZ platform entirely just because they are turned off by the double action mechanic. I agree that a lot of people coming into LO will be CO shooters running their exact same set up but foregoing the admitidly bizarre hammer down mechanic the guys shooting DA/SA guns in CO have to deal with

You can  “get past” the DA that people complain about in the CZ lineup in about a week of training. Hell, the DA pull on my shadow 2 is about the same weight as a Glock triggers normal pull. I dunno what the big deal is. Everyone should be “slapping” the trigger in this game anyways, unless you’re still prepping I dunno how you even notice. 

[GJM]

So far, there seems to be a lot of limited optics activity, and enthusiasm. That said, based on reliability issues, I have been observing, the killer LO gun may be a well vetted CO pistol. Also, in pure performance, while the LO pistols split well, my friends, who are good shooters, are shooting their LO guns worse than the CO pistols they were shooting. And they are good shooters.

Edited May 25, 2023 by GJM
Spell better

[ColoradoNick]

1 minute ago, GJM said:

So far, there seems to be a lot of limited optics activity, and enthusiasm. That said, based on liability issues, I have been observing, the killer LO gun may be a well vetted CO pistol. Also, in pure performance, while the LO pistols split well, my friends, who are good shooters, are shooting their LO guns worse than the CO pistols they were shooting. And they are good shooters.

I wonder if HHF’s will be updated next year when it becomes a solidified division? The difference from CO to LO should be extremely negligible IMO. Depending on equipment I don’t see splits even varying much. Sure if you’re shootings a stock Glock there will be a difference but sticking with the CZ line up I think my shadow 2 is about a 1 lb heavier pull vs a TS. My average splits are .18-.2 I don’t think I would go much faster if any with a SAO gun? Transitions would be the same. I think the only real separation (at least in my current training) is reloads. On a 10 yard target I can hit reloads in 1.2 about 10% of the time. Match speed is much more like 1.6-1.8. A magwell would definitely make 1.2 consistent. So we’re talking 2-3 seconds over a complete match or a handful of classifiers?

[shred]

1 hour ago, GJM said:

So far, there seems to be a lot of limited optics activity, and enthusiasm. That said, based on reliability issues, I have been observing, the killer LO gun may be a well vetted CO pistol. Also, in pure performance, while the LO pistols split well, my friends, who are good shooters, are shooting their LO guns worse than the CO pistols they were shooting. And they are good shooters.

My experience (from shooting 2011's pretty much since they were invented and GMs in Open and Ltd from back when I was a bit younger and spry-er) is I'm noticeably better with a 2011-based LO gun than a CZ or TF CO gun.  It's not a lot; maybe 5%, but it's there.  Most of it seems to be the better grip I get with a magwell and the nicer trigger, plus a lot of experience with the platform.  Could be another reason why long-time 2011 shooters & pros move to LO.

 

 

[CC3D]

12 hours ago, ColoradoNick said:

You can  “get past” the DA that people complain about in the CZ lineup in about a week of training. Hell, the DA pull on my shadow 2 is about the same weight as a Glock triggers normal pull. I dunno what the big deal is. Everyone should be “slapping” the trigger in this game anyways, unless you’re still prepping I dunno how you even notice. 

Oh yeah I agree 100%. At least on a tuned DA it makes no meaningful impact- I'm more so commenting on the game mechanic of forcing those guns to go hammer down. It's a weird artifact of a division trying to pretend like single action only guns provide a gamebreaking advantage. Like mentioned in another post, a well tuned shadow 2 trigger is as good if not better than my stock TSO trigger- I've tried them side by side several times

[CC3D]

2 hours ago, GJM said:

So far, there seems to be a lot of limited optics activity, and enthusiasm. That said, based on reliability issues, I have been observing, the killer LO gun may be a well vetted CO pistol. Also, in pure performance, while the LO pistols split well, my friends, who are good shooters, are shooting their LO guns worse than the CO pistols they were shooting. And they are good shooters.

This may be a result of experience with one platform vs another. The majority of our shooting is subconscious and we're going to shoot the gun we've been competing with for years better than a new platform the majority of the time.

[Racinready300ex]

37 minutes ago, CC3D said:

Oh yeah I agree 100%. At least on a tuned DA it makes no meaningful impact- I'm more so commenting on the game mechanic of forcing those guns to go hammer down. It's a weird artifact of a division trying to pretend like single action only guns provide a gamebreaking advantage. Like mentioned in another post, a well tuned shadow 2 trigger is as good if not better than my stock TSO trigger- I've tried them side by side several times

 

If the guns weren't intended to have the hammer down CZ would just make the SAO and certainly decockers wouldn't exist. You can say DA isn't a disadvantage but I don't really believe you think that. 

 

I don't think it's a hindrance, I've shot matches with DA/SA guns starting with the hammer down even though I wasn't required to because I didn't think it really mattered. I'm guessing you've not done that because deep down you think DA matters or we wouldn't still be talking about if starting with the hammer down makes sense or not. 

[CC3D]

13 minutes ago, Racinready300ex said:

 

If the guns weren't intended to have the hammer down CZ would just make the SAO and certainly decockers wouldn't exist. You can say DA isn't a disadvantage but I don't really believe you think that. 

 

I don't think it's a hindrance, I've shot matches with DA/SA guns starting with the hammer down even though I wasn't required to because I didn't think it really mattered. I'm guessing you've not done that because deep down you think DA matters or we wouldn't still be talking about if starting with the hammer down makes sense or not. 

It's not a hindrance- it's an annoyance. Having to go hammer down *before a stage in a competition* is an extra step that only exists because of the arbitrary rules about action types in the division. We're used to it because we compete but if you take a step back you can see how silly rolling or pinching the hammer down is before a stage on a shadow. On a decocker gun with no safety it obviously makes sense to start hammer down but that's not what I'm referring to.

 

Now if we're talking a significantly heavier trigger pull on their carry models, yes that is a hindrance- but I totally see the merit behind DA/ SA on a carry gun. The shadows are the upscaled versions of these carry guns and that DA/SA functionality carries over to them. But I have to imagine that DA/ SA would not be the default on CZ's competition models if DA was not required in the division where those guns are shot in. If when production was introduced it allowed single action only guns, do you believe CZ would have designed their flagship competition gun to be DA/ SA? I doubt it, it wouldn't make sense. They're DA/SA because they have to be according to the rules. 

 

23 minutes ago, Racinready300ex said:

I've shot matches with DA/SA guns starting with the hammer down even though I wasn't required to because I didn't think it really mattered.

Odd flex but okay lol

[ltdmstr]

Bottom line is, given a choice, most would prefer to shoot a 2011.  You have better function with the SAO trigger (although not necessarily a performance advantage), better durability and reliability, familiarity with the platform for many/most, and many more options for parts and customization.

Edited May 25, 2023 by ltdmstr