2006 Aware

[Northern Xtreme]

I shot the AWARE Thursday with my revolver. They did an excellent job as usual. Some very elaborate well thought out stages, very revolver nuetral also.

I am dying to see the results. They used palm scoring so I think the problem may be at USPSA headquarters, I also tried to upload some results from our local match and wasnt able to.

One thing I find interesting is that I always seem to chrono lower at the Green Mountain range. A friend and I both had a power factor of 171.7or 8 at the AREA 7 this year, and then with the same exact loads we both had power factors of 165.7or 8 at the AWARE.

I am betting we will see a few get dropped to minor unexpectedly.

Thanks again to the Green Mountain crew. You really do a world class job and I hope you can continue holding this match, it is the highlight of my summer shooting each year.

[madone]

I agree, excellent match as usual. AWARE is my favorite match of the year, and they have yet to disappoint.

I shot on Saturday, weather was great, stages were great, staff was great....Now if only I could shoot great.

Oh well, can't wait till next year. Thanks alot GMPS!

Edited August 7, 2006 by madone

[Rob Boudrie]

Great match - thanks to everyone who put it on.

Match Director Scott Chapman told he he would not have access to post scores to the web until Monday evening, and that the posting period for corrections would remain open until about thursday or Friday.

The results upload system is working fine - if you are having trouble email me (rob@boudrie.com) with the club code or major match name as well as the password you thing should work.

Rob

[AWARE2005]

Thank you all the competitors for attending this years AWARE. I would especially like to thank all my crew that make this match happen every year. I cannot say enough about the quality of help that we have to put this event on. I have without a doubt in my kind, the hardest working club in USPSA.

Id would like to thank Caspian Arms, our great friends and match sponsor. Smith and Wesson for its generocity and continued support and Glock for its extreme generocity as well.

By the way..for clarification. There is no issue with the Palm scoring or USPSA. I cannot get cell service,,much less internet access at the range. I will have the scores up somtime Monday. Id like to sleep in for a bit for the first time in 9 days! The Palm scoring is godsend....I cannot ever imagine going back to paper scoresheets for a major match. Thank you to Auto Scoring Syatems for their support and product and to Ron Boudrie for his techincal help getting this together for the Palm system and EZWinscore.

Scott Chapman

Match Director

[Dave Marques]

Just got back from the match (7 hr drive). The match was GREAT- all the RO's were friendly as well as knowledgeable with respect to the rules. The stage designs were fun and challenging-and one stage, well was above and beyond. Words will not do it justice-It must have taken them weeks to build just that one stage. You guys really put on a good show! Next year I will be making a vacation out of it as I did a few years ago-it is nice over in Stowe.

[Round_Gun_Shooter]

Just adding my thanks also. Every stage had excellent staff. All were a joy to shoot and overall this is a great time for me. Got to see some people I had not seen in a while, met some new people.

All in all the stages were great but made me think a little too much. My head hurts Dividing by six get's tough.

Thanks again to the Scott, his staff, and the sponsors. AND to Ed and his staff. Great lunch

Gary

TY43215

[Rob Boudrie]

Many of the stages had a variety of shooting strageties where the choice was not obvious except to someone of very high skill. Do I take the head shot or take the time to move a couple of steps for an easy full target shot? Do I take the swingers from further back to eliminate an entire shooting position or move to the easy position to play it safe? Do I try for that very quick popout or take it later as a stationary target? If I take it as a stationary target do I do the atypical (for a right handedshooter) step of going to the rightmost position first since a bit more is exposed after activation than before (shooting this target before activation was permitted, and actually made for good stage design in this case).

Target distances ranged from a few feet (4 targets) to 30+ yards and everything in between. Shooters who think that short targets ruin a match had plenty of changes to shoot stages where many shooters were throwing M's due to the distance involved. There was also a decent assortment of poppers, US poppers and plates at distances that were reasonable, but not "speed shooting" range.

Stage selection was definitely "US Style" - lots of long stages, no speed shoots, and all Comstock (the one stage advertised as Virginia Count was altered and ended up Comstock). There were no mandatory reloads, an almost totally freestyle approach (with the occasional "Steel must be shot from this box" directive), and no designated single hand shooting.

All in all a great match.

[Jim Norman]

Thanks to all of the AWARE Match Staff. This was one of the best matches I have shot. Excellent RO'ing. A Sense of Humor was definately present at all levels, which with all of the stress of running a large match is one of the usual casualties.

There were challenges for all levels of shooter. No one that has been shooting USPSA for any time should have been intimidated, but no one would say this was an easy match no matter what their level of achievement.

The weather was definately some of the best shooting weather I have experianced. If Scott can guarantee weather like Saturday and Sunday again next year, he should have no problem filling the match to waiting list levels!

Jim

[srf]

Let me add kudos!

This is the fourth year I've shot the match and by far, the smoothest running and best. We had a short delay on one stage and still finished in just under six hours which is great considering the large facility.

GREAT STAGES and PROPS!!

The date change seemed to help with the weather, which was spectacular (especially compared to the last couple of years).

Thanks to all!!

Edited August 7, 2006 by srf

[10mmdave]

And I'll add my thanks also, great match, great stages done up very well.

Look forward to next year.

(now that left popper on "Gold Rush" I'll know better next year )

[Round_Gun_Shooter]

(now that left popper on "Gold Rush" I'll know better next year )

Put some more powder in and you will be fine

[IPSCDRL]

Nah, more powder won't help if you hit it low. (I know, see the one "M" under my score on stage 2) US Poppers are VERY different from Pepper Poppers in that they test accuracy as well as power. DVC anyone?

Hit a Pepper Popper low and it just may s-l-o-w-l-y fall over while a US popper will just laugh at you.

The weather was much better this year with some cloud cover and rain only coming on Thursday morning.

I have always had a special affection for the AWARE invitational as it was my first "big" match when I started shooting USPSA around ten years ago. I have shot the match eight times and worked it every year since 1998. Vermont is beautiful in August and it is the one chance a year I get to see a bunch of really nice people.

[kamakiri]

Thanks for all the kind words, everyone! It's always great to see so many familiar faces returning and to know that our efforts are appreciated. It's also nice to get to work with a bunch of great folks, some diehard club regulars and some special folks who make the annual pilgrimage just for this match. (Thanks to Mike, Beth, Wally, Tom, Evelyn, the Mura clan...).

As far as results go... I don't have them all to hand (I'm a dragon builder, not a stats whizz), but if memory serves and nothing changed unexpectedly here's a rough idea of how it all turned out:

Travis Tomasie won Limited (and was also HOA at the match), edging out Dave Sevigny (the two traded stage wins back and forth), with Lee Dimaculangan in third. I heard that Lee's ammo went minor, and Dave had some gun problems (and also had to shoot in the rain Thursday morning), but Travis seemed to be in exceptional form and would have been hard to catch under any circumstances. All three of these guys are model competitors, absolute gentlemen, always helpful and positive; and it's always an education to watch them take down a stage. As an example-- before the first shot was fired Thursday morning, Dave noticed a flaw in the layout of one of the stages that would have allowed a clever competitor to shoot it faster in a way counter to the intent of the stage design. Instead of taking advantage of the loophole he'd noticed he suggested a quick and easy way for the RO's to fix it, eliminating the "sweet spot" that would have made the stage far more boring if everyone had caught on (and also undoubtedly preventing a lot of highly decorated hard cover from getting shot up bad). And the US Army definitely couldn't have better embassadors than Travis and Lee.

In Open we had a rematch of last year's top two. This time it was Allan Zitta who claimed top honors over Matt Joe, with a pretty talented field of A and B class shooters on their heals.

Limited-10 was again won by Larry Houck, closely pursued by Steve DeLottinville and hometown favorite Steve Rubalcaba, who shot a great match. Go Steve! I believe these three claimed all the stage wins between 'em.

In Production Dave Marques topped the field for the second year running. Dave, you whupped me good this year. I could plead fatigue, shooting in the rain, whatever, but you shot a terrific match; way to go. I think you won five or six out of the nine stages, with three or four of us battling it out for second place each taking one.

Finally, we had a good turnout of wheel guns. I can't remember exactly how the winner's name was spelled (Sardina?), but I certainly remember him shooting-- best wheelgunner I've ever seen in this neck of the woods. Times of around 40 seconds on "Camelot" and 26 seconds on "1 Million B.C." should impress anybody who was there and ran those stages with an auto.

Congratulations to all the winners, and thanks to everyone who came and helped make the match a success, on either side of the timer.

Elye A.

[Jim Norman]

Deleted

Edited August 8, 2006 by Jim Norman

[IPSCDRL]

Really appreciate the update, but how about the rest of us?

Just posted. See USPSA.ORG

[Jim Norman]

Damn, I tried to get my post off as soon as I saw the scores.

I edit about as fast as I Reload. Two lousy reloads and two mikes. Next year, next year!

Jim

[AWARE2005]

I posted the stats about an hour ago. I will be keeping them open until midinight Friday August 11th for corrections. I do my best to get everything as correct as possible. Get anything you need changed to me and I will try to get it updated on a daily basis.

[IPSCDRL]

I just posted about 50 pictures from the match to the USPSA photo gallery.

Enjoy.

Edited August 8, 2006 by IPSCDRL

[AWARE2005]

Mikey Mikey Mikey,

In picture DCS03145, what exactly is Frank doing behind you while you have your head in the Guilltine yoke.

[IPSCDRL]

Mikey Mikey Mikey,

In picture DCS03145, what exactly is Frank doing behind you while you have your head in the Guilltine yoke.

I think he's giving me "rabbit ears". In the other photo he looks like he is kicking me in the butt. (I didn't post it)

Gee, I thought you would have commented on # 3153.

See if you can get the photos Mike Felber took. I think he has at least one of each stage.