Florida Open - 2007 Now That The Match Is Underway

[dirtypool40]

ok it's Thursday, someone is out there, let's get some stage dope....

[zhunter]

I just spoke to them, FIRST SHOT FIRED tomorrow ( Friday) is at 7am!!!!!

Registration is at 6am.

The sun will not be over the berm yet at 7am!!! Better bring some non-tinted glasses to start with!!!

See ya there

[L9X25]

The sun will not be over the berm yet at 7am!!! Better bring some non-tinted glasses to start with!!!

Z-,

That is NOT a joke. I have clear glasses that I shoot for the first stage or two and then the sun is at the top of the berm and you need the dark glasses. You hear the first shots soon after the sun rises.

[zhunter]

The sun will not be over the berm yet at 7am!!! Better bring some non-tinted glasses to start with!!!

Z-,

That is NOT a joke. I have clear glasses that I shoot for the first stage or two and then the sun is at the top of the berm and you need the dark glasses. You hear the first shots soon after the sun rises.

IT WAS NOT meant to be a joke, rather a helpful hint!!!

Feel lucky if you are starting on a westward facing stage, but only half of us will, so it is 50-50

Edited February 15, 2007 by zhunter

[Bear23]

Eric,

Tell Doyle and Nunley hello from me...We expect to hear up to date feedback on how the match is going...I will be there next year....

Oh,

and keep them out of trouble...

Mullan

[dirtypool40]

Cool, I'll be "stacking" behind the S_I carrying SWAT Tanks from NM, should be great.

Pat and I BOTH just missed the cut and will cry and tell "bad beat" stories to each other about how we coulda shoulda.

I am sooooooo looking forward to this weekend.

Edited February 15, 2007 by dirtypool40

[Sue and Sarah]

How nice to be standing on the balcony eating an ice cream in February! Washed a good 20 pounds of road salt off the truck after arriving for the match. Coming from Michigan where it was 12 degrees when we left, this 55 degrees feels balmy.

Does anyone know what time check-in is on Saturday and Sunday?

Thanks, Sarah, Sue and Steve

[L9X25]

Does anyone know what time check-in is on Saturday and Sunday?

SSS,

Assuming you are already in Frostproof, you should stop by on Friday and pick up your shooters packets. Depending on what squad you are assigned to, you usually will have one early day and one late day. On the late day you get a few extra minutes of sleep. I hear that the first squads shoot at 7:00am on Friday and I would not expect much different on Saturday.

[Sue and Sarah]

Does anyone know what time check-in is on Saturday and Sunday?

SSS,

Assuming you are already in Frostproof, you should stop by on Friday and pick up your shooters packets. Depending on what squad you are assigned to, you usually will have one early day and one late day. On the late day you get a few extra minutes of sleep. I hear that the first squads shoot at 7:00am on Friday and I would not expect much different on Saturday.

Thanks, we'll be by tomorrow to pick up our packets.

[XD Niner]

I spent over three hours today trying to come up with even remotely viable plans for the ten stages. Stage 10 was designed by Manny Bragg. It is a 32 round stage with, you guessed it, 32 turtle targets. I think most people spent 50% of their planning time on this stage alone. I asked Manny what his strategy was. He looked at me and said that he hadn't figured one out yet. Sheesh, he designed it for Pete's sake. He said he was bringing his bullet proof undies tomorrow. I told him it wouldn't do him any good.

As usual, there isn't a single No-Shoot or partially blacked out target. However, many of them are hidden behind walls, barrels, tires and other real hard cover. Many 20+ yard shots. Almost all the stages can be shot in a variety of approaches within the same Division.

Stage overview;

Stage 1: Police Officer - 30 rounds in a Hogan Alley like stroll through a town facade shooting on both sides of the street. Careful positioning along the route is everything.

Stage 2: Defense Contractor - 30 rounds with a start in a folded, spindled and mutilated Huey grasping your plastic play toy M-16

Stage 3: Dairy Business (I start on this tomorrow at 7:30) - 31 rounds (two poppers and a plate plus 14 turtles). Starting position is both hands on the butt end of a calf that is just being birthed. Run side to side and then down range and up a set of stairs to mow 'em all down.

Stage 4: Motocross Racer - 29 rounds (the runt of the litter) starting off holding onto some MX bike handlebars and working horizontally along a segmented wall with ports to engage 15 targets including one popper and a swinger.

Stage 5: Dentist - 31 rounds including three poppers. Start lying in dentist chair with loaded gun on nearby shelf. Three Production/L-10 reloads later and you've drilled 'em good.

Stage 6: Banker (with a drawing of the ugliest teller in the known universe) - 30 rounds. The first 7 targets must be engaged while moving down the center aisle with a 10 pound brief case held in your week hand.

Stage 7: Plumber (is my crack showing?) - 13 turtles including one swinger through a distant port and 3 poppers. More side to side and then down range movement.

Stage 8: Painter - 31 rounds including 5 steel with more running hither and yon.

Stage 9: Appliance Repairman - 30 round romp through the grave yard of cast off appliances. Includes a flopper and a swinger just to make it interesting. Most of the targets are hidden behind barrels or walls. Easy to break the 180 here.

Stage 10: Statistician - Manny Bragg's 32 round/32 target amphitheater-like layout from Hell. It takes a really good plan to avoid failing to engage a target or popping one twice. My bet is that Manny will mysteriously disappear after this match and his body will never be found.

So it basically looks like the same old, same old. Jeez, I hope I don't doze off due to boredom

As for those of you worrying about the cold, I grew up in Green Bay so stop acting like a bunch of pansies. Highs should be in the low 60's all three days. Don't worry about the morning cold. Once you see these stages, you'll likely become numb no matter what the temperature.

Tally Ho!

[SmittyFL]

Well, I just finished loading my ammo.

Going to pack up the long undies, mittens, and hand warmers and hit the rack.

A couple hours work tomorrow and I'm off.

[Micah]

OK, being I don't want ANYONE to go minor due to the cold weather, here is my plan.

[....]

<whew!> I was worried the plan would somehow involve the ammo arriving at the chrono station at 98.6F

Hah! In the mouth or.......

[Kevin Kline]

A couple hours work tomorrow and I'm off.

Right, couple of hours my a#* !!!!! Get a real job Shannon !!! This make your own hours crap has got to stop. How the hell are the rest of us supposed to be able to keep up with you working real full time jobs??? Im in the wrong business, I need to be into your business.

You sure you didnt want to bring Gary's ammo with you as your match ammo???

[Fireant]

Kent,

Thanks for the overview of the stages, but the more important question is what's up with the open gun in your avatar?

[dirtypool40]

XD Niner, good intel, can't wait to get started tomorrow.

Season opener, in the cold with friends!!! Yee Haww!!!

[dirtypool40]

OK, it's late Friday,we should have reports coming in from ZHunter, Jeff "Tito" Degracia and others.

come on what gives???

[MattBurkett]

Well just wrapped the match. Had a great time shooting with Dave Sevigny, Brian Smith, Shay, Paul, Ralph Arredondo, Ron Brown, Chris Patty, the other two who I am too tired to remember.

Damn long day. A few pretty good thinking stages. Was fun arguing with Dave about strategy and ideas.

Remind me not to take two months off and then go shoot this match.

Thanks to Frank Garcia and the crew for doing a great job on the event.

:-)

A couple of hints:

1. Train on IPSC classic targets before the match. Was watching that just trash points for many of the guys because they aren't used to shooting them.

2. Close one eye when you shoot through slots or slats.

3. Once you have a plan stick to it - don't change it unless you have a REALLY good reason.

It was great catching up with as many shooters as I did.

Take care and good luck to the guys and gals with the rest of the match!

Matt

[Sharyn]

Video coverage

[clown]

stage 10 makes my head hurt.

[cliffwalsh]

OK, it's late Friday,we should have reports coming in from ZHunter, Jeff "Tito" Degracia and others.

come on what gives???

ZHunter lies....

[XRe]

The match appears to be a solid, no BS kind of match. A couple of forced strong-hand stages (through use of props), one thinker/memory stage, and a lot of wide open strategy.... The squad schedule for the weekend is ... entertaining Shoot a stage, then an hour off, then shoot another, and so forth. My squad starts at 0700 tomorrow morning, so I'm planning on crashing out here in a little bit, and trying to be fresh for tomorrow.

Got some good pics today of Matt, Dave, Brian Smith, zhunter, Chris Patty... I'll try to get some of them up tomorrow...

Met zhunter for the first time today Looks like I'm squadded w/ Smitty, Chris Tilley, Todd Jarrett and Bob Londrigan. Should be a good match to learn, and hopefully to shoot well, too...

[Bryan W]

shoot well Dave and have a blast

[zhunter]

It was a GREAT DAY!!!

My squad was awesome, even tho I got stuck on Cliff's Squad.

I took lots of video, but I am not able to get it on line until tomorrow.

The stages were awesome, made you think, and think long and hard. There were many ways to shoot each and every stage. That is what made it fun, it was open to interpretation. You never felt like a piece of cattle just following the trail.

Shooting this match Single Stack was a blast, challenging, but lots of fun. Unfortunately, not many others chose to do so, I was a bit disappointed in the SS turnout. There had been lots of people shooting SS in the months prior to this match, but I think the Florida Open reputation scared many away, or should i say, back to their Limited or Open guns. YES, there were lots of tight shots, none with any black paint on them tho And there were once again, NO No Shoots!!!! Just plenty of wide open Classic Targets. Many long, i.e. 25 to 35 yard shots tho.

It was cold today, upper 40's when we started, and no sun to keep ya warm until about noon, but then the wind started blowing, out of the Northwest I might add, so it is gonna be seriously COLD in the morning for the weekend shooters.

Even tho I had some gun/press problems, today was the most fun I EVER had at a match!!!

Wish I could do it all over again tomorrow Even with the ammo problems.

I got to meet for the firs time: TLShores and XRe. Thanks for looking me up guys, always cool to meet BE'ers!!

Sorry to report TLShores injured his right calf, and had to withdraw. That sux dude.

Edited February 17, 2007 by zhunter

[XD Niner]

Well, I managed to survive another Florida Open. I shot Production with my trusty XD-9 Tactical. It didn't miss a beat all day. I wish I could say the same for me.

I shot in Squad 3 with the crazies from Puerto Rico who showed up in shorts and long overcoats in the balmy 46 degree weather. I talked to a few BE'ers but somehow managed to miss Jay.

The match was great fun as Jay has already said. I think everyone had a terrific time despite the chilly weather this morning. The good news for us Friday shooters is that it will be a good 15 degrees colder tomorrow morning. Also, the match was ahead of schedule pretty much all day. It looked like most folks finished 30-45 minutes ahead of schedule. There were no or minimal waits between stages. For an A personality like me, the flow of shooting is much, much better with a one day format than the two day format. Those shooting tomorrow will have about two hours between individual performances during which time they can bask in the frigid weather.

For the second year in a row, I was the first shooter on the first stage (Stage 3 for our squad.) Because 3 of our 10 shooters were no-shows, I also had the privilege of being first on Stage 10, Manny Bragg's Statistician with 32 classic targets and 32 rounds. I was dreading the stage heading into it. Bruce Wallace and I developed a strategy that required bouncing from side-to-side like a pin ball while trying to keep track of which targets you had already engaged. Amazingly, it worked like a charm and turned out to be one of my better stages. I lost track of how many Failure to Engage calls I heard from the RO while shooting other stages nearby. At least one GM fell prey to this problem.

I had two brain fades (Banking and Defense Contractor) but other than that I was pretty happy with my overall performance. However, I had a half-dozen Mikes that I would have liked to avoid but there isn't a whole lot you can do about them after the bullet leaves the barrel.

The vendors seemed to be doing okay and I helped add to the economy by buying some Brazos tuned magazines to go along with my used Brazos Pro SC Open blaster that I picked up yesterday. Now all I need to do is crank up the XL650 and start putting out some 38 Super ammo.

At least I will be much warmer in my garage cranking out ammo than those poor schmucks shooting at 7:00 tomorrow morning in sub-freezing temperatures. I'm sure the Saturday/Sunday shooters will have some good stories to add this thread.

[dirty whiteboy]

Isn't this match held at "Frostproof"???