CHA-LEE's Tale

[BeerBaron]

I love tinkering too. And there's no doubt much more scope for that with a 2011 as a base gun. You can still tune up a CZ or EAA though, just not as wide a choice in bits.

[CHA-LEE]

One major disadvantage of the CZ platform is the significant reduction in aftermarket parts available. That and availability of parts. If you need a CZ part there is really only one source to get them in the US. The 2011 support on the other hand is dramatically better. You are hard pressed to be in a situation where you can't get the parts you need whenever you need them. If your preferred vendor does not have the part you want there are 10 other vendors that will have it.

You also have the local brain trust and support factor to consider. If you break a part on a CZ or EAA limited gun at a match you are on your own in supporting it. If you break a 2011 at a match there is a very good chance that another shooter at the match will have the part or be able to help you solve the issue.

[BeerBaron]

makes total sense.

It's the same here in limited (well we call it standard) in that 2011's rule the roost and that is reflected in aftermarket support, gunsmith support and the existence of a strong brains trust.

[CHA-LEE]

This past weekend I shot the Utah State match. I knew that my left arm was still at 60% strength but I didn’t realize how much that would negatively impact my performance. With my weak left arm I couldn’t transition or shoot aggressively. This forced me to shoot and transition a lot slower than normal which translated to significantly increased stage times. On Saturday I was in the mode of simply trying to survive the stages without injuring myself and this resulted in fairly consistent but slow stage runs. I decided to push 100% on the last stage of the day and this resulted in a decent stage time with not so good hits on target, but at least hits. Doing this did flare up the pain in my neck though so I am glad that I saved the “Test” for the end of the day.

On Sunday I decided to keep my transitions conservative but push the shooting speed and this resulted in a crap ton of misses. It was more “fun” to blast at the targets faster but with dramatically reduced grip strength in my left hand my on target hits were all over the place and not even on the target in some cases. The good thing is that I didn’t reinjure my neck because I was still transitioning and moving less aggressively through the stages.

I knew that I wouldn’t be able to perform my best with my super weak left arm and neck issues, but I didn’t realize how frustrating it would be. It was super frustrating to know the best way to shoot the stages and know that I would be able to rock the stage runs if my left arm would actually work, but didn’t. All I could do was grind through the stages the best I could and try to enjoy the time I had on the range. It was fun to visit with friends and participate in the match, but it was really a waste of my time. If I hadn’t already paid for all of the travel expenses I would have been better served by skipping the match.

This coming weekend I am attending the Oklahoma Sectional match, which is a one day match on Saturday. I am in the same boat of already paying all of the travel expenses for the match so I will still go. But I am not really looking forward to it. Knowing that you will not be able to perform before you even go to a match is a really sucky mental state to be in. Hopefully I get some good healing done this week so my left arm is at least a little stronger than before. We will see how it goes.

[MarkCO]

I hope you can get some good rest this week and have a great match Saturday!

[CHA-LEE]

I was able to get an MRI done today as there was a cancellation and I could fit into that opening. I am not a claustrophobic person but being jammed into the tube of the MRI machine for 30+ minutes does test ones resolve. I got through it without any issues and they gave me a copy of my images on a CD. I am not a doctor, but looking at the images its pretty clear to me that I have a couple of disks in my neck that are blown out. I have attached a picture of the MRI image showing the disks to this post. I can't remember which disk gave me trouble last time and I don't have the MRI images from the last scan. I will have to put in a request to get my old MRI scan images so I can compare the two. Now I have to wait in the queue to see a neurosurgeon for a consult and review of the MRI. That is current scheduled for the start of October, but I have put myself on the cancellation list so maybe I can get in sooner. I am keeping my fingers crossed. Until then all I can do is continue to take it easy and hope that it heals on its own. But looking at the MRI image, I find it hard to believe that I won't have to go under the knife for a long term fix.

Edited September 4, 2014 by CHA-LEE

[bayougump]

I'm no dr but the 4th and 5th from the top look like the ones that are protruding out on the nerves. That's what some of my MRI's looked like when I still had full looking discs. Hope things get better, back pain sux

[CHA-LEE]

The Dr called me to talk about the MRI results. The old disk rupture is the lower one in the picture. The new one is the one above it. So I guess the good thing is that the upper one looks not as bad as the lower one and I "Healed" to almost 100% from the lower one. I still have a very slight amount of numbness in my right hand pointer finger from the last rupture and that is never going away per the doctor. Their call to me today was to basically tell me that they had a chance to look at the MRI and wanted to confirm the schedule of the official consult. They also mentioned that if my pain/weakness/numbness gets worse to contact them ASAP. I was able to get a new date set for the official consult and review with the neurosurgeon for September 17th. Its great to pull the review date back in a few more weeks, and by then I should know if my "take it easy and let it heal on its own" plan is actually doing its job.

I hope that this new disk rupture can heal to a point where I am almost 100% again so I can have a few more years of "normal" life until I actually have to get it surgically repaired. I have been doing a lot of online research about surgeries for these type of disk failures and the two main options are Fusion, or Artificial Disk replacement. In the data I can find, the fusion procedure produces about 5 - 10 years of relief until the disks above or below the fusing point start to blow out due to the extra pressure. The Artificial Disk Replacement procedure seems to have a lot better 5 - 10 year success rate but there isn't a bunch of data on really long term results. Another crappy factor is that here in the US the FDA is only approving the use of single layer artificial disk solutions so if you have multiple disks that are screwed you can only get one disk replaced and the rest need to be fused. As time goes on they may approve and adopt the multi layer Artificial Disk replacement solution, but that isn't happening today. At least not for what insurance will cover here in the US.

So........... Hopefully I can fully recover from this current disk rupture without needing surgery. Then keep my fingers crossed and hope that my beat up disks last long enough for the Artificial Disk technology to improve to a point where they have better long term data and allow multi later replacements. Or maybe they will have a totally new Terminator bionic neck replacement by then

Edited September 4, 2014 by CHA-LEE

[CHA-LEE]

This past weekend was a busy one. I flew out to Oklahoma City on Friday to attend the Oklahoma Limited/Production Sectional match. The whole match is shot in one day on Saturday so I flew in on Friday to get a chance to check out the stages. All of the stages were well laid out, challenging and had many choices in how to shoot them. The weather was hot on Friday with a temp of 99 degrees and pretty humid. I was able to walk all of the stages and come up with decent stage plans for each one. On Saturday morning I woke up and looked outside to see it raining. It wasn’t a heavy rain, just a consistent drizzle. I got to the range early and the match staff said the match was still on even though we would be shooting in pretty wet, muddy and sloppy conditions. I was glad that they chose to continue with the match as I was flying out Saturday evening and the only chance I would have to shoot would be that day. All of the targets were replaced and bagged and everyone on my squad worked hard to get the stages reset quickly as we churned through the stages. We started on stage 1 which was on the “Grassy” berms so it was mostly wet and not too muddy. But as we kept going down the range the bays got progressively more muddy up to the point of being ankle deep sloppy mud. I did my best to be safe and not push hard in movement to keep from slipping and falling down. I succeeded in not falling down or losing any of my shoes in the sticky mud so that was a huge win. Dropped magazines were totally mud covered so you had to basically wash them out in a somewhat clean puddle of water on the stage. Luckily the mud would rinse right off the mags without much scrubbing needed.

Since the rainy and muddy range conditions slowed down the time it took to churn through the stages I requested to shoot through the final few stages so I wouldn’t miss my flight home. The Match Director and Range Master ran me through the last stages of the match and I was able to get all of the stages shot. I really appreciate them accommodating my request to shoot through the final stages as I am sure they had more than enough to deal with that day given the range conditions. I didn’t feel like I shot very well through the match. I was moving around the stages pretty gingerly due to worrying about slipping or falling down. Then I ended up with a total of 4 misses for the match which was a lot more than I wanted given how slow I was shooting due to my weak left arm. Battling my weak left arm all day wasn’t fun either, but its better to put it to use and shoot, verses not shoot.

When the results were tallied I was very surprised to see that I had won the match. I really didn’t expect that given that the Friday shooters shot the match in “normal” range conditions and there were several other good shooters performing well on Saturday regardless of the muddy conditions. A win is a win I guess and I will take it. I really wasn’t looking forward to attending this match due to knowing my left arm wasn’t up to full strength, but after attending I was happy that I went. Not because I won the match either. I was happy to attend because it gave me a chance to shoot at a new range, make some new friends, and gain some more experience in shooting during less than optimal weather/range conditions. I hope that this club hosts another major match again next year as the facility is really nice and it would be really fun to shoot a match there when the range conditions are dry. I will keep an eye on it for my 2015 shooting schedule.

[CHA-LEE]

On Sunday I was able to shoot a local club match at the Aurora Gun Club. It was nice to shoot in “Dry” range conditions compared to the day before. I shot an OK match but noticed that my left arm was struggling to keep up with the pace of shooting I was trying to push. My transitions were slower and less precise and managing the recoil was dramatically worse than “normal”. Seeing the gun muzzle flip excessively while shooting is an odd visual input. I am basically stuck in a mode of shooting/transitioning slow and getting my hits but having a crappy stage time, or transitioning/shooting fast and getting crappy hits with a good stage time. It’s really frustrating to be in this situation because both of these solutions really suck. It also sucks to KNOW that you can perform a lot better than you are if only my left arm was at full strength. There isn’t much I can do right now though other than grind through the situation and hope that my neck heals and allows my left arm to get back to full strength. The healing process is really slow going and I really doubt that I will be back to even 75% by the time I have to head to the Nationals. Oh well, that is how life works some times. We can’t always get what we want.

Rick has gotten my Full Dust Cover, Bull Barrel limited gun together and I was able to shoot it a little bit on Thursday. It currently has the heavy magwell and tungsten guide rod with the plastic grip like my first 2011 had as I am waiting for another Phoenix Trinity stainless grip to show up. I only shot it about 50 rounds and it had a distinctively different felt recoil than my short dust cover, bushing barrel limited gun. It felt softer shooting but had more muzzle flip. I didn’t shoot it a ton because its pretty much useless to try to tune the felt recoil with my gimp left arm. That and I need to swap out the front sight to a taller one to get the POA/POI the same. My goal is to get this blaster up and running to serve as a functional backup gun to take to the Nationals. It may not be in an optimally tuned configuration by the time the Nationals comes around, but it will at least function as a viable backup gun. I will be fiddling on this blaster this week to get it a little closer to serving that purpose.

[Glock26Toter]

I think that you are being challenged in a way that will benefit you greatly when you are all healed up. I'm not saying you're going to be all "I'm glad blew my disk out" or anything, but you are learning to manage your grip so precisely that when you are at 100% it will result in some mighty precise shooting. At least I hope it ends up like that.

[SpaceFlunky]

This past weekend was a busy one. I flew out to Oklahoma City on Friday to attend the Oklahoma Limited/Production Sectional match. The whole match is shot in one day on Saturday so I flew in on Friday to get a chance to check out the stages. All of the stages were well laid out, challenging and had many choices in how to shoot them. The weather was hot on Friday with a temp of 99 degrees and pretty humid. I was able to walk all of the stages and come up with decent stage plans for each one. On Saturday morning I woke up and looked outside to see it raining. It wasn’t a heavy rain, just a consistent drizzle. I got to the range early and the match staff said the match was still on even though we would be shooting in pretty wet, muddy and sloppy conditions. I was glad that they chose to continue with the match as I was flying out Saturday evening and the only chance I would have to shoot would be that day. All of the targets were replaced and bagged and everyone on my squad worked hard to get the stages reset quickly as we churned through the stages. We started on stage 1 which was on the “Grassy” berms so it was mostly wet and not too muddy. But as we kept going down the range the bays got progressively more muddy up to the point of being ankle deep sloppy mud. I did my best to be safe and not push hard in movement to keep from slipping and falling down. I succeeded in not falling down or losing any of my shoes in the sticky mud so that was a huge win. Dropped magazines were totally mud covered so you had to basically wash them out in a somewhat clean puddle of water on the stage. Luckily the mud would rinse right off the mags without much scrubbing needed.

Since the rainy and muddy range conditions slowed down the time it took to churn through the stages I requested to shoot through the final few stages so I wouldn’t miss my flight home. The Match Director and Range Master ran me through the last stages of the match and I was able to get all of the stages shot. I really appreciate them accommodating my request to shoot through the final stages as I am sure they had more than enough to deal with that day given the range conditions. I didn’t feel like I shot very well through the match. I was moving around the stages pretty gingerly due to worrying about slipping or falling down. Then I ended up with a total of 4 misses for the match which was a lot more than I wanted given how slow I was shooting due to my weak left arm. Battling my weak left arm all day wasn’t fun either, but its better to put it to use and shoot, verses not shoot.

When the results were tallied I was very surprised to see that I had won the match. I really didn’t expect that given that the Friday shooters shot the match in “normal” range conditions and there were several other good shooters performing well on Saturday regardless of the muddy conditions. A win is a win I guess and I will take it. I really wasn’t looking forward to attending this match due to knowing my left arm wasn’t up to full strength, but after attending I was happy that I went. Not because I won the match either. I was happy to attend because it gave me a chance to shoot at a new range, make some new friends, and gain some more experience in shooting during less than optimal weather/range conditions. I hope that this club hosts another major match again next year as the facility is really nice and it would be really fun to shoot a match there when the range conditions are dry. I will keep an eye on it for my 2015 shooting schedule.

We'll be elated if you come back and shoot in OK again! I know there was talk of plans already being started for the 2015 Sectional. Im sure info will be posted once it is available.

[CHA-LEE]

I shot matches on both Saturday and Sunday this past weekend. I am trying to push through this weak left arm and numbness issue while shooting these matches, but its not producing very good results. Having a left arm that is half the strength as my right is a significant disadvantage in recoil management, transitioning aggressiveness and solid reload mechanics. Since I can’t grip the gun hard enough with my left hand the gun is muzzle flipping a lot more and the front sight is not returning consistently in the rear notch post shot. I basically have to wait until the excessive muzzle flip is over with, then manually drive the sights back to an aligned state before breaking the next shot. If I do this, I can get good hits. If I don’t, then I have crappy or no hits. This past weekend I decided to push the speed of shooting while I consciously gripped the shit out of the gun with my left hand to see how it would turn out. The results were a dismal failure. Super crappy hits or no hits at all on all of the stages I shot this way. For example, on Sunday I had a miss or no shoot on all stages except for one where I got lucky and ended up with “D” hits instead of misses. On Saturday I shot 85% of the available points and on Sunday I shot 87% of the available points. This failure in ability to capture 90% - 95% of the available points while shooting at a competitive speed is a perfect example of how much this weak left arm is negatively impacting my performance. I can’t even elaborate how frustrating this situation is.

As it stands now, if I have not gained back a SIGNIFICANT amount of left arm strength by the end of next weekend I am going to cancel going to the Nationals. If my left arm is still weak at that point it does not make sense to try and compete at the nationals with a crippled left arm. All it will do is frustrate me more and waste a bunch of time off and money beating my head against a brick wall. I was hoping that I would be healed up a lot more by now, but this weakness and numbness is lingering a lot longer than I expected.

My neurosurgery consult is on Wednesday so I will get a chance to see what my prognosis and options of fixing this are at that time. I know that the nerve damage that is causing the weakness can’t go on too much longer before its permanent. So I may be going under the knife to fix this in order to save the nerves from being permanently damaged. I don’t want to go under the knife to fix this, but I also don’t want a gimp left arm for the rest of my life either. This is all around a really crappy situation to be in right now.

[BritinUSA]

Well, that sucks !

From a cursory review of the Nationals stages this year it looks like there are few opportunities to really shoot fast anyway, without seeing the actual stages its hard to gauge what type of match its going to be and if your slower shooting will have that much of an impact. If all goes according to plan you should get to see some video of some of the stages on Monday during the pre-match and if you can wait that long before canceling your trip it might be worth it.

In the meantime I would suggest watching some video of last years Nationals and listen for the cadence of the shots of the top competitors, if you can shoot accurately with that type of cadence then you could still do well at the match though obviously you don't want to further injure yourself.

[PatJones]

Charlie, do you have a minor caliber gun to play with at our local matches? It might allow you to shoot with a softer grip while you're healing up.

[CHA-LEE]

Well, that sucks !

From a cursory review of the Nationals stages this year it looks like there are few opportunities to really shoot fast anyway, without seeing the actual stages its hard to gauge what type of match its going to be and if your slower shooting will have that much of an impact. If all goes according to plan you should get to see some video of some of the stages on Monday during the pre-match and if you can wait that long before canceling your trip it might be worth it.

In the meantime I would suggest watching some video of last years Nationals and listen for the cadence of the shots of the top competitors, if you can shoot accurately with that type of cadence then you could still do well at the match though obviously you don't want to further injure yourself.

Being able to shoot accurately "fast" on difficult shots is a major part of my style of shooting that makes me competitive at the higher levels. The double whammy is not being able to drive the gun aggressively and consistently to the next target during transitions. Shooting slow plus Transitioning slow = FAIL BOAT even if I do get my hits. I can get away with these issues at local matches and still finish well overall, but I WILL get murdered at the nationals with these issues.

All I can do is take it easy this week and try my best to let this injury heal on its own so my strength comes back. If I still have a weak left arm by next Sunday, I will cancel my trip to the nationals regardless of what the stages look like. I don't need to frustrate myself even more by trying to force a performance I know I can't execute properly due to my weak left arm. All the while spreading that frustration over a week and spending a decent chunk of change doing so.

[CHA-LEE]

Charlie, do you have a minor caliber gun to play with at our local matches? It might allow you to shoot with a softer grip while you're healing up.

I do have a minor gun setup that I could use, but I don't want to go there yet. Shooting minor solves the recoil management issue, but not the target to target transition issue. If this weakness ends up being permanent, then shooting minor may be a viable long term solution. Its not a preferred solution, but its at lease a solution.

[thermobollocks]

Shoot round gun, then transitions won't matter as much

[CHA-LEE]

Shoot round gun, then transitions won't matter as much

I don't have the patience to play the round gun game. I like having massive amounts of extra bullets to miss with.

[PatJones]

Geez, even I knew enough not to suggest that.

[thermobollocks]

Geez, even I knew enough not to suggest that.

Half the reason you and I are in the chunk of the game we're in is an abundance of poor sense

Charlie, I'm glad you're able to shoot to an extent, and I can only imagine the irritation of not having your body respond to the things that you already know how to do. I'm thankful that you're still willing and able to work the locals, and I can only hope that medical technology will get your neckbones back together in a way that you like.

Here's a dumb question: Would a plastic minor gun transition any better for you?

[CHA-LEE]

Geez, even I knew enough not to suggest that.

Half the reason you and I are in the chunk of the game we're in is an abundance of poor sense

Charlie, I'm glad you're able to shoot to an extent, and I can only imagine the irritation of not having your body respond to the things that you already know how to do. I'm thankful that you're still willing and able to work the locals, and I can only hope that medical technology will get your neckbones back together in a way that you like.

Here's a dumb question: Would a plastic minor gun transition any better for you?

A "Lighter" gun may be easier to transition with, but it makes managing the recoil more difficult. I don't want to switch up my guns, ammo or gear to work better with my weak left arm until I know that it will not get better. Until that time comes, I am going to continue to grind through the process of using my normal stuff and hope that my left arm recovers sooner than later.

[BritinUSA]

If it comes to that, it may be easier to just put a 9mm barrel in that new Limited gun and shoot minor. With the weight of that gun it would be like shooting an Airsoft !

[CHA-LEE]

I had my neurosurgery consult today. Basically the doctor told me to wait and see how it goes with healing on its own. He said that disk injuries like this can take many months to heal on their own and it’s simply too soon to make a determination as to if the weakness or numbness would be resolved by surgery or not. Since I am not in pain and it seems like it is healing the doctor is reluctant to do anything until more time has passed. He wants me to give it at least another month to heal. At that point he can assess the healing process and see if I am making progress or not. If I am not then he would consider a surgical solution.

If this does get pushed to a surgical solution they recommended that I get both of my damaged disks removed and fixed. This could be done in a combination of disk replacement at C6/C7 and disk fusion at C5/C6, or fusing both C5/C6 & C6/C7. Currently the FDA does not approve of multi-layer artificial disk replacement so that isn’t an option today. He did mention that this may change as more time passes and the FDA feels that the artificial disk replacement is a viable option here in the US. But that is probably several years down the road. The doctor I talked to specialized in disk fusion so he was pitching that option pretty hard. But if it comes to a surgical solution I will get multiple opinions from doctors that specialize in artificial disk replacement.

So basically, the good news is that I am not in pain and I seem to be on the road to recovery. I have also cut through a huge chunk of the medical and insurance red tape and scheduling delays so if I do need surgery I can get it done relatively quickly. The bad news is that it will probably take several months before I am back to a “Normal” strength and feeling in my left arm IF it is going to heal. All I can do is continue to take it easy and be patient so the healing process can do its thing.

From a Competition Shooting Performance standpoint I need to come to grips with the rest of the 2014 shooting season pretty much being done with. I can’t expect to perform 100% at these major matches since I am and will not be 100%. So I need to decide if simply participating in the remaining major matches with zero expectation of performing well is worth the time, effort, and expense of attending. I am a very competitive person so going to a major match without a performance goal or expectation is a very difficult position to be in. I can blow off local club matches, but the major matches will be really hard to mentally let go of. Or maybe it will be a good thing to go into these major matches with absolutely zero performance expectation? It just sucks that the Nationals happens to be the next major match on the schedule to test this new mindset out on. Do I go to the nationals or not? I am still undecided.

Edited September 17, 2014 by CHA-LEE

[Nimitz]

One question you may want to try to answer is if you will heal faster by just writing off the rest of 2014 and just focus on healing vice trying to continue to shoot at some level?

This time last year I tore the cartilage in my left wrist and while not the same degree of injury you have I still faced a decision. And while I don't have your match schedule I do train 12 days a month plus 2-3 matches/month so i was faced with going from shooting 15 days/ month to zero days/month.

In my younger days I'm sure I would have selected a solution that did not include stopping shooting and would have tried to work through it. However, since I'm old and decrepit I made the very difficult decision to simply stop shooting and let my wrist heal. Best decision I ever made as after 5 weeks i was back to a full shooting schedule. My hand surgeon said it could take several months to heal , if ever, based on what Course of action I decided to pursue. He was also confident he could repair it with surgery but I was motivated to avoid that at all costs having had more than my fair share over the years ...

Just something to consider ....

Edited September 17, 2014 by Nimitz