Recent Spotlight Shooting Stories
Had an overall good match, one of my best times for 6 stages. But, my focus has been on comparing my practice runs to my match runs. It's easy to have some blazing runs in practice, but not keep up at the match. Or worse, just self destruct at the match trying to shoot unrealistic practice times. This day went fairly consistent for me.
Steel Challenge Intermediate Myths
2022-07-07Greg goes through some Intermediate Shooter tips/myths for Steel Challenge. Great tips, and such good quality video's, Spittin' Brass is a PRO.
Greg covers some tips on shooting Smoke & Hope: See your sights!
Dominant eye / two eye shooting.
Grip strength & weak hand.
Upgrade your gear/gun?
Changing mags.
ShootingBot Ad. :)
2nd Video in the Steel Challenge Myths series from our partners @ Spittin' Brass
Steel Challenge Beginner Myths
2022-06-16Greg Kerce goes through some of the issues facing new shooters looking to get into Steel Challenge.
I'm one of the Intro class instructors here at Volusia. Greg is 100% right, steel challenge can be highly competitive, but it's also a super friendly competition format. If you are new, we will help you get on track. If you plan on shooting USPSA / IDPA, steel challenge is an excellent first step. Highly recommend it for most newer shooters before jumping into the deep end of the pool with run-and-gun. If your club happens to have an Intro class like ours, it's an excellent idea to take. But, if it's not available, just find a match. As long as you are solid with your gun safety, you will have fun!
This was another excellent video from our partners @ Spittin' Brass
Mantis X Training
2022-06-05Looking at the Mantis X shooting trainer.
The mantis-X has multiple versions designed for dry and/or live fire training. To do dry fire you can use the X2. To also do Live fire you need the X3 or the X10.
What is the concept? Basically the sensor detects what your gun (you) are doing right as you break the trigger. It then saves/compares this data to help evaluate your shooting.
Ex: "Too little trigger finger."
I am a certified NRA basic pistol instructor (though I rarely do anything with that) and help instruct the Intro to Competition Class when my local range, Volusia County Gun Club, hosts a class each month. A significant number of the people taking the Intro to Competition class should probably be taking an intro to shooting class instead. Helping them sort out why they are shooting a foot low-left of the plate every time is half the battle. The Mantis-X would seriously help!
The Mantis is designed to attach to a rail. If your pistol doesn't have a rail, they have magazine baseplate adapters.
Disclosure, I do not have a Mantis yet. But, it's definitely on my to-do list, as a personal shooter to catch issues,
and especially when helping newer friends/family shooters.
Or, for my occasional individual instructing I think it would extremely helpful. I plan on having one soon and will update this to a "review" at that time.
Below is one of their youtube videos (they have a lot available).
And a link to their product comparison page :
USPSA: Range is NOT clear
2022-05-19
Anyone that competes and hasn't seen this video, probably should. It's an eye-opener.
Video embed from Rob Engh's youtube account.
A lot going on here. From what I have read, the guy down range was significantly hard of hearing, so that explains a little. That stage design with solid walls added risk. Pretty easy and obvious to blame the RO, but plenty of acting RO's aren't actually certified, just shooters trying to help out so we all get to shoot a match. And obviously nobody else there managed to help out and catch it either. But yeah, the most dangerous thing I've seen come out of a match.
Highlights from the 2022 West FL Steel Challenge Championship.
Match had about 190 total entries. Center-fire pistol was thin. Since the ammo/primer shortage started, Steel Challenge has become ever more run by the rimfire shooters. Even Shootingbot skipped center fire pistols this year. RFPI has become my favorite niche. I still like the challenge of shooting iron-sight pistol, and when I'm back to shooting Limited it should be a decent transition.
The shootingBOT youtube channel is new. If you can, Like & Subscribe to help us get on the map!
Denny Chapman (of Big Daddy Unlimited) interviews World Champion shooter Chris Barrett @ Volusia County Gun Club.
Chris Barrett isn't a local/regular here, but he showed up for a weekend of steel shooting. Having won multiple Steel Challenge world titles, he had more than a few people following him around the range. His shooting held up, beating our top locals by a solid 15 seconds.
Another excellent video from our friends @ Spittin' Brass
Tweet: Riding the Rails
2022-04-28Not shooting related in any way. But I always enjoy seeing quirky people doing quirky things out on their own and this one caught my attention.
This man built a rail cart and rides it along abandoned railroad tracks in Southern California pic.twitter.com/PPzAY4Cv0A
— Mark Tomasovic (@MarkTomasovic) May 6, 2022
Tweet: Homemade Gatling gun?
2022-04-21I have no idea on the legality of building this. All I can say is that it's fascinating, and admire the engineering.
Don't have the money for a class III FFL?
— Nalgas Güeras (@ImGoingInDry) April 21, 2022
Improvise, adapt, overcome. pic.twitter.com/0p2MPqxFfj
2022 Ultimate Steel Challenge
2022-03-15The Ultimate Steel Challenge match at Volusia County Gun Club is 12 stages. We run the standard 8, plus 4 retired stages from earlier years. Zig-Zag, Double Trouble, Triple Threat, and a version of Flying-M.
We had about 100 entries total.
Spoiler: Super Teen Raegan won every division she entered, and was also high overall 1st, 2nd, and 3rd. That's impressive.
ShootingBOT took a division win. Yes!
Fun fact: USPSA magazine did an article on this match and included a pic of me shooting. Looks like I have finally made it, anyone know where I pick up my VIP passes?
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