AAR May Sandusky, Ohio May 4&5, 2019

[Corvette]

What a great Appleseed! We had 19 dedicated shooters on the line at Erie County Conservation League near Sandusky, Ohio.  Our newest Blue Hat, Jason, was a big help in setting up Friday night hanging flag brackets and setting up the line for a great weekend.   We used a different target line this weekend based on our experiences last year.  The Target frames on the range are set for bench shooting from the covered line at 100 yds.  Using these frame puts targets too high for our needs,  especially when in prone.  So, we had a new system this year for attaching backers to the existing frame which allowed us to post targets below the frame.  This worked great all weekend.

Saturday dawned overcast but not too cold.  Shooters arrived on time and we got started with a welcome and the safety briefing.  The morning Red Coat was shot with 19 shooters  and it was clear we had a great group .  We had 15 of 19 at 100, 8 at 200, 6 at 300 and 3 at 400. We had five people join Daniel Morgan's Rangers and we had one cleared Red Coat (great job Jim).  What a great start.

Instructions on steady hold in prone, the six steps and NPOA were delivered throughout the morning and supporting drills were shot.  Everyone made progress and stayed focused.  Mid-morning, the temp dropped and the on and off drizzle came.  This stayed with us all day. Not heavy, but just enough to annoy everyone.

The first strike was presented at lunch with the help of Cadence's's replica Brown Bess.  Back on the line for seated and standing steady hold instructions which were followed by a practice AQT.  The second strike was delivered at the afternoon break and the third at the end of the day. 

Saturday's Red Coat showed that we were successful with our instructional efforts.  We had 17 of 18 shooters (almost 100%) at 100, 11 at 200, 10 at 300 (almost double the morning), 4 at 400 and 5 people joined Daniel Morgan.  Two shooters cleared their Red Coat (Contrats to Jessie, to clear a Red Coat on the first day of your first Appleseed is really impressive).

Sunday dawned overcast but a little warmer.  All of our shooters returned.  The Sunday morning Red Coat showed a slight decrease from Saturday PM but this is not unusual.  We had 4 bucket shots and 3 cleared Red Coats (great job Matt,Robert and Jim).

After the completion of several NPOA drills, we embarked on the AQT grind. During the day, we had five Riflemen (four new, one requalified) who shot a total of 12 qualifying scores.  High score went to a new Rifleman (Jim).  Two cleared Red Coats and high score for the weekend is pretty impressive.

KD was presented at lunch.  As we treated this as a Patriot Month shoot, we did the Patriot Volley just before the afternoon break which was followed by the DOM's.  Before we knew it, the Sunday Red Coat was shot with similar good results.  Out of 18 shooters, we had 7 people join Daniel Morgan and one cleared Red Coat (Jim) that was done with the new Tipmann Arms Appleseed rifle.  Huzzah.

I would like to thank all the shooters for being so dedicated to working on their skills and for being so safe all weekend.  To the instructors and Blue Hats that helped (Cadence,  Jason and GMJoe) my thanks for your participation.  It is your fine work that led to the great results our shooters displayed.  Huzzah!  And, our thanks to ECCL for hosting us.  We love your facility, and really appreciate your support.

Corvette

[Corvette]

Some photos from a great event.

Corvette

[Corvette]

More photos.

Corvette

[Cadence]

Huzzah! Huzzah! Huzzah! Welcome to Jason, our newest Blue Hat