Sunland CA Oct 8/9 2011 AAR

[V]

What a great weekend, at a great facility, with wonderful weather.

Thank you to everyone who came out to celebrate the heritage and improve their marksmanship.

We had 18 shooters out for this weekend and gonejohnny and I had a blast pushing through the marksmanship and heritage. The group was very attentive, saw more than one "notetaker" and put the lessons to good effect. We had a large contingent of self-confessed "new shooters" who we were pleased to see, having no ingrained bad habits to unlearn first,  soon put the slings, SHF and six steps with NPOA to good use, seeing groups magically shrinking.

Barron brought his whole family Liberty, Linda and Patience who with borrowed LTRs and breaking out the AR were doing great on the left hand side of the line.

We had some returning Appleseeders who came achingly close to nailing those patches down in the 200 plus range.... but no cigar. Ray, Luke, keep persisiting. The two Williams (Bill and Wise) along with Don and his back brace (now there's talking achingly) plugged away the whole weekend.

Ed, Lon and Jerald were our Sat only shooters, remember, dry practice at home before your next AS will get you a long way after drinking from the firehose.

Sofia, Gracie, Dawn and Susan (from Turners, on the recommendation from her boss who was at the Corona 210 shoot) acquited themselves well on the marksmanship front and will do well on spreading the word in their Seventh stepping. I see a patch in their near future if they continue improving at the same rate.

If I left anyone out, or got any names wrong, please let me know, its a hectic schedule and my old brain isn't what it used to be.

Thanks again to gonejohnny for helping out the whole weekend, fresh from his first "hat" experience at Corona 210 and gratefuldog for riding to our aid on Sunday where we had 7 returning shooters.

Please post your experiences and photos here for everyone.

Cheers
Phil "V"

[V]

Added details to my first message.

Thanks again everyone for a great weekend. Where else in the world do we get to do this, shoot rifles, share stories and enjoy the company of American Riflemen. Lets spread the word and keep these traditions and spirit alive.

Cheers
Phil

[gonejohnny]

Absolutely great weekend, spent with some really wonderful Americans! So much of my weekend was spent trying to keep up with the great instruction from V, that the whole experience seems a bit of a blur as I try and collect my thoughts!

Chris and Chris, the scoped brothers! Getting those sights zeroed in before your next AS will make it a much more pleasurable experience. Let's put those ROC cards to good use get you both where we know you want to be!

Dawn: Thanks for jumping in the truck all bright and early on her birthday weekend! She'd never shot a rifle before in her life and was getting my trusty old LTR to put shots on paper by lunchtime. Truly inspirational!

"Hasty Luke", it's great to see such enthusiasm for marksmanship. Even more wonderful is that he brought Gracie and Sofia along with him for the weekend! As if that wasn't already enough, he loaned one of the girls his extra .22 and even cleaned it for her during the Saturday night head-ache. So darn close to to shooting his score! I know he likes that hasty sling, but maybe a little more time with a loop might keep that NPOA steady and take him past the plateau. Ever thought about National Match Military sling? Might find it the best of both worlds... especially on an AR.

Sofia and Gracie, I really hope you both understand how far you've come in just one weekend. It'd be great to see you both out on the lines again getting better and better and better.

Susan was the very definition persistence this last weekend. With smaller and smaller groups throughout the course of the weekend, she was always the first at the papers to check her work. Nicely done, and I hope we get to see you again soon!

Jerry's already living the life of a RM! All that's missing is some more time in the sling and a score. Hope you put some of what you learned from the fire-hose this weekend into practice and have fun shooting on that trip up to Tehachapi. Super thanks for bringing an Eazy-Up. Always super appreciated!

Again, thank you all for the awesome weekend and I hope to see you all again very soon!

- GoneJohnny