Searsboro Iowa, June 14 & 15 Brownell's Big Springs Range
While a weeks worth of heavy rains raise the DesMoines River to Once in 500yr Flood Levels fourteen two day shooters assemble in Searsboro at the Brownell's Big Spring Range Complex for the second ever Appleseed in Iowa. Appleseeders traveled from Kansas City, Central Missouri, Minnesota, and all points in Iowa. It was good to see Franc and Vic again, attendees of 4-19 Appleseed.
Day One Appleseeders worked positions , the six steps, and NPOA drills most of the day with First Strike history at lunch (note to Fred: Iowa-mark began before even Queen Anne's War this time!). The afternoon followed on with more drills and instructor/student clinic time ending the day with our first QDAQT. Second Strike history after policing up the range then dismissal. No Rifleman today.
Day Two started early with assembly with equipment on the line by 8:30. Admin and review then on to the fun with the first of the day redcoat by nine. The Raven led us in mag change instruction and then sighters & drill on green classification targets. Ball & Dummy drill shook out the demons and Appleseeders began to see results of their efforts. Another QDAQT and we had a Rifleman as NRATC scores a 216 with the first of his three Rifleman scores of the Day. Then on to the STAR shoot where as often, shooters fire their best groups of the day! Amazing what can be done with NPOA. Another QDAQT and severe thunderstorm warnings with outlook of heavy rain for the next six hours cause us to take lunch early and wait out the gathering storm. Second Strike History at lunch and the clouds clear out and we are back to the range and QDAQTs ranking another Rifleman (woman) as Armada comes in with a 212. Ending the day with RedCoats and a Run & Gun team redcoat, Seventh Steps and call to duty.
A successful Appleseed, with fourteen percent of attendees making Rifleman, and the remainder coming on quickly.
Thanks to all, Iowa-mark
Random shots from Searsboro
random shots
First Strike History
"T" time
who here felt good about what they accomplished today?
in the past, people used to cheer when they felt good about something,
but not a hooray, too new, not a hurrah, but in the 1770s it was huzzah!
three huzzahs, one for the boys of 1775, one for ourselves, and one for what we've done here today! huzzah! huzzah! huzzah!
Whew!!
Just came out of the"After Appleseed " fog, result of two 6 hour drives and an Appleseed in between, oh, and 8 hours of employment on both ends.
Searsboro was a great venue. We drove through the troubled flood lands on the way in from Missouri, but the range was in great shape and the weather cooperated, giving us just a cooling sprinkle Sunday. The range is superb, purpose-built and very well maintained.
My wife, Zulema, ( Armada) finally gave in and accompanied me to an Appleseed, and also agreed to participate. She is not new to rifles, but is not an active shooter. I ran her through the positions, safety rules, and a basic explanation of NPOA, but beyond that she walked onto the range cold.
We arrived at the range late Fri. nite, and tent camped on a cool, breezy, and unusually clear summer night. IOWA-mark and his son Alex, The Raven and friend Ron, all arrived about 7:30 Sat morning.
After admin. and intros, we got right to business . Red coats, squares, slings, 6 steps, etc. The pace was easy in the morning, but after lunch and history, we picked things up a bit. This was the best group of shooters to work with, excellent attitudes and quick to apply new knowledge. Saturday closed with no new Riflemen, but with terrific improvement across the board .
Sunday dawned a little cooler and cloudy, great weather for Appleseeding! Another Redcoat to start the day, followed by Ball and Dummy, NPOA star, and QDAQT, and we had our first Rifleman. Congrats, Greg!
Lunch, with a dessert of History (delicious!) and back to the line for some "fine points" instruction, then on to QDAQT. There was some milling about during scoring on this one, and Alex whispered that Armada had a really good score and they were double-checking it. When Mark announced that my wife was our newest Rifleman, I got so choked up I had to go find my sunglasses. Congratulations, mi amor. Well done!! Wanna be an instructor!?!?
More drills, QDAQT, an afternoon break for Dangerous Old Men, another QDAQT and star, and Run and Gun, followed by Seventh Step and Patch presentation, and another fantastic exercise in liberty was over. Searsboro is a great place for Appleseed, and I will be looking forward to helping out again.
Many kudos to IOWA-mark for putting this together, and to The Raven, Alex and Ron for their hard work. Special thanks to Mark's wife, Connie, for her hospitality and picnic basket, and for her support of the instructor crew, especially Mark.
Longshot
The Raven Reviews
review, apply, check targets
progress
Run & Gun!
note: Iowa-mark and The Raven stay out of the path of the thundering Great Plainsians :)
Run & Gun
team fire, five rounds per shooter all to go on one red coat target per team, six on six, but no, a malf makes it six on five, how will it turn out?
hint: there are riflemen among the five!
The Seventh Step and a Call to Duty by Longshot
to the sound of huzzahs!!!
Rifleman Armada
to the sound of huzzah!!!
Rifleman NRATC
Great reports! Good to see the seeds still germinating out in Iowa. Glad to see the folks showing up and getting seeded! Just wish for once we'd get to use that long range bay! Where are the RWVA engineers and pontoon bridges?
Thanks guys for putting on a great event and spreading the vision! JB
new to this forum... finally found this post...
want to say thanks to all instructors, the program, & Brownells... ( the 3 guys from MN ) had a blast, & all learned alot... we are itching to qualify next chance we get...
in my dazed & corn fused state ( sorry about the Iowa pun ), I posted a thread in the regional section, in which I stuck a couple of pics Dan took... ( BTW... the instructors kept us busy enough that he didn't get many pics taken )...
Awesome training guys... I'm highly recommending this to several MN ranges, the respose so far, has been great... ( I'm wanting the chance to qualify again, perhaps a bit closer to home ;) )