The weather was good to us on the first day of our 2013 KD shoot at San Jose's Metcalf range - just a few rain drops in early afternoon. We had 15 shooters on the line, and they came prepared - we got right through the "Sunday morning' equivalent review of SHF, etc., meanwhile some previous riflemen were getting their come ups for going to long distance.
We got in one AQT (fired simultaneously by 25m and KD shooters) in before lunch. At 25m we had a requalify from Doug at 234 - still standing as high score for the weekend - and a new Rifleman made, as Ken came in with a 215, which he later bettered with 217. Andy requalified at KD with 40/50, which he later improved with a pair of 44s.
After lunch we went into the grind, getting longer breaks than usual as the long distance shooters swapped targets. We got in three more AQTs, and Larry turned in a Rifleman score of 210. After being warned about our quaint customs with North Bridge water, he stepped that up to a 221 and avoided the shower. ^:)^ Larry and his son drove all the way down from Reno, so we're glad to see that worked out! We also had previous Rifleman Ben pick up his long distance rocker with a 47/50, high KD score for this range so far!
We're likely to see rain tomorrow, and that windage lesson may come in handy. We had some more folks knocking on the door today, and other ready to step up to KD, so we hope for some good :~ in spite of the weather.
Larry appeared to find the threat of water to be very motivating. :-)
My weather software seems to think the worst of the rain will be over just as we're starting. We'll see.
A quick report on Sunday:
While our shooter numbers were lower (Easter Sunday), the weather favored us. It rained to the West, it rained in the North Bay, it rained in the Central Valley, but it missed us! O0 ^:)^
We got in a good number of KD AQTs, lessons on windage and range determination, some heritage at lunch, including a work in progress by yours truly on the history of gun rights, and presentations by Melissa and American Amazon.
We had one more KD rifleman step forward: After Doug's 25m requalify yesterday, he shifted to the KD side and posted up a 47/50, to tie Ben for the high score of the weekend. They now jointly hold the high score for this range, so of course there will have to be a shoot-off at some point. :~
That might just be possible: After discussion with the range master, we now have single day KD events on the calendar here for August 31 and November 30. We still have to work our course of fire, but the first is likely to be 'straight KD' - instruction in the AM, followed by sighters and KD AQTs. For the second, we may follow up on the local interest in trying some more 'unknown distance' shooting - in other words, exercising our range determination skills. That could be interesting... :---
Pix were a little scarce this weekend, but I'll get some up in a couple of days.
A morning full of potential.
Awesome shoot! Thanks to everyone who stepped out and made history this glorious weekend! O0
Melissa
One more picture. It was so pretty Sunday morning I snapped a couple on autopilot, but unfortunately once the instruction started I was too busy to think about photography.
Speaking of instruction, I don't think I got a chance to thank everybody but the instructors were all great. It's really nice having a bunch of them around - just as an example my sitting position got cleaned up tremendously by three different instructors who each improved some little detail. It adds up.
What a wonderful weekend! We had a great group of enthusiastic shooters and surprisingly beautiful weather. Thanks again to all who came out and joined us. Hope you like the pictures!
Ducky's photos came out better than ours, but here's a few more:
A bit of nature's eye candy welcomed up to the Metcalf 200 yard range:
(https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-KG8D8ARiw6o/UWTe_UnTlvI/AAAAAAAAEfM/UAmFAt4n_Co/s640/100_1791.JPG)
Ken shot his score, and later on stepped up to take an Orange Hat! ^:)^
(https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-A3f02n8znx0/UWTe5xzTr7I/AAAAAAAAEek/GIB2htBeOJs/s640/100_1780.JPG)
Ben collects his well-earned Long Distance rocker.
(https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-m4SCw9v2prI/UWTe6pCSnDI/AAAAAAAAEes/qJMi5R1MSC4/s640/100_1782.JPG)
Doug makes it a tie score!
(https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-F_GH2LuwvZU/UWTfFxcdmNI/AAAAAAAAEfk/USBrNKhiDgE/s640/100_1794.JPG)
Pick up the mats...
(https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-88AKLtYgNus/UWTfLZmKzyI/AAAAAAAAEfs/przRwOk5Et4/s640/100_1795.JPG)
...and sweep up the brass, the party's over! But we'll be back!
(https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-3bukTw9rowE/UWTfSv0xkHI/AAAAAAAAEf0/D1pF08s7z6A/s640/100_1796.JPG)
There are a few more pix in the album (https://picasaweb.google.com/114208333789247233986/SanJose313?gsessionid=PbXDJfrQ-8qJC2vlHsajXg#).