We had the second ever Appleseed 25 meter event at the great Butte Gun Club! Thank you Mike Johnson from the club for making it happen. Thanks again to our orange hat Rick D for the super effort in arranging this! Thank you EERT for traveling so far to help out. Your experience, knowledge and camaraderie was greatly appreciated.
The weekend was HOT, thank everyone who brought the sun shades, we wouldn't have made it without them. Despite the heat everyone hung in there and the attitudes never soured.
Congratulations to Steve and Tony, our new Riflemen! It is rare when an individual makes Rifleman their first Appleseed. You obviously had some good habits before your arrived.
The Howard gang was great entertainment, as usual. Young Jacob and Genno are off to a great start towards becoming Riflemen and better Americans.
I hope to see you all again next year, if not in Missoula for the December Winterseed, and maybe the Known Distant shoot!
Don't forget your dry fire practice at home, its a great way to progress and not learn what you've been taught. A few of you were a shot or two from earning your patch, don't lose that edge!
Slainte
(Dolan)
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First off, congrats to the new Rifleman. Since both of you scored additional RM after your initial 210, you missed the North Bridge baptism. Huzzah!
It was enjoyable for me to share an Appleseed experience at a new range and meet some new friends. Your range appears to have some awesome rifle opportunities, and I want to come back for trigger time of my own!
I saw some great improvement in trigger control over the weekend. There was virtually no "happy finger" by the Sunday AQT session. I was also impressed by the "calling the shot" exercise portion of the Ball and Dummy drill. Calling the Shot is rarely taught and enforced anymore, but it is a key to self-improvement, and not only in the shooting disciplines!
Some of you may be asking "what should I do now?" The document the Shoot Boss sent out last night titled "Peter's Brief Guide to Dry Fire Practice" has everything you need to keep going down the Appleseed Marksmanship Trail. If your shots in Stage 4 aren't mostly in the black (4 and 5's), I recommend starting with prone dryfire to fully develop your NPOA skills. After that, take a look at your Stage 2 and 3 targets. Did you get all 10 rounds fired? If not, work on these stages dry with a timer to get into position, mag inserted and rifle charged, npoa acquired, etc. You can "dry" building your mag nest, benchmarking your npoa position, along with your mag changes. Practicing these skills dry under time pressure you enable you to get used to the pressure of these faster stages and get all your shots off with NPOA intact. Refer to the Appleseed Guidebook before your practice sessions to make sure you haven't forgot something!
Another item to add into dry fire is calling your shots. If you are calling your dry fire shots correctly, you will be able to ascertain whether your sights are in the black when you break the trigger. When you think you have Stage 1 accounted for, hit me up and I'll share another standing dry drill that will develop some speed for deer and grouse hunting. I just love grouse breast wrapped in bacon, covered in foil, and cooked along the edge of the campfire coals.
Feel free to contact me with a PM on this forum if you have any questions.
I hope to see some of you at the Missoula Winterseed! Huzzah!