Project Appleseed

With summer in full swing, we kicked off another great event at Skyline Hunting and Fishing Club! We greatly appreciate the support of SHFC in hosting our events.
We've had a welcome break from all the rain and now summer is here and it is hot!

On day 1, we started to see groups shrink quickly as everyone practiced their sling use, prone positioning, 6 steps of firing the shot and natural point of aim.

We heard riveting recounts of the events of April 19th, 1775 over lunch and got a very special treat at this event. Dave and Zakai, two members of our local Living History Days cadre came to the event dressed in full period garb! They told us about life in 1775 in the colonies and taught us about their garb and equipment. What a great visual for all our stories. I think everyone learned a lot. Thanks to you both for coming out and teaching us, it was a pleasure to have you. Living History Days will be having an event September 22-23, 2023 at the Red Rocks Baptist Church in Morrison, CO where you can get an even bigger glimpse into what colonial life was like. I'll certainly be checking that out!
We got back into shooting after lunch and quickly worked through sight adjustments, the sitting and kneeling positions, transitions, and the standing position. Everyone was feeling good so we dove right into the first AQT of the weekend! At the conclusion of that, three rifleman emerged! Keith, Darren and Luke demonstrated they were men that know very well what they are about, starting strong and qualifying on the first AQT of the weekend! Great work guys. With several others knocking on the door, we ended day 1 hot and tired, but looking forward to starting day 2.

We returned to an even warmer morning on day 2, so everyone was eager to get shooting and beat the heat. After some morning review and sight adjustments, we dove back into AQT's. We shot a warmup AQT before lunch. During lunch we heard about some dangerous old men, and Dave and Zakai gave us a live demonstration of firing a flintlock musket and rifle! Another really great visual demonstration of what was being used on the battlefields of April 19th, 1775 and throughout the Revolutionary War.
After lunch, we went right back to AQT's and another rifleman emerged! Esteban showed us what he is all about, qualifying with a very solid score of 230! At that point, everyone felt like we needed a little change of pace, so we decided a game was in order. We posted a red coat, and everyone loaded 21 rounds. The course of fire was 5 shots in each silhouette and one in the shingle in 5 minutes. Points were assigned for hits, with more points for smaller targets (1 point for a 100 yard hit vs. 4 points for a 400 yard hit). Highest three scores would get a fabulous prize. After we scored targets, Esteban and Keith both cleared it with a maximum score of 55 points! We used hits in the circle of the silhouettes as a tie breaker with Esteban taking first place! Jared and Dave were the next highest scores, cleaning the silhouettes but just missing the shingle, with Jared having more hits in the circles, taking third!

We got back to AQTs and decided the rapid fire type was in order. Jared crushed it with a score of 233, making our fifth rifleman of the weekend! Great work!

Thanks to all of our participants for spending the weekend with us. It was a pleasure shooting with you all and we appreciate you all dealing with the heat, having really great, teachable attitudes and for really bringing a great vibe to this event. The marksmanship was top notch and I think everyone at this event has a very solid understanding of the fundamentals of marksmanship.

Many thanks to our team of instructors: Zuke, flux, bravhrt, codefogey and maxwell.hau5.caffy for making this event happen. It was a great weekend!

Feel free to post any pictures you took in this thread!

Thanks to everyone for coming out for this event!

The riflemen!

Our fabulous history re-enactors.

More photos!

Action shots

Thank you so much for running a phenomenal course, Lead Sled!

I think I mentioned it to you once or twice, but I want to say it to everyone else, too. This instructor team was one of the best I've ever seen in terms of knowledge, patience, kindness, teaching ability, passion for the subject, and teamwork. I've taken over 600 hours of commercial firearms training and rarely have I seen professionals who were as professional as this team of volunteers. I was absolutely blown away and will be recommending your Appleseed team to everyone.

Much gratitude to Skyline HFC for the use of their excellent facility and kudos to our all our shooters, particularly the five who earned the coveted Rifleman patch!

During registration on Saturday morning, well before rifles were brought to the line, the anticipation and focus glinting in the eyes of the shooters told me that this was destined to be a fantastic shoot! It was a pleasure to coach this group, which included three sets of father/son shooters, and spanned over 60 years in age differential from youngest to oldest.

Tickets are still available for the Pistol Clinic at Ben Lomond GC in Ramah, as well as 25m rifle shoots at Pikes Peak GC, Boulder Rifle Club, and Skyline HFC.
Here's the link to upcoming events: https://appleseedinfo.org/schedule/?qstate=CO&state=Colorado