Eureka, CA June 23-24

[Freeman]

Appleseed has another fantastic weekend in Eureka. Though we had some battles with Redcoat mosquitoes in the mornings, one could hardly find a better place to spend the weekend. The folks at the range treated us exceptionally well and each shooter, to a person, improved a remarkable amount.



The weekend's award for tenacity definitely goes to Ruth. Ruth battled initially with her new scope, but persevered and ended the weekend with some very respectable groups. She will no doubt have a Rifleman's patch in her future.



Wayne left the weekend having shot one of the most beautiful groups I have seen in a long time. He came as close to sending three shots through the same hole as you can get. Excellent shooting!



Janet did some beautiful shooting herself, having shot the best 2nd stage AQT score of the weekend.



Alan started off the weekend with exceptional shooting and improved along the way. Having come so close, there is no doubt in my mind that Alan will be coming home with a Rifleman's patch the next time around.


For those wanting the AR-style sights for their Rugers: http://www.tech-sights.com/ruger3.htm

[Aardwolf]

It would have been nice to see a bigger turnout this time around but I have to admit getting more one-on-one instruction was really nice. Over last year I saw my groups shrink by about half and they became much more consistent. My average AQT score last time was at the low end of marksman, this time around it was at the low end of sharpshooter with much better groups.

I do still need to work on calling my shots and following through on the trigger.

Thank you, Freeman!

[Aardwolf]

This article originally appeared in two parts in The Redwood Stumper (August & September 2012), the newsletter of Redwood Gun Club in Manila, Ca.

Project Appleseed Returns to Redwood Gun Club

June 23rd and 24th marked the return of California's northernmost Project Appleseed Rifle Clinic. Project Appleseed is presented by volunteers from the Revolutionary War Veterans Association (RWVA) based out of North Carolina. Its purpose is to teach the fundamentals of rifle marksmanship from prone, sitting and standing positions and the history of the events of April 19, 1775, including the Battles of Lexington and Concord and the retreat by the British to Boston. In California alone, RWVA has 89 Appleseeds scheduled in 2012. We're very lucky that two of those are right here at our club.

RWVA tries to accommodate as many ranges as possible so it is usually shot on a 25 meter range. Targets are scaled down and the contrast is reduced to simulate longer distances. At our club that means the firing line is down range on the 100 yard range. For this reason on Appleseed weekends both the 100 yard and 200 yard ranges are closed.

Our Small Band
While previous Appleseeds have been quite full, due to relatively short notice, school having just let out, the promise of rain or some combination thereof, this one was much smaller with only five slots filled when pre-registration closed. And I knew one of those would be a no show ahead of time as my wife had just come down with the cold I thankfully (?) had (mostly) beaten the previous week.

Wayne and Janet were veterans of two previous Appleseeds and I of one. Ruth, a relatively new shooter, was attending for the first time. Our sole Instructor and Shoot  Boss was Chris "Freeman" Bradley who drove up from the bay area for the weekend. Though the turnout was more modest than previous Appleseeds and despite being vastly outnumbered by the mosquitos, everyone was as enthusiastic as always. It's amazing what an ice breaker sharing insect repellent can be.

After check-in Chris gave us a safety briefing that covered range commands and procedures and making your rifle safe the Appleseed way: Mag out, bolt back, safety on, flag in, rifle grounded, step back.

Posterity! You will never know how much it cost the present Generation to preserve your Freedom! I hope you will make good use of it. If you do not, I shall repent in Heaven, that I ever took half the Pains to preserve it. -John Adams

After a couple of quotes from our founding fathers and a brief discussion we were ready for some shooting.

The Redcoats are Coming!
Each day of an Appleseed begins and ends with Redcoats to measure a shooter's starting skill level and progress. The target consists of four bell shaped silhouettes and a rectangle. The silhouettes represent a prone man and are at simulated 100, 200, 300 and 400 yard ranges. The rectangle represents the wood plank Revolutionary War Riflemen used to demonstrate a head shot at 250 yards. On the paper it is one inch high and ¾ inch wide and at 25 meters looks even smaller on top of the front sight! The course of fire is three shots at each silhouette and one for the "head shot" in sixty seconds. If you weren't counting that's thirteen rounds, one for each colony. The greatest range with three hits is your maximum effective range.

I began the weekend effective to 200 yards and ended the weekend effective to 400 yards with the bonus head shot, only dropping one shot on the 300 or it would have been clean!

Drill, Baby, Drill
After seeing where we all stood as shooters, Chris began the actual instruction with the use of a GI-style web sling, or as it said on the label, "SLING, SMALL ARMS." These slings are not available anywhere locally and are different from a regular hunting sling, so you'll need to order one from the Appleseed Store at least two weeks ahead of time. It took mine about ten days to arrive from Colorado. Using a bare rifle stock with swivels Chris demonstrated the use of the loop sling, hasty sling and hasty-hasty sling. Also, the proper way to control your rifle while getting into and out of the sling.

At last September's Appleseed I didn't take to the loop sling and did all of my shooting using the hasty sling. It just felt more stable to me. After occasionally shooting with the Smallbore Prone League on Tuesday afternoons this summer (and feeling a little out of place among all those purpose built single shot bolt guns with my AR-style M&P 15-22), I had begun to use the loop sling more. I've found while it still feels somewhat less stable, it is obviously more stable because I shoot better with it and I've even gotten used to it. I still prefer hasty for standing though.

Over the course of the day Chris demonstrated a position and then we practiced it by shooting 25 meter drill targets, five one inch black squares on a quarter inch grid field. He covered prone: on your elbows and belly; seated: taylor-fashion with legs crossed, ankles crossed or legs open with knees up; kneeling: on one knee; and standing. Some positions work better for some body types and levels of flexibility, particularly in the various seated positions. After we could shoot from the various positions, he covered safely transitioning from standing to prone and standing to seated.

As important as proper position is proper sight picture. Using a visual aid Chris explained sight pictures for notch and aperture iron sights and also scopes. Appleseed prefers to teach a sight picture that has the bull on top of the front sight, "pumpkin on a post," but when training military personnel they don't mind them using the military sight picture of the top of the front sight in the center of the bull.

Pop (Math) Quiz
Yep, there was geometry and some math, too. Not anything difficult but very important to know if you needed to adjust your sights. By this time most everyone was shooting good enough groups that it made sense to make some adjustments. Using one of the 25 meter drill targets as an example (that ¼ inch grid is there for a reason), Chris explained minute of angle (MOA) and converting that to inches and converting that to clicks on our sights. The short version: 360 degrees in a circle, 60 MOA in a degree, one MOA equals one inch at 100 yards/meters (close enough anyway), one inch equals one click, adjust for range as needed; i.e., ¼ inch equals one click at 25 meters. I've heard this explained several times before but Chris' explanation and examples were the best yet. The only thing missing were the rules of thumb for adjusting for wind. This wasn't included in my previous Appleseed either so it doesn't seem to be part of the curriculum.
Liberty Training Rifle

At this point it became apparent that not all equipment is created equal. I'm happy to report that my M&P 15-22 had no problems at either Appleseed. Others were not so lucky.

Appleseed will train you with whatever rifle you bring but over the years they have evolved something they call the Liberty Training Rifle (LTR). It is a Ruger 10/22 with quick detachable sling swivels installed, an extended magazine release and the factory sights replaced with Tech Sights M1/AR-style aperture sights for a longer sight radius, better sight picture and increased adjustability. An automatic bolt release is another popular upgrade for the LTR, especially for shooting prone. The .22 LR comes into its own when you see how much ammo you will go through in a weekend, five hundred rounds is common. What you save in centerfire ammo will put a good dent in paying for the rifle if you don't already have one.

Ruth's 10/22 was fine but the newish major brand-name scope did not want to sight in and seemed to have very inconsistent movement of point of impact per click. It finally did get sighted in and her groups improved considerably.

Wayne started with a borrowed tube fed .22 but the rapid loading and reloading simply works better with a magazine fed rifle. Chris loaned him an LTR and he shot one of the best groups of the weekend.

Janet started with her own 10/22 with factory sights and was having a lot of trouble seeing the rear sight. Chris loaned her his other LTR and her groups immediately shrank to half their previous size.

There are two parts to being a Rifle(wo)man and the rifle is one of them.

NPOA
When one holds a rifle it is naturally going to point at something; it might be the ground or the sky. If that rifle is set on a table it will point at the wall or perhaps down range at a target. If that rifle is picked up and then set back down on the table in exactly the same position it points to exactly the same spot on the target. That target is the rifle's natural point of aim (NPOA). The trick of course is doing that while holding the rifle and doing it again and again moving from target to target.

Appleseed teaches a series of steady hold factors that allow us to shoot accurately and to quickly repeat that accuracy. Unfortunately unlike the table in the example above (and possibly Paul's hypothetical exoskeletal Mutant Wasp Army from the last Stumper), people are flexible and squishy, not making for the best platform. So for us, the key is to build a stable shooting platform using our solid bones and rifle sling.

By using the steady hold factors you will be able to relax almost completely into your rifle and sling. Changing the NPOA is accomplished by leaving your support elbow planted and shifting your hips right and left or forward and back. I discovered that if my muscles were getting tired it meant I was doing it wrong. By being relaxed you will fall right back into your NPOA after absorbing recoil.

Good shooting is really pretty easy, most people with a little instruction and practice can shoot pretty well most of the time. Good marksmanship is learning to be lazy enough to shoot well every time, again and again.
Firing the Shot

Now that we're in position we can finally pull the trigger, right? Not so fast, Appleseed has several steps for that, too. Quickly, the six steps are: Sight alignment, sight picture, respiratory pause, focus on front sight and front sight on target, squeeze the trigger and follow through/call the shot. I have a little bit of trouble with follow through, a tendency to let off on the trigger too quickly but almost have that beat. The next challenge for me is calling my shot. I'm doing better but sometimes I'm still just plain wrong.

Also covered is shooting in rifleman's cadence, taking a respiratory pause at the bottom of each breath and firing a shot. This allows a steady rhythm of a shot about every three seconds.

The goal of the marksmanship portion of Project Appleseed is for a Rifleman to be able to consistently shoot 4 MOA groups out to 500 yards. By using a sling, applying the NPOA technique and a relaxed body you could be a Rifleman.

Quick 'n Dirty
This is why a lot of people come to an Appleseed, to take the Quick 'n Dirty Army Qualification Test (AQT). If you put together everything you've learned and shoot Expert on the AQT you will earn the coveted Rifleman patch and qualify to become an Appleseed Instructor in Training if you choose.

The AQT consists of four stages on the same bell shaped silhouettes from the Redcoat target scaled for range and reduced contrast (grayed out) to simulate the haze of distance. These have scoring zones though. All stages are timed and some include forced magazine changes, transitions from standing and NPOA shifts. Two stages are slow fire and two are rapid fire.

Stage 1 is shot standing at a simulated 100 yard target with ten rounds in 2 minutes.

Stage 2 is two 200 yard targets starting from standing and transitioning to seated or kneeling. Magazines are loaded with two rounds in one and eight in the other. Five rounds are fired at each target in 50 seconds.

Stage 3 starts standing and transitions to prone. Magazines are loaded as above, two and eight. The three 300 yard targets are shot three on the first and second silhouette and four on the third in 60 seconds. This is the stage I had the most trouble with. Even shooting in rifleman's cadence I wouldn't get off all my shots in the allotted time. Maybe I breathe too slow or take too long changing NPOA but I finally "cheated" and for every other respiratory pause I would take two shots.

Stage 4 starts out prone and gives you a full 5 minutes to put one ten round magazine into four 400 yard targets. Two rounds each on the first two targets and three each on the last two. You will want to make these count as they are worth double points. (The standard AQT calls for twenty rounds on this stage.)

There are 250 points possible and 210 or higher is required for an Expert or Rifleman qualification. (A little higher than the standard AQT because there are fewer rapid fire stages.) 170 for Sharpshooter and 125 for Marksman. Even qualifying at any of these levels is something to be proud of, it means you shoot better than most.

How did I do? Well, better than last time. At my first Appleseed I barely made Marksman most of the time but did have one AQT that was a point short of Sharpshooter. This time around I was solidly in the upper half of Marksman and hit Sharpshooter once. I still need more practice, I'm not a Rifleman yet.

Heritage
At Revolutionary War Veterans Association (RWVA) they say that people come to an Appleseed for the marksmanship but they stay for the history. The story of the events of April 19th, 1775 are told as an oral history in the tradition of the period. You will hear the stories of Paul Revere, Captain John Parker, Captain Isaac Davis, the probable spy, Margaret Kemble Gage, the "Dangerous Old Men," Hezekiah Wyman and Samuel Whittemore and the young woman Elizabeth Zane. You will hear of the Battles of Lexington and Concord and the retreat of the British regulars through Menotomy to Charleston.

"I ... ordered our Militia to meet on the Common in said Lexington to consult what to do, and concluded not to be discovered, nor meddle or make with said Regular Troops (if they should approach) unless they should insult or molest us; and, upon their sudden Approach, I immediately ordered our Militia to disperse, and not to fire:--Immediately said Troops made their appearance and rushed furiously, fired upon, and killed eight of our Party without receiving any Provocation therefor from us." -Captain John Parker

You will hear how the American militiamen defeated the the greatest army in the world because they possessed the marksmanship skill to use aimed fire to pick off the British officers and throw the Regulars into disarray.

The instructors are passionate about the men and the women and the children who fought and died for the liberties that we all enjoy today. When they tell the stories of the Three Strikes of the Match that marked the end of the American Revolution and the beginning of the Revolutionary War you can hear it in their voices -- and you will feel it, too.
Thanks

I would like to personally, and on behalf of everyone who has received instruction through Project Appleseed at Redwood Gun Club, thank the Club and the Board who bring Appleseed to our range. It is a minor hardship to the Club and its members for the 100 and 200 yard ranges to be closed for a full weekend but it is truly appreciated. I would also like to thank the Rangemasters who come out early and leave late on Appleseed weekends. Thank you to RWVA and Chris "Freeman" Bradley for making the drive up here and sharing his weekend with us to make us better marksmen.

The Author
Alan started shooting again last year after a 25 year break. Using iron sights he shot a clean Redcoat target and an Expert score on the AQT on August 5th at the Backwoods Home Appleseed in Brookings, Oregon and brought home a Rifleman patch.