Bonfield,IL Oct 14-15, 2023

[Geek]

It was a great weekend for Illinois patriots.   We had another sold out event at the ISRA Range.  It was refreshing to see that cooler weather, misting rain, and an eclipse did not deter this group.  After our welcome and safety brief, rifles were brought to the line and Redcoat targets posted.  The results showed we had some room for improvement.  Most of the group identified as beginners.  They did not have many bad habits and that was good news.

We worked through the day with instruction on steady hold factors for prone, sitting, and standing positions.  The six steps of firing the shot with NPOA, the secret sauce for rifleman, were explained and demonstrated.  We did some drills to reinforce the material presented.  Once groups started to shrink, we covered IMC and started making sight adjustments to put POA and POI in the same spot.  Some history you don't hear in school was presented about the events on April 19, 1775.  Some more drills followed with a practice AQT.  At the end of the day, our final redcoat target was posted with significant improvements.  We went from 0 on the 400 yd target and 1 hitting the shingle to 4 on 400 and 4 connecting with the shingle.  2 cleared the redcoat.  What a great conclusion to our first day.  We missed the eclipse as the cloud cover did not clear until the end of the day.

Day 2 started with a gullible guy called Geek working as SBiT.  The weather was a little less cold and not as wet.  We covered the safety rules, making the rifle safe, and ammo malfunctions as a refresher before bringing rifles to the line and posting the first redcoat.  The results were encouraging as we had 2 hit the 400 yd target and 3 hit the shingle.  We still had room to improve.  This was a good start.  After reviewing SHF, NPOA, and the six steps to firing the shot, we verified the cleaning overnight did not change our POI.  A couple folks changed gear on us too.  So, IMC was reviewed and adjustments made.  We shot an AQT and realized we needed to do more work on time management for the transition stages.  During lunch we had a conversation about taking the skills learned at 25M and applying them to full distance.  We heard more history about ordinary people that took extraordinary actions on April 19, 1775.  The time was upon us to see if it all came together on some AQTs.  Scores were very pleasing.  Everyone improved.  We had a new rifleman amongst us and his score confirmed it on the second AQT as well.  Matt, AGT, scored a 213 followed by 210.  He has been working hard since his first event back in July.  We attempted a fun shoot with a Brown Bess.  The failure to ignite accented the fact it is a primitive firearm.  We posted our final red coat for the weekend.  Results were awesome.  We ended with everyone getting all three rounds into one of the four silhouettes.  2 on the 400 and 7 hit the shingle.  2 cleared it.  What a tremendous way to end our weekend. 

In closing the weekend, youth patches were awarded to Rachel, Anna, and Tiger.  Matt got his hard earned Rifleman patch and volunteered to take an orange hat.  I want to thank those that brought friends and family to this event.  Steve, Joe, Justin, and Chris, you are our best volunteers.  I also want to acknowledge Matt and Terry as perennial/serial attendees.  Seeing you at events is always a pleasure.  To our new shooters, Joe, Anna, Jacob, Rick, Tiger, and Tom, a rifleman persists.  I saw great improvement in all of your targets through the weekend.  Keep practicing and use dry-fire until you can come back.

A special thanks to the Illinois State Rifle Association Range for hosting another sold out event for us.  They are great folks. To the instructor cadre of Pookie, ChuckA, Warriorpoet, tbone4, and ITB, we know how to have fun and share our passion for liberty. 

The only picture I managed to take was from Friday night's setup.   It was a bit soggy.  Things were not this wet when we started on Saturday.

[ChuckA]

Thanks All for a great weekend: the out-of-staters, shooters, and IITS.

Congrats to our new rifleman, and Orange hat!

It was great to get to get back at it, hear some new ways of sharing the history/heritage, and keep us IL orange hats moving forward. Im looking forward to when we have our team fully staffed again.

I think the line that stuck with me the most this weekend came from Geek: "Heritage is history that matters to you."

Hope to see everyone on the line again soon.

Edit: Huzzah! after several attempts i can finally post.

[Paladin223]

Thanks to ISRA for their support of the Appleseed program.  And a special shout out to the instructors who took time out their lives to provide a weekend of history and marksmanship training.

It's always great to the young folks who come out to learn more of our nation's history and learn a strong foundation in their marksmanship training. A nod to one of these young patriots, Rachel who made tremendous progress with borrowed rifle that she wasn't familiar with.

Congrats to Matt for earning his patch and stepping forward on the instructor journey.

Also, a big salute goes out to this group of patriots who came out this weekend to celebrate the freedoms we have in this country.

[ITB]

Thanks to all of the shooters who came out to hear our message of heritage and history.  Saturday was a pretty miserable day, so that's a testament to your grit.  It was breezy, cold and rainy, but attitudes stayed positive and the shooters kept plugging along.  Mother did not cooperate, and we suffered the additional extra chill of the annular eclipse, while clouds prevented us from observing it.  The Shoot Boss had even brought eclipse glasses!    

And thanks to the instructor crew - Pookie, ChuckA, WarriorPoet and tbone4.  You guys made my (and Geek's) job easy.  And congratulations to Geek for successfully completing his SBIT2.  Jay, I look forward to seeing you in a Green Hat soon.

Congratulations and Welcome Aboard to Matt, AGT, our newest Orange Hat!  Thank you for stepping up to help our mission.

Here are some more pics I took over the weekend...

WarriorPoet teaching 6 steps


Geek welcoming folks back Sunday morning


ChuckA teaching prone


Geek reviewing cross-legged


Pookie teaching standing


Matt receiving the Rifleman Patch


Our newest Orange Hat, AGT.  Huzzah!


Geek and our youth shooters with their Diamond patches


Geek wrapping it up after the Sunday afternoon Red Coat


A beautiful end to a beautiful weekend