By Bill Corcoran
Regional matches are NRA Highpower matches meant to bring the best shooters in neighboring states together for friendly competition. Each state usually holds one, and a special pin celebrating the event is provided to decorate hats or shooting bags. This year’s Missouri Regional at the Bucksnort range near Marshall, Missouri saw 56 shooters from Missouri, Arkansas, Kansas, and Illinois (and maybe another state or two) vie for the title of Regional Champion. The ironic conclusion is that nobody I talked to knows the gentleman who won! Obviously, he wasn’t from Missouri, Arkansas, or Kansas, because most of the shooters from these states know each other; and the Bucksnort range is not very good at disseminating match results—they usually come a month or two later in the mail—so it will be a while until we know.
The Osage Orange Sharpshooters were represented by 12 people: Mike Hawkins, Bob Weiss, Les Welch, Alex Belt, Ed Bowles, Pat Worley, Robert Head, Bob Ketel, and I shot on Saturday, and on Sunday Mike Thorn, Jerry Patten and Stand Dulin showed up for the team match while Mike Hawkins and Bob Weiss went home. That’s a great turnout considering that of the 56 shooters on the line Saturday, 9 of them were from our club—that’s the best representation of any club or organization at the event. On the other hand, I know there are another 10 or 12 people in the club that should be on the line shooting with us—I hope you will join us soon.
We spent Friday afternoon practicing at the various yardlines (200, 300, and 600), and even though the wind was gusty, it was warm and pleasant. Playing hooky from work seemed like the wisest choice a man could make.
Saturday, May 3, was a difficult day to shoot. A cold front had moved through, it was about 40 degrees at the start, and the wind was gusting to 25 miles an hour. This made the offhand stage very difficult early in the morning. By the middle of the afternoon we had worked our way back to the 600 yard line, the sun was out, and it was quite pleasant. Unfortunately, the wind still played havoc with bullets, and I was pleased to get off the line with a 191. Nobody else wanted to talk about their scores, and I think many of us wished we were shooting one of the hotter, sexier, 6mm rounds to hold a little bit tighter in the scoring rings. All in all, none of the Sharpshooters wanted to discuss scores, and most of us just wanted to forget the day. I believe Alex Belt finished with the best score of our group, a 758 out of 800.
Dinner that night was at the Barbecue joint (as it always is), an old house with the best barbecue on the planet. That made up for some of the day’s tribulations. On Friday night it had been very entertaining to see Bob Ketel try to put away a whole barbecued chicken, and on Saturday the waitress remembered him and asked did he want another. (He declined and went with the combination plate—two dead pigs and a goat, I think.)
Sunday is the day most of us look forward to at the Regional. The day begins with a 4-person team match were each member of the team fires the 50 shot National Match Course of standing, sitting, rapid prone and slow prone. This is exactly the same as our 50 shot Garand matches except there are no sighting shots, standing and sitting are shot at 200 yards, rapid prone is shot at 300 yards, and slow prone is shot at 600 yards. Alex Belt, Les Welch, Bob Ketel, and Mike Thorn shot as a team coaching themselves, and I coached a team of Stan Dulin, Jerry Patten, Robert Head, and Ed Bowles. We put Pat Worley on a team of crusty old veterans, and I’m sure both they and he learned a lot from the experience.
The team of Alex, Les, Bob, and Mike probably shot the better score, but nobody really cares (well, maybe they do). We all had a good time. My team had a good time too, and your humble President is actually the one who benefited the most. I got to spend about 4 hours coaching the shooters without worrying about myself. Watching the wind and analyzing the shooter’s actions allowed me to become much more focused on the mental aspects of shooting, because I didn’t have to worry about my own performance (since my team is very forgiving of bad coaching). And that was a good thing for me. I can only say ‘Thank You’ in very large letters, because it was one of the best experiences of my shooting life.
For both Robert Head and Ed Bowles, I made incorrect wind calls for their last shots at 600 yards, and this cost each shooter a couple of points. All they did was laugh, and I appreciate that. Reading the wind and analyzing the shooter’s shot execution is a difficult activity, and no one is born with the capability. One of these days I’ll learn it.
It takes some confidence and a desire to experiment to step outside the Dalton Range and go to the big game. As an example, Stan Dulin showed up Sunday and shot the AR-15 for the first time in his life. It was hard to know what to think for a while. Stan is quite an accomplished shotgun shooter, but in moving to the rifle he had to accommodate an eye that had gone essentially blind. So he elected to learn to shoot from the opposite side. In other words, he went from being a right handed shooter to a left handed one at age 68. Wow! Couple that with the fact that he tried the AR-15 for the first time, and you can imagine some of the problems we faced. Well, I’m here to tell you, Stan made it through, his score wasn’t the lowest I’ve seen shot at Bucksnort (in fact, I think I shot a lower score my first time there), and we all had a good time. As Stan told me, “Bill, you’re always saying you want people to come up here and try things for the first time, so I did.” I guess that says it all. I’m very happy that Stan had the guts to lay down on the line and shoot an unfamiliar firearm at an unfathomable distance trusting only in his coach to keep him on target. That takes a tremendous amount of faith, perseverance and focus. I hope others in the club can follow in Stan’s footsteps.
After the team match, we squadded for a CMP Excellence in Competition (EIC) match, also known as a leg match, to compete for points towards the Distinguished Rifleman’s Badge. The fates smiled on us, because by Sunday afternoon it was warm, sunny, and almost without wind—in other words, a perfect day for shooting. Leg points are given out based on the number of non-distinguished shooters in the match. If 15 or fewer people participate, one 6-point leg is awarded. If 16-25 people shoot, a 6-point and an 8-point leg are given, and if more than that shoot we can have a 10-point leg along with the other two (6 and 8 point) legs. Jerry Patten and Stan Dulin had not planned on shooting the leg match, but they hung around just in case another shooter was needed. Two years ago Jerry did the same thing, becoming the 16th shooter in the match, and I won the 6-point leg to finish my Distinguished Badge (it takes 30 points). In other words, I owe my badge to Jerry. And Sunday, he and Stan were ready to do the same thing. Well, they didn’t need to. Even though we were once again on the cusp, with 15 non-distinguished shooters, we managed to press-gang the father of one of the junior shooters into participating, and that made enough shooters to qualify the match for awarding both a 6-point and an 8-point leg.
This match started at the 600 yard line, since the team match had finished there and we were all ready to shoot. Alex Belt and Les Welch both shot good enough scores there (187 and190), and we headed to the 200 yard line for standing and sitting. Both Alex and Les shot well enough offhand (91 and 92, respectively), but in the sitting stage Alex shot a 96 and Les a 92. By the time we got back to the 300 yard line for the rapid prone stage, it was 5pm, there were shadows on some targets, and the sun was glaring into our eyes from the side—this made shooting very difficult and some of the scores showed it. When the smoke had cleared, Alex Belt held on to shoot a 470 and win the 8-point leg. Kent Finley, from Centralia Missouri, won the 6-point leg with a 468 shooting an M1A. Les Welch was just a hair behind with a 465 (we call it, ‘First Leather’). In situations like this, I always wonder, ‘wouldn’t it be nice if another 10 Osage Orange Sharpshooters were here and we could award 3 legs?’ I’d like to see more of us attend the leg matches because your attendance will help your team mates achieve their goals. And by the way, if you weren’t there, you missed seeing me shoot a personal best, 488-14x to win the match.
So let’s review—about 21 shooters competed, and there are three awards in the match (winner, first leg, second leg). Your Osage Orange Sharpshooters took two out of three of these prizes, and we came within a whisker of sweeping it clean! Folks, that’s good, that’s real good.
The Missouri Highpower Championship will be held at the Bucksnort range on Saturday June 7. It is an 88 shot match (80 shots for record and 8 sighters). Pre-registration is highly advised. On Sunday, June 8 there will be another team match and you are requested to attend (that means you too Stan Dulin). There is no leg match this time. I look forward to seeing you there.
–Bill