20 shooters, 7 in Unlimited class, 13 in Hunter.
Everybody I spoke with had a great time.
This was the first "regular" field target match held at PRGC in many years. By "regular" ft match it was a 10-55 yard, sub 20fpe, AAFTA style match. But held at night, in the dark, with lights illuminating the face of each target and also placed at the shooters stations. 10 lanes, 2 targets per lane, 2 shots per target, distances not given.
Shooters came from as far as New Mexico (Rex J.) and Utah (Justin J.). We also had some Tucson area shooters (Larry F., Steve Q, Franz D.) and Flagstaff (Steve M. and Martin M.) travel to attend the match.
Targets were the same S&S Targets that we use for the high power field target matches at this location. Of course reducers with much smaller kill zones were employed, and some new and interesting shaped kill zones made their way into the match this month (star and hearts for example).
Mike S. and Ben S. make and sell these targets and the sky's the limit when it comes to faceplate designs. I believe S&S Targets is a nod to their last names, but haven't confirmed that with them.
One competitor told me it was 91 degrees at match start time, but didn't feel that warm. I was told wind was nearly calm/still, which is a good thing, considering the course was rather difficult. Estimating the size of the couple of non-round kill zones, the course Troyer was a 33. And that isn't accounting for the match being held at night. The highest T was the 0.75" target at 30 yards on lane 5, for a T of 40. Lowest T was the 7/8" target at 18 yards on lane 2 for a T of 20.6.
Rex told me he really struggled with the far targets, scope image was clear, and he felt like good trigger releases, but missed. There are often very deceiving winds at PRGC, so perhaps there was downrange wind that couldn't be felt at the shooters stations.
Justin Jacobson of Utah Airguns and Shane Kellar of Element Optics shared a gun. They arrived with no dope, but sighted in and figured it out as they went along, with some help from Strelok. Impressive! Also impressive to note that they were shooting the .22/18.1grain pellets, a very unorthodox pellet for AAFTA type field target. As it was described to me, it was quite something to listen to them figure out dope as they went through the course, effectively working together and helping each other by extrapolating the trajectory as they noted impact points on the targets. Sounds like they make a great team during a match, and that seems to also be the case in their business ventures. Shane donated a bunch of Element Optics lanyards for participants, thanks Shane!
It was great to see Dan and Steeler F come out and play. They were using a 35 yd minimum parallax scope and I heard that their primary gun is all set up for RMAC and they didn't want to mess with any of the hard-earned settings prior to that big competition, so made do last night. Regardless of the equipment setbacks, looks like they had a good time.
We also had another father and son team, John and Andrew W. Glad to see these father/son combos coming to matches and enjoying field target as a family. I know I really have fun when I'm able to attend a match with my sons, and that sentiment seems to be shared.
Anthony T of Penchetta was 19/24 in the beginning, really lighting it up, but also experienced some sort of equipment difficulties at some point and that is reflected in his score. Tony is a past AZ State FT champion and can be quite tough to beat.
I was told that Mike S and Wayne R shot a good portion of the match accidentally using dope from the wrong gun! Mike was using dope from his ft pistol and Wayne was using dope from his springer. Seems like it didn't hurt Mike S's score nearly as bad as it did Wayne R. I've seen Wayne R shoot a perfect/clean match before, he's another one that can be serious competition (when he uses the dope for the correct gun
).
And it sounded like the dark got to Franz a bit, he commented that he fired 3 different times with the bolt open, something that he's never done during a daytime match.
Here's the box score...I included stats for the targets past 50 yards, and that 40 T target on Lane 5, which actually didn't seem to give shooters as much trouble as the 50+ yard targets. Interesting.
Thanks to Ben and the crew for setting up another great field target course for us! And as always, we appreciate Phoenix Rod and Gun for letting us enjoy their facility. Photo credit to Ben, Van, Larry, Rex. Thanks to Wayne M for keeping track of distances and kill zone sizes and shooting that my way for Troyer calculations.
(will use the next couple posts to share some of the great photos I was sent).
Everybody I spoke with had a great time.
This was the first "regular" field target match held at PRGC in many years. By "regular" ft match it was a 10-55 yard, sub 20fpe, AAFTA style match. But held at night, in the dark, with lights illuminating the face of each target and also placed at the shooters stations. 10 lanes, 2 targets per lane, 2 shots per target, distances not given.
Shooters came from as far as New Mexico (Rex J.) and Utah (Justin J.). We also had some Tucson area shooters (Larry F., Steve Q, Franz D.) and Flagstaff (Steve M. and Martin M.) travel to attend the match.
Targets were the same S&S Targets that we use for the high power field target matches at this location. Of course reducers with much smaller kill zones were employed, and some new and interesting shaped kill zones made their way into the match this month (star and hearts for example).
Mike S. and Ben S. make and sell these targets and the sky's the limit when it comes to faceplate designs. I believe S&S Targets is a nod to their last names, but haven't confirmed that with them.
One competitor told me it was 91 degrees at match start time, but didn't feel that warm. I was told wind was nearly calm/still, which is a good thing, considering the course was rather difficult. Estimating the size of the couple of non-round kill zones, the course Troyer was a 33. And that isn't accounting for the match being held at night. The highest T was the 0.75" target at 30 yards on lane 5, for a T of 40. Lowest T was the 7/8" target at 18 yards on lane 2 for a T of 20.6.
Rex told me he really struggled with the far targets, scope image was clear, and he felt like good trigger releases, but missed. There are often very deceiving winds at PRGC, so perhaps there was downrange wind that couldn't be felt at the shooters stations.
Justin Jacobson of Utah Airguns and Shane Kellar of Element Optics shared a gun. They arrived with no dope, but sighted in and figured it out as they went along, with some help from Strelok. Impressive! Also impressive to note that they were shooting the .22/18.1grain pellets, a very unorthodox pellet for AAFTA type field target. As it was described to me, it was quite something to listen to them figure out dope as they went through the course, effectively working together and helping each other by extrapolating the trajectory as they noted impact points on the targets. Sounds like they make a great team during a match, and that seems to also be the case in their business ventures. Shane donated a bunch of Element Optics lanyards for participants, thanks Shane!
It was great to see Dan and Steeler F come out and play. They were using a 35 yd minimum parallax scope and I heard that their primary gun is all set up for RMAC and they didn't want to mess with any of the hard-earned settings prior to that big competition, so made do last night. Regardless of the equipment setbacks, looks like they had a good time.
We also had another father and son team, John and Andrew W. Glad to see these father/son combos coming to matches and enjoying field target as a family. I know I really have fun when I'm able to attend a match with my sons, and that sentiment seems to be shared.
Anthony T of Penchetta was 19/24 in the beginning, really lighting it up, but also experienced some sort of equipment difficulties at some point and that is reflected in his score. Tony is a past AZ State FT champion and can be quite tough to beat.
I was told that Mike S and Wayne R shot a good portion of the match accidentally using dope from the wrong gun! Mike was using dope from his ft pistol and Wayne was using dope from his springer. Seems like it didn't hurt Mike S's score nearly as bad as it did Wayne R. I've seen Wayne R shoot a perfect/clean match before, he's another one that can be serious competition (when he uses the dope for the correct gun
).And it sounded like the dark got to Franz a bit, he commented that he fired 3 different times with the bolt open, something that he's never done during a daytime match.
Here's the box score...I included stats for the targets past 50 yards, and that 40 T target on Lane 5, which actually didn't seem to give shooters as much trouble as the 50+ yard targets. Interesting.
Thanks to Ben and the crew for setting up another great field target course for us! And as always, we appreciate Phoenix Rod and Gun for letting us enjoy their facility. Photo credit to Ben, Van, Larry, Rex. Thanks to Wayne M for keeping track of distances and kill zone sizes and shooting that my way for Troyer calculations.
(will use the next couple posts to share some of the great photos I was sent).
