|
|
Area 2/Rio Salado Desert Classic 2007 Phoenix/USA
06.11.2007:
Thank god I did arrive without any
problems in the currently warmest place in the whole U.S., we have around sunny
28°C, cloudless here in Phoenix. That opens up good conditions for tonight's tuesday steel
match at the Rio Salado range, where the Area2 Championship will be held from
friday on. Tomorrow there will be another small club shoot at the
Scottsdale Gun Club, I will be attending that as well. OK, suntanning and then off to the range see what's happening...
Just being back from the range. Nice four stages built into half existing stages of
the coming Area2 match. But they had nothing to do with the coming courses of fire. Only square plates, big and small, and two
round ones where used. I had two unusual jams in the beginning that pretty much put me out of the
race straight from the beginning.
I used a mag I stepped on at the match in Düsseldorf/Germany, maybe something
isn't alined up with it anymore. With the other mags I had no more problems. That's another thing
this match was good for: that not to happen in the coming match besides that it was
real fun!
07.11.2007:
It was a nice club shoot at the Scottsdale Gun Club. Basic stages, built with
the metric target with the head box. You got to get used to them in the first place, some required head box shots at
15m
were not easy to perform since you couldn't call these shots. A typical matter of practice. Being back at home I am going
to practice more basics and precision again. Two field courses, one medium and one speed shot, that being a USPSA Classifier
stage rounded up the evening. In the end I ended up with two mikes. Friendly people and a gun store with so many firearms,
even with semi and full auto rifles for law enforcement, that I have never seen in that quantity at one place. Results to be found
on the web site of the Club, see above. Tomorrow registration for the Area2 is on the way.
08.11.2007:
Registered to the match today and had a look at some of the
stages, and met some well known faces. The courses of fire look
very challenging. I am in squad one, together with Saul Kirsch. We are going to start tomorrow at 7a.m., so I have to get up
early. The heat on the range this afternoon was incredible, around 32°C, in the sun it might be more. But it's
forecasted to cool
down a little in the coming days, we'll see...
09.11.2007:
We started early this morning at 7a.m. The first stage was a 32rd. field course with a - to us Europeans -
strange starting position. You first had to stab a target with a plastic knife, retrieve your gun and shoot
the sequence. Some windows apeared, in the end you had approx. 3m high platform, from which you had to
shoot 4 more targets on the ground. This part with running up the stairs was fun to
perform.
The next stage was another wall stage with different openings, the start position with your palms on a car hood.
The tricky thing about this, as before on the first stage was, from which opening to shoot what target, since they appeared
more than once.
You had to memorize them perfectly. the Third stage had a small car which should represent a starship to be the center part of the stage. You'd seat
in it, pushing it from left to right or vice versa with your feet. Two Texas Stars were part of the course, I had
a couple of extra shots on them, since I didn't practice them well, at least didn't pactice them at all...
The fourth and last stage today was another field course, starting seated in a Helicopter, then shoot targets
left and right along the way, move through a car, step out again and there were another 8 targets and two steel,
one to release a bobbing target. That stage was most fun today, although I did shoot a noshoot there and lost a second damnit...
Tomorrow we start late and end up in the evening...stay tuned
btw all the stages got the names
from a feature movie, like "Escape from New York" (Snake Plissken..),
"Mad Max 3" (Bartertown..) or the "the Godfather", another
issue for us Euros (Germany in specific) pretty "political uncorrect"
thing, but I DIG it....!!
10.11.2007:
The first stage today was a pretty much forward jungle lane with this time the classic target.
I did that very well. After that, a break was on schedule to be spent in the vendor's tent.
The next stage after lunch was "the Godfather", a nicely built stage with 14 rounds, two steel
and a bobbing target. You had to surely hit both steel perfectly to make sure the
option target, with appeared
to be 1m from the shooter fit in perfectly before engaging the bobbing target at around 18m.
"Pulp Fiction" was a 9 rd. speed shoot, start positon eating a burger, then engage two steel and three targets,
one of them to be released with the first popper. That target was disappeared, came out and stayed. So you could
shoot all targets before that one.
"The Untouchables" had another starting position from a scene out of the famous movie. You had to hold a
baby carriage, after the start you retrieve the baby (toy...) and engage the first three targets with
the strong hand. Then you placed the baby down on a table and continued free style. OK, not very much
polical correct, but we're here in the U.S., and you have to consider a different
rule in general. The last stage for today was "Mad Max", another jungle run stage. Starting in a car, retrieve gun 3m away, and
off you'd go. A very nicely built course, but when I ran through it, the sprayed dust from the hitting bullets
were severe, I was glad I had a red dot for engaging some on the other targets.
I had a pretty good day, Saul is in the lead by about 60 points, he's shooting a very consistent match, I'm in second
with about 25 points on the other guys in our squad.
Tomorrow we have got two more stages, again start early...
11.11.2007:
Well, the match is over. For me it was a blast und so much fun. I'd manage a second place
in Open Division behind Saul Kirsch with a margin of 6,5 Match%. I shot two solid stages
today, and after yesterday I am pretty happy. The pricetable was huge, so many items you'd
rarely see somewhere else. I won a Springfield XD pistol, and I think everybody walked away with a worthy
price.
In Limited, Henning Wallgren won over Taran Butler. For full results go to
the Match webpage.
Tomorrow I am on the way back to Germany.
Thanks for reading!! Chris
|
