Gun Nuts Media

From Gun Nuts: The Next Generation

Outgoing president John Seigler is the keynote speaker. He just said that if we(NRA) had 20 million members, we’d be able to elect whomever we wanted.

He just metioned the Park Carry bill, which he followed with a mention of how Obama is still coming after our rights given the opportunity.

He is now talking about how NRA is sanctioning 3-gun matches and 50 cal matches.

Now he is talking about the incoming president of NRA gettig into the shooting sports.

NRA members raised 120 million dollars for shooting sports. Larry Potterfield donated 1 million dollars to NRA’s shooting programs.

John closed with a reminder that we to be diligent to defend our rights.

Well, that is all she wrote, folks.  The main event at Bianchi Cup has wrapped up, and here are your winners:

Open Division: Bruce Piatt

Metallic Division: Robbie Leatham

Production Division: Dave Sevigny

I ended up 17th in production division, so yay for a top 20 finish; and I also finished 3rd in the Speed Star Match.  The Speed Star Match is a sanctioned event that runs concurrently to the main Bianchi Cup, and caters more to “going fast”.  I managed to shoot it clean and fast enough to earn third place in Production, so I’ll come home with a decent plaque for the wall.

I’ll have a more detailed post up on the Bianchi experience when I get back – I have over 400 photos to process when I get home and a ton of notes to go through.  I will say this though – this has been an absolutely tremendous experience for me, and I can’t wait to come back next year.

I’ll be live on NRA News with Cam Edwards tonight at 9:20 eastern time. We will be talking about Bianchi Cup and a newcomer’s perspective on the event.

Unless something crazy happens, it looks like Dave Sevigny is going to win Production Division. He is the only production shooter over 1800, and should take the event. There are a few shooters left to go, but it would require near perfect scores to pass Dave.

I just got done talking to last year’s Metallic Champ, Robb Vadasz, and he let me know that Robbie Leatham just wrapped up the metallic division with a score of 1909. Robert V. came in second with a 1907, and assuming he cleans the plates, Phil Strader will take 3rd.

Today is the last day of shooting for guys like me at Bianchi Cup. Despite the stress of the match, I’ve had a great time shooting, and would be remiss if I didn’t thank Tom Hughes for giving me the opportunity to shoot this match.

My last event is the steel plates. In practice, I’ve shot these better than any other event, but I’ve also been. Inconsistent with my performance. I have a tendency to get in front of a plate rack abd I want to burn it down as fast as possible. Here at the Cup, I have all the time in the world to shoot the plates, so I need to slow down and focus on getting clean hits. I would like to be able to shoot clean at 10 and 15 yards, and keep the plates dropped at 20 and 25 to a minimum. The big danger about the plates is that there is no 8-ring to salvage points for a bad shot.

Also, I should be appearing on NRA News with Cam Edwards tonight. I’m not 100 sure what time, but I’ll post or twitter the time as soon as I know. You can listen to NRA News at NRAnews.com or on Sirius radio on the Patriot channel. Don’t miss it!

Here are a couple of quick snaps from Day 3 at Bianchi Cup. Here is the actual stage of history…the (in)famous mover.

From Bianchi Cup 2009

You know, one of the concerns/reasons I’m here is to help drive awareness of Bianchi Cup in younger people who may or may not be interested in the shooting sports. With that in mind, it’s rewarding for me to see young shooters here, like this competitor running a gun in Open Divisions.

From Bianchi Cup 2009

Additionally, women shooters are well represented at Bianchi Cup. You see a lot of ladies shooting this event, and not just the “big names” like Julie G. To my detriment, I don’t remember this shooter’s name, however she’s got that open gun pinned up against that barricade like a champ.

From Bianchi Cup 2009

For people who follow the shooting sports, this is a pretty crazy experience. I caught a picture of Bruce Piatt getting ready to shoot the barricade, just hanging out.

From Bianchi Cup 2009

Tomorrow is my last event of the match. I’m not in contention to win Production division, but I honestly never expected to be. My goal for this was to shoot to the best of my ability, and I feel like I’m doing a decent job at that. I’m not too happy with my performance on the Practical or the Barricade, but I’m very pleased with my performance on the Mover today, where I shot a 408. I shot the 10 yard stage clean (as you can see here, and managed to not make a total fool of myself on the 20 and 25 yard stages. My goal is to shoot about a 1500 overal – based on my current score I need to get 39 out of 48 plates tomorrow to hit my goal. If I really channel my inner Todd Jarrett, I’d like to get 44 plates, but the odds of that are not good.

We’ll see how tomorrow goes – hopefully I’ll be able to report good news!