Gun Nuts Media

My date with destiny has come and gone, and the mover is now past me, both literally and figuratively. If you’re wondering how I did, here’s my 10 yard mover target:

From Gun Nuts: The Next Generation

You’ll need to click it to get the full size, but that target would score at 120 points, with 11 “x’s”. Now, I didn’t do as well on the 15, 20, and 25 yard stages, but I did better than I thought I would, and just good enough to put me within striking distance of my goal of 1500 points.

Tomorrow I have my last event, the falling plates. In theory, the plates are my strongest event. I have the most amount of practice shooting plates, and it’s an environment where I tend to feel somewhat comfortable. My goal for the plates is to shoot a 380 or better – which would mean dropping a maximum of 2 plates per run. So far, the Para has been great – it is superbly accurate, and if I changed to front sight out for something designed for more “precision shooting” and less for run ‘n gun stuff, it would be an excellent gun for this game in Production Division.

The thing that I’ve learned about Bianchi is that accuracy is EVERYTHING. No one cares about how fast you are, because just about everyone can make the time limits here. Shooting IDPA or USPSA isn’t great practice for Bianchi…but shooting Bianchi will make you better at IDPA and USPSA.

I’m sitting by the mover watching people shoot it before my shoot time comes up. I shot the mover well this morning in practice, but my gun started acting up. So right now, I’m just hoping that the gun works right for the entire stage. It seems to be okay now, I stripped it down and cleaned it, and then it ran fine for a test magazine. The gun has worked flawlessly so far, and has been temendously accurate when I’ve done my part.

Hopefully, the hotel wifi will be working. This evening, and I’ll be able to get some pictures up.

(Note: hardcore gamers will get that)

Today, I shoot the mover. Unfortunately, I don’t shoot it until 4PM this afternoon, which gives me some time to kill. I’ve been breaking down the scores posted so far, and it seems that the best scores in Production are in the 430 range. My goal is to crack the 400 mark on the mover today, which would go a long way towards keeping me out of last place. Tomorrow I shoot the plates as my last event, which is good because in practice it’s been my strongest event.

This evening, I should have some pictures of today’s match action to show you, assuming that the hotel’s wifi is working by then.

Again, keep checking here to see the updates I’m posting on my twitter feed!

I mentioned yesterday that this whole thing was kind of like taking batting practice with the Boston Red Sox, right?  Well, to continue the analogy, today I actually stepped on to the field with the team and played in the shooting sports equivalent of the World Series.  That’s the neat thing about this game – there is so much history surrounding the sport.  I’m shooting the same courses of fire that they shot 30 years ago at the first Bianchi Cup.  There are shooters here that have been coming to this event for 20+ years, and to take part in and try to assimilate part of that culture is an intense experience for a new shooter.

On to the shooting though!  Today were my first two events, the Practical and the Barricade.  I thought the Barricade was my strongest event coming in to this, because it was the most similar to what I’d shot before IPSC and IDPA competition.  I ended up shooting about 10 points better on the Practical than I did on the barricade – shows what I know,  suppose.

As I’ve mentioned before, tomorrow I’m up to shoot the mover.  Right now, I’m on a pace to shoot about a 1500 for the match, which if my predictions hold true would put me about 300 points behind the eventual winner, but also not in last place.  Honestly, while I could be happier with my performance, I also understand that I need to set realistic expectations for myself – but even more than that, I need to have FUN.

And ultimately, that’s what I’m doing.  The people here are great, and NRA puts on a great event – I’m having fun at Bianchi Cup, and I’ll be back next year to do it again.

But I am certainly having fun.

From Gun Nuts: The Next Generation

Photo courtesy of the fine folks at NRABlog.com – seriously, they’re doing a great job of covering this event. Sure, you can read my twitter feed for live updates, but the NRA team is putting up useful and entertaining posts, not just “oh god I’m so scared of the mover”.

I am actually having a great time at this event – while Bianchi Cup isn’t necessarily “my game”, I’m learning about my actual skill set as a shooter and just how much actual practice I need if I want to be truly competitive at this game.

The following message is for my dad: Next year Dad, I want to “borrow” the custom Ruger for this match. It would be the bee’s knees.

And then there are guys like Dave Sevigny. I’m watching him shoot the Practical match right now as I blog this, and even though Bianchi isn’t his favorite game, it’s impressive to watch him shoot. I’m scheduled to shoot the Practical in about an hour, so watching these guys shoot is definitely a good idea.

In unrelated news, I can’t belive that my crackberry gets high speed data out here.

“Too many mind.  Mind the crowd, mind the sword, mind the other man…too many minds.  Have no mind.”

The above quote is badly butchered from The Last Samurai, where one of the characters tries to explain a zen concept to Tom Cruise’s character.  The idea behind the quote is that with much practice and repetition, you should not consciously “think” when you’re performing your action.  The action should simply happen, because it’s what your body knows to do in that situation.  “No mind” shooting is the ultimate form of competitive shooting – the gun comes out of the holster, goes to the target, and you simply shoot without thinking about it.

Of course, achieving this state of zen is a lot more difficult than it seems – it does take constant practice and training to be able to achieve this.  I’ve only done it a couple of times that I can recall, and each time it was some of the best shooting I’d ever done.

To paraphrase the no mind concept in the words of Mrs. Ahab: “Relax, and shoot ’em in the middle.” It is both that simple and not that simple at the same time.

Yesterday was my first full day at Bianchi Cup, and it was kind of an intense experience.  As I said on my brief appearance on last night’s Gun Nuts Radio the experience is rather unusual for most sports fans.  I’ve been reading about and watching Bianchi Cup since I was17 or 18, and then yesterday I was actually at the practice range shooting it.

Imagine if you will that you’re a baseball fan, and you’ve watched a certain team most of your life, then one day you’re not just watching that team, you’re taking batting practice with them.  It’s kind of like that, actually.

What’s impressed me  the most about all of this though is the community feeling that  this event has.  A lot of the shooters have shoot this many times, and everyone kind of knows everyone; there is kind of a feel of a big community picnic that surrounds this event.  At the same time, everyone has been tremendously welcoming of the self-identified “new guy”.

But there is also a championship to win, and you can feel that as well.  The shooters at this match are deadly serious – yes, we’re having fun, but guys like Bruce Piatt, BJ Norris, and Jerry Miculek are here to try and win this thing.

I’m heading out soon to go shoot my first events: The Practical and The Barricade.  After that, I hope to swing by the practice range and get a few rounds off at the mover again, as now that I’ve shot it once I kind of have a better idea of how to approach it than I did yesterday.

Again, check the Gun Nuts Radio Blog for cell phone pictures, and keep checking back here for my twitter feed updates!

129 – Giddings, Caleb

Match I: Practical Event Wed 5/20/2009 13:15
Match II: Barricade Event Wed 5/20/2009 14:30
Match III: Moving Target Event Thu 5/21/2009 16:15
Match IV: Falling Plate Event Fri 5/22/2009 13:00

That’s my competitor number, and match scheduling for Bianchi Cup. It’s nice to know that I’ll have basically ALL DAY Thursday to freak out about shooting the mover. I talked to Tom Hughes briefly this morning about the match, and apparently there are only 26 shooters in Production Division. Reading over the squadding, Dave Sevigny is shooting Metallic, but BJ Norris is slotted for Production (at least that’s what the paper says).

I’m just going to try and do what my wife told me to do: “Relax, and shoot ’em in the middle.”

It’s going to be a beautiful Tuesday in Columbia, and that means one thing for me: Practice Range. After I get registered and pick up my packet, have some coffee, etc; I’ll be heading out to the Green Valley club to hit their practice range so I can make a fool of myself on the mover. I’m terrified of this stage, I can’t even begin to explain the grip of fear that the Mover holds me in. While at the 10 yard stage all you have to do is fire six shots in six seconds; that alone isn’t that hard. However, I’ve never done six shots in six seconds at a target that was moving at 10 feet per second laterally across my field of vision. Should be interesting.

I’ll have more updates later on – keep following my twitter feed in the side bar, and the Gun Nuts Radio blog for mobile blogging from my crackberry!