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International Tactical Rifleman's Championship |
| blog post from www.LongRangeHunting.com |
| The International Tactical Rifleman’s Championship took place at the end of August. I chose to post about today because of a new video clip that will help everyone see better what this competition is about. This is the second time I have competed in this 3-day, two-man team event. Steve Hugel (sscoyote) and I did it in 2004, and neither of us had done anything like it before. As far as I know the only time this competition has ever had an "All Handgun Team" was in 2004 and this year with Wayne and myself. How Steve and I got involved with that back in 04 is another story to be told on another day. There is a stage where you shoot out of a helicopter (One that is really flying). The winners of that stage, win the AR's that were donated to be used on the chopper event. This is a field or tactical match so, no benches are used, and there is no distances given on the targets. Sometimes targets seem all but impossible to find and at time they are partially concealed. Some targets could not even be engaged from the prone position, even on the two field courses. Add to that shooting in intense glare at times, heat, wind, hilly terrain, combined with the fact that you are under a time frame to finish the course. If the team behind you catches you, you are disqualified for that day and your score ends there. On two of the three courses it was required to trot some between stages to finish it in time. On the two field courses, the distances the carbine shooter is responsible for is out to 500 yards while the precision shooter is responsible for shots out to 1,000 yards. Misses count against you, and if you do not engage them at all it takes away even more points. Some teams literally had negative scores (Thank goodness we did not). At times, the terrain is such it is impossible to see impacts if you miss, and at times the laser rangefinders did not work. Being prepared to reticle range your targets is a plus. If your gun, your equipment or you break-down, you do not get a re-shoot. You can use your partners gun (which may not be equipped for the tasks at hand) to finish the course, if he brought enough ammo for two shooters. Just imagine carrying 500 rounds of 45ACP plus your gear on mountain type terrain, while shooting a 45 ACP off-hand at distances out to 50 yards at times(most of the time it was shorter than that though…Yep, that was half of our third day. The other part was a lot of carbine shooting out to 200 yards for the carbine shooter and a shoot house for the pistol shooter. They allowed a ammo drop for the second part of this course, and we each had 500 rounds for each part, so in total, 1,000 rounds a piece for this course. Time allowed for each part of the course-45 minutes. My partner, Wayne carried the same amount of rounds for a Rock River AR-15 Pistol (Scope: Leupold VX-3 3.5-10 1" tube with Holland's ART), chambered in 5.56 (used 69 gr. SMK's, Winchester brass, TAC powder-Also had a Holland QD brake), and did most of the shooting off-hand in the this stage, affectionately called the gully course. It had a hill that is affectionately called “Puke Hill,” that lives up to its name from time to time. Here is the link D&L Sports™, inc. - Competition Information Page... we shot from the prone position on the two field courses. I used my rear grip XP in 6.5-284, McGowen barrel, Holland Radial brake, Barrel Attitudes barrel modification, McRee stock. Lapua brass, Fed match pricers, Hybrid 100 V and 140 grain Berger VLD's. SCope was a Leupold Mark 4 FFP 6.5-20 With Holland's ART Reticle If you want to be challenged in every sense of the word in terms of shooting, I would encourage you to do this competition. It is the most unique I have ever done by far, and it is changed up every year. This year we even were being pulled in a trailer and engaged targets with the pistol and the AR at the same time while moving. Leigh Merriman (Specialty pistol shooter/hunter who lives in Gillette) was one of the Range Officers, and was actually our RO for course three. We also have a new specialty pistol convert thanks to the match. Another one of the RO’s who lives in Gillette was our RO, and use my XP for the 500 yard egg shoot (one shot only-No sighters). Leigh used my XP as well for the egg-shoot. The RO’s were allowed to compete in the egg-shoot. Adam was only an inch or 1.5” from the egg. In fact, it was the second closest shot of all. There is also team shoot-offs, which is a team on team single elimination, with shots from 100 to just over 500 yards. We had a great time even though we were tired and sore. We were very pleased to come in 12th place in the match. There were a few naysayers, who had been claiming that those handguns could not shoot those distances-well thankfully they were proved wrong. It was nice to place a little better than the top half of the teams. Wayne is a superb shot off-hand with an AR-15 pistol-I was sure impressed. It is sort of hard to put in words the types of shooting we did, but emotionally you would go from exhilarating to humbling at times. I saw one of the RO’s on Monday and spoke with another one, and they were both tired and sore. On the field courses the RO’s rode 4-wheelers from stage to stage. The third course called the “Gully Course” that had the mountainous terrain and the shoot-house the RO’s walked with us. Imagine going through around 400 rounds in 20 minutes engaging both reactive steel and mil-parks...It sure was fun, is all I can say. |
| Here is the link: https://download.yousendit.com/Y1RxRm81Y3lvQUkwTVE9PQ You will need to copy it and then paste it into your browser |
 Pic from course #2 |
 Pic from course #3 |
 Pic from course #3 |
 Pic from the first part of the Gully Course were we had just climbed in the "War Wagon" |
 Chopper stage. Yes, I am and can shoot a rifle! |