CWSA Steel Challenge -- 06/03/07

Sunday morning's weather looked even better than Saturday's, perhaps a little TOO good, in fact. Too bright, too much glare, and too hot can make it a long day, and Steel Challenge matches seem to be particularly tiring anyway. I decided to only shoot in the Rimfire Open (optical sight) and Centerfire Open(Optical sight) classes, but when I saw that there were only two entries in Rimfire Limited (basically stock iron sighted guns), I decided to shoot that class too to fill out the class a bit.

Rainy shooting the "Roundabout" stage.

We set up two stages. "Roundabout", and "Smoke and Hope". (To find out more about Steel Challenge matches, check out their website.

The rules call for shooting each stage five times, with your slowest run discarded, and the other four added together towards your total time. As the day wore on and we worked our way through the stages with each gun, it got hotter and hotter. I suspect I'm not the only one to end the day with a little sun burn! A number of shooters were starting to wilt, I think! Natives of Western WAshington, used to 49 degrees and rain, just don't do well in 80 plus degree weather........

Mercifully, the day finally came to a close, and the scores were added up. There were no surprises, and most shooters seemed to finish just about where they usually do. Evil Al won the Rimfire Open class, but I was about six tenths of a second behind. I just can't seem to quite catch him at the Steel Challenge matches, I think he's won every Rimfire Open this year.

JimP won the Rimfire limited class, as he usually does, but I wasn't too far behind, and I edged out Al S. by only .02 seconds total time. Can't get much closer than that!

Centerfire Open class was won by Tony C., closely beating out Evil Al. Since I wasn't drawing from a holster, I was assessed an additional ten second time penalty, so I ended up fifth, although my times were good enough to be a bit higher. If only I could hit the first plate every time.....

I didn't note the results for the other classes, so I don't know who won the revolver classes.

Finally it was time to drag my sunburned and worn out self back home for something wet and cold, followed by a nap and a shower.

Next weekend KeeWee and I are off to Banks Lake in Eastern Washington, along with a number of our fishing club members for a weekend of bass, walleye, and perch fishing, and just generally kicking back for a few days.

Shooting's a lot of fun, but you gotta take a break once in a while, too............