Welp, let's do an UpNorth AirGunner-style long(ish) write-up about my experience at PA Cup:
I drove out Thursday from Chicagoland (6hr drive) after being pathetically sick for the previous 2 days. This was a change of plans from leaving Wednesday night, but I wanted one more good sleep in my own bed to recover. This would end up being a lucky move, as I arrived to the FX USA house a day late. Norm Shanley and his wife Lisa had decided to get their own hotel, which left me with the master bedroom w/attached bathroom that was being held for them! Lucky me! ...And honestly lucky for the rest of the guys in the house, too, since it was probably good to have me a bit quarantined. I went to the range and sighted in, then came back and chilled with Chris Turek, Nikolai Boldov, Ernest Rowe, and Newman Buck. We feasted on rice pilaf that Николай Болдов made and then I went to bed early as I was still not feeling great.
Friday I shot my (2) qualifying bench cards. Relay 3, the one with high winds, as it was later in the day. I shot a 200 and a 202. Not great, but given the winds it did land me in finals. I then went and shot Springer Gunslinger with a $99 Walmart Gamo breakbarrel and el-cheapo scope, and only lost by 1 target! Everyone was laughing with me about using a fricken GAMO!

Then I shot magfed PCP Gunslinger with my FX Airguns Panthera Hunter Compact .22. I had to face Nicolas Gregoris who is the fastest gunslinger on this side of the Mississippi. He beat me so fast I didn't even realize, finished all my targets, and still blurted out "DONE!" at the end..... ooof!
Saturday I woke up and got ready to shoot my single bench card for 100 yard benchrest finals. At the breakfast table I asked Nikolai if I should switch to the Jts Airguns pellets since I was running a bit low on FX Pellets, only having 20-40 pellets in each of 4 sorted tins - not enough to shoot a whole card with any one weight. My JTS tin was full of 100. Nikola told me "absolutely do not do that". This was advise I should have taken. During the sight in, I tried (5) JTS pellets and shot an MOA group, so it was out the window with Nikolai's advice and I thought the JTS were going to be the ticket. What I did not realize was that I was now leading up my barrel with (2) different lead formulas/consistencies and that made for uncontrollable results, with two heart-breakers out in the white... Never will I not listen to Nikolai again, but you live and you learn. Last place in finals was the result, but still, 33rd place out of 150 shooters ain't so bad!
Then it was on to Field Target, with the first half (15 lanes, 4 targets each) taking place on Saturday after bench finals. I got squadded up with Cecil of Hatsan and legendary shooter John Bagakis. I couldn't have asked for better squadmates. It was my first Field Target rodeo and they helped me out quite a bit. I shot poorly, a 32/60. What? I know I can do better than that! At the end of the day I found my issue. I had been fully loading my mags with the super thin-skirted 13.43gr JSB pellets and it was dinging up the skirts as the full strength of the mag spring cycled. This caused me to miss a lot of the further targets. I stopped this for day 2, only loading 4-8 pellets at a time rather than 18, and I shot a 46/60, which was only 4 impacts under Mr. Bagakis. Not too shabby, and I proved that the Panthera Hunter Compact .22 can be tuned for sub-20 AND perform well in Field Target. The gun was a laser, the missed targets only being attributable to the shooter.
Overall this was a great event and a nice capstone to my rookie year in professional airgunning. My message remains the same as it always has to anyone reading this - just get out there and compete if that is what you want to do. My whole "jump in the deep end" here was prompted by a long stay in a hospital bed last year where I thought "Man, if I ever get out of this bed I am going to every competition possible with zero excuses". You never know when you could lose it all, so get out there and make your dreams happen, guys. A year ago I was little known, with no sponsors, no airgun victories, and I had no idea how fun this is! Now I am ranked #1 in the nation currently for Airgun NRL22, I made finals 2 of 3 times in pro benchrest in my rookie year, took 20th of 100 in PRS at RMAC, 8th in PRS at NAC, I'm on the best pro team ever, I've got tons of support, I've made tons of friends, and this is only the beginning. Get out there and get it, guys. If I can do it, so can you!