Of course they aren't "commercially" sorting or washing or lubing or sizing or rolling their ammo they sell. Get my point? Someone needs to start a business for competition ammo. So they can meet the "commercially" requirements.
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Official 2025 Pyramyd AIR Cup thread!
- Thread starter Airgun Nation
- Start date
My bad!
I misunderstood Mike’s 100 FPE comments. But, I do think he has a great suggestion here for the organizers of future 100Y ‘pellet only’ events. Given Nicolai was testing or presumably shooting the .70g at 960 FPS with a great BC at 145 FPE, a power limit of 100 FPE as an example (for “commercially sold pellets”) would keep it fair for ALL who attend.
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My hat is off to anyone who takes the leap, time, money and effort to hold an event like this. At the end of the day, it's their call, and as of right now, the winners have been established. Any protest need to be made at the event while its happening.
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JSB is making an attempt by just releasing their premium ammo line that is sorted by weight and I think head size too. They were handing out samples at PAC but I have not shot any yet to try them.
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This is so American , finding fault with the guy that won , but then i don't have any info from matches in other countries , Maybe it is just the Human Condition ?
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i was at a match where all the ammo was there new , Tenex ,Lapua ,several others even CCI you had to buy your ammo to shoot .
every complained that " it isn't my batch or Die "
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While I'm unfamiliar with the intricacies of Nikolay's pellets, I did see a video of his "mass production" machine back in June
Nikolay wrote: You know about my PASSION to the airgun benchrest and high accuracy shooting competitions. Due to that political game I couldn't get any new good pellets, barrels, airguns here, I couldn't be competitive! And that disturbed me a lot!
So I had to create and develop my own Diabolo domed pellet, purchase and upgrade a pellet production machine and start the mass production (up to 10000 pellets an hour) in Russia some time ago. That took several years, a huge effort and investments, but I did it! Now my pellets, which are called RBT Diabolo, are available in Russia in .177 - .30 calibers that allows us to step up to the next level due to great stability, high accuracy and repeatability and the highest ballistic coefficient in accordinate caliber.
Perhaps the hosts of these events will consider changing their verbiage to "commercially available" or even allow "hand-made" projectiles in the future? Because lets face it - we've all seen a lot of the equipment used to win these events that isn't "mass produced" or readily available.
Just my 2 cents
-Michael
Nikolay wrote: You know about my PASSION to the airgun benchrest and high accuracy shooting competitions. Due to that political game I couldn't get any new good pellets, barrels, airguns here, I couldn't be competitive! And that disturbed me a lot!
So I had to create and develop my own Diabolo domed pellet, purchase and upgrade a pellet production machine and start the mass production (up to 10000 pellets an hour) in Russia some time ago. That took several years, a huge effort and investments, but I did it! Now my pellets, which are called RBT Diabolo, are available in Russia in .177 - .30 calibers that allows us to step up to the next level due to great stability, high accuracy and repeatability and the highest ballistic coefficient in accordinate caliber.
Perhaps the hosts of these events will consider changing their verbiage to "commercially available" or even allow "hand-made" projectiles in the future? Because lets face it - we've all seen a lot of the equipment used to win these events that isn't "mass produced" or readily available.
Just my 2 cents
-Michael
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I can make a video of anything, Michael and then claim this or that. I can float a saucer balloon in the air, make a video and call it a UFO
It means squat! Find the pellets for sale anywhere in the world. AI cannot, even deciphering through the Russian languages. Also, you can import and sell AEA as well as JSB in Russia. Nikolay claimed he couldn’t get pellets in to Russia
. Don’t whiz on my back and tell me it’s raining 
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I say he is legal with seeing this video. Too bad politics keep our US market out of his reach. Hopefully things will eventually change in that arena. Regardless, any protest needs to be made at the event while its happening. This after the fact back and forth between folks who weren't even entered in the contest, (me included) is irrelevant at this point.
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In the words of Ron Robinson @AirNGasman , "if you allow one rule to be broken, it voids every rule!"
We all play by the same rules and those that organize these events are burdened with upholding the rules for everyone.
We all play by the same rules and those that organize these events are burdened with upholding the rules for everyone.
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Looks like we’ll have to wait until RMAC 2026 to see how this plays out. It won’t be at EBR 2025, and those “unobtainium” pellets didn’t do that great for him at RMAC 2025. He shot a .25 version in 2024 that were nicknamed “corkscrew” and although not “mass produced”, they were not competitive so no one really cared.
His scores at PAC were fairly consistent with the other top shooters, perhaps little to no wind didn’t show as much of an advantage due to high BC as they might have in difficult conditions.
It’s easy to see based on the scores just how mild the conditions were at PAC. We don’t have the scores in the Finals, someday perhaps?
It would be considerate of PA to post the scores from all three events sometime this year, maybe even prior to EBR…
His scores at PAC were fairly consistent with the other top shooters, perhaps little to no wind didn’t show as much of an advantage due to high BC as they might have in difficult conditions.
It’s easy to see based on the scores just how mild the conditions were at PAC. We don’t have the scores in the Finals, someday perhaps?
It would be considerate of PA to post the scores from all three events sometime this year, maybe even prior to EBR…
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And ya know how many competitors made it a point to come to me and protest the pellets he was using during the event?....0! And after his finals scores were announced and the dust was settled, to my knowledge and from what I saw, he received nothing but congratulations from his fellow competitors.
Here's what strikes me as funny, Nikolai used these projectiles in 2024, placed 8th and took home some money and no one said a thing about it.
I will only speak for PA and the Cup here:
I had spoken with Nikolai about this in the past, and he informed me at the time (this was before the 2024 Cup) that they were being produced in quantities substantial enough to sell and he intended to do so. That was good enough for me. Remember, the rule currently says mass-produced and does not say commercially available. In my view, they are two different things. I believe he tried to move production outside of Russia when it became clear to him that he would not be able to export them, but I am unsure what the success of that looks like. That is second-hand information though, and not direct from Nikolai. Regardless, my logic as the match director was that if they were allowed to compete in 2024, I had no reason not to allow them for 2025. That's my decision, and if you take issue with that, I fully understand. But know this, who the person is, what gun they shoot, or what brand(s) they represent have zero influence on that decision. I would hope that any competitior that has actually attended the Cup and interacted with me would know that. And I can fully understnd where the skepticism of that and the thoughts about potential brand/sponsor bias might come from, but when I say that it isn't a factor, I mean that for the event at large, and not just for myself. We have tried to create a neutral space for the industry to congregate and competitors to enjoy, and I'd like to think we do a pretty good job of that.
The intent of the rule as I have always viewed it as a match director, was to ensure that competitors were using diabolo shaped pellets, and not slugs. The issue with the mass produced factor is two fold. What does "mass produced" mean? And how do you address someone using pellets that don't exist any longer or exist yet but are/were made in mass? This definitely is something that should be addressed for next years rules.
Regarding his inability to export them, I know a little bit about importing and exporting from Russia and can confirm that this would be a near impossibility right now to do legitimately. While Russian made goods have been generally difficult to import into the US, this has obviously been greatly impacted by the conflict in Ukraine. How anyone could do this currently is beyond me, I know we (Pyramyd) cannot.
I agree with those that have said that the general rules used are ambiguous and could do with some changes, and we have been discussing this with the leadership of the ASA in an effort to not only tighten things up, but more clearly define what the standards are and should be. I hope that the other big matches and their leadership will come to the table and be involved in that conversation as well, though I am unsure of how that will go as I am not sure if either are members of the ASA currently. And I would welcome any of you that have a strong opinion about any part of the current rules that are commonly used to write to the ASA and make those feelings/opinions known.
Also, just to say it publicly, I really need to thank Mike @thomasair for the two card final idea. If it wasn't for a conversation with him on this topic a few years back, this never would have happened and is definitely a step in the right direction. And one that I hope the other events will consider if time allows. Maybe we will be able to take it even further in the future.
Full results are coming. We post a match report every year that I am currently working on. Should be up within the next few days.
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Let FX actually produce and market the RBT pellets. They can say they evented them even. All it takes is money. Of course, FX doesn't make their pellets, JSB does. Let them make these pellets. Then we can all use them and they will be mass produced.
Small batch production is not mass produced.
Small batch production is not mass produced.
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I’d someday like to meet those blue aliens from Avatar. It’s a video, so it must of course be true.
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Maybe when team Centercut puts on an event, we can then play by yalls rules. 
At that point your input and opinions WILL matter.
At that point your input and opinions WILL matter.Upvote 0
What’s a “yall”?Maybe when team Centercut puts on an event, we can then play by yalls rules.
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I'll let Caleb or Derrick explain it to ya, they're both familiar with the term. If I'd said "do yall want some FREE Russian pellets, you'd certainly be able to comprehende that.What’s a “yall”?
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