We had an Xtremely ambitious plan to pack some serious shooting in one weekend and boy did we ever get it done, quite the airgun saturated weekend!!!
The smiles on these two faces says it all (Kelden and Kent)
Many of us got to camp on Thurs but the course setting got under way on Friday morning, and afternoon. With silhouette, a 13 lane regular field target, and Xtreme field target courses to set, we were BUSY. After my son and I got settled down to sleep Friday night, out of the blue he commented, "dad, I'm pretty tired tonight." Me too buddy, me too.
Breakdown of the weekends events:
Friday evening = sub 20fpe silhouettes
Saturday morning = 52 shot regular field target
Saturday during lunch = sub 20fpe COVID Challenge
Saturday afternoon = 40 shot Xtreme Field Target
Saturday evening = high power COVID Challenge
Silhouette Match
Colbens first time shooting silhoutte. He did pretty good for a 7 year old out to 70 yards. I was most happy with him for not getting the turret messed up, not shooting the wrong targets, or shooting any targets out of order.
Dan, Kent, Colben
.20 Vet
Silhouette spectators and shooters (Kelden, Abbie, Van shooting here)
Larry, Steve Q, Will
Rex and Barry
Silhouette spectators
Kelden, Abbie, Van
Steve Q, Rex, Larry
The gun Will and myself used
Field Target
We set up a 52 shot match, in typical Aspen Mtn fashion (long distance between shooting stations, 13 lanes, interesting target placement, challenging but fun).
Some set-up pics...
There's a frog through a hole in that pile of wood somewhere.
Dan and Barry
Barry
Barry (man, kinda feels like a Barry showcase here. Good time to give credit to Van T for letting me use a bunch of excellent pics that he took, I'm wondering if he was squadded with Barry?)
Me and Colben
Dan
Covid Challenge
The winners of each COVID Challenge received certificates for custom scope wheel packages from JD's Custom Design. Thank you very much for sponsoring the event!
The premise here was simple. Place the COVID target out to 55 yards and let everybody take one shot. Those that knock it down advance to the next round, but first a smaller kill zone is swapped onto the target. Steve Q won the sub 20 fpe challenge after being the only person able to knock down the second target. I believe there were 7 or 8 that knocked it down the first time, but only Steve Q got the smaller kz in round two.
This is what the target looked after the last round of the high power COVID challenge. I had left by this time but I understand Sandy won a scope wheel certificate. She told me later that she was eager to get JD to make her a wheel for her Athlon Midas Tac. That seems like a mighty small kill zone. I think I was told it was a 1/2 inch.
Xtreme Field Target (I was told to start dropping the "E" cuz nothing about XFT is easy.)
We set 5 lanes here, and shot through twice to make the possible score a 40.
A little experiment here to keep the paddle visible. Seemed to work well on the larger KZ targets.
This bear......
Was between these small pines (1.75" kz at 43 yards)
Fishy zoomed out
Fishy up close
Froggy (1.75" @ 60 yards)
This quail was the looooonnnnnggggg one (3" at 93 yards)
same quail as above but pic taken from about 20 yards away.....
same quail as above but pic taken from shooting station.....(yeah, where's the target?)
And the aftermath of the 93 yard quail... (looks like the wind was maybe left to right here...)
Lane 1 (1.5" deer @ 43 yards and 3 inch bear @ 63 yards)
Xtreme Dan, Van, Ben
Xtreme Colben
Xtreme RAW
Xtreme Dan and Van
Xtreme Rex
Xtreme Steve M, Abbie, Will, Kent
We used the timers and had 3 minutes to take 4 shots. The timers really add a cool element to the competition. I'd personally like to see timers used at monthly regular FT matches more often as they truly add some extra excitement to an event.
Talk about a 180 degree different environment in which to be shooting XFT, compared to the desert down at Phoenix Rod and Gun club where all the monthly winter XFT matches have been held. Very enjoyable match.
I heard some comments that it seemed easier than matches down at Phoenix Rod and Gun so I worked up the numbers.
Average Near distance = 46.4 yards
Average Far distance = 74.6 yards
Highest Extreme Troyer = 49 (1” @ 4 9 yards on lane 2) I wanted to see hit rates on this target but many of the scorecards don't say what lane people started on so I couldn't calculate them.
Furthest target = 3” @ 93 yards on lane 4
Overall Extreme Troyer Factor = 33.32 (ETF only takes into account the kill zone size and distance. This number is actually quite comparable to matches we shot at PHX Rod and Gun all winter. Just goes to show how much harder it is to knock down long range field targets in an environment with very little vegetation to give hints about what the wind is doing (like at PHX Rod and Gun). Up here near Aspen Mtn the trees and grass gave lots of visual cues about what the wind was doing out at the targets.
Van's van (well trailer really)
Van has been renovating this van for nearly a year. And it turned out awesome. The detail in the exterior paint is pretty impressive. It has cool scenery from all over the state of Arizona (Weaver's Needle, Four Peaks, Monument Valley, etc). The inside is pretty amazing too. Great job Van. I think we should call it the field target mobile.
Just some random cool pics...
And finally,
Huge thank you to Rex, Steve Q, and Ben for running all of the above super-fun insanity. Marathon weekend of airguns and every bit of it was great. Also, huge thank you to Airguns of Arizona for donating prize money and to JDs Custom Design for donating the scope wheel prize packages. Those types of donations create excitement around events and that is a good thing, for all of us. Thank you to everyone who attended, I enjoyed the time with all of you. Congrats to the winners, some crazy-good scores were turned in, especially when taking the difficulty into consideration, truly impressive shooting.
and finally finally,
We had a couple new shooters, Larry and Will. Both decided to fully commit to the weekend and they were camping with all of us diehards. Was great to get to know those two and hope to see them at future field target events. To anybody interested, come on out-it'll be worth it.
The smiles on these two faces says it all (Kelden and Kent)
Many of us got to camp on Thurs but the course setting got under way on Friday morning, and afternoon. With silhouette, a 13 lane regular field target, and Xtreme field target courses to set, we were BUSY. After my son and I got settled down to sleep Friday night, out of the blue he commented, "dad, I'm pretty tired tonight." Me too buddy, me too.
Breakdown of the weekends events:
Friday evening = sub 20fpe silhouettes
Saturday morning = 52 shot regular field target
Saturday during lunch = sub 20fpe COVID Challenge
Saturday afternoon = 40 shot Xtreme Field Target
Saturday evening = high power COVID Challenge
Silhouette Match
Colbens first time shooting silhoutte. He did pretty good for a 7 year old out to 70 yards. I was most happy with him for not getting the turret messed up, not shooting the wrong targets, or shooting any targets out of order.
Dan, Kent, Colben
.20 Vet
Silhouette spectators and shooters (Kelden, Abbie, Van shooting here)
Larry, Steve Q, Will
Rex and Barry
Silhouette spectators
Kelden, Abbie, Van
Steve Q, Rex, Larry
The gun Will and myself used
Field Target
We set up a 52 shot match, in typical Aspen Mtn fashion (long distance between shooting stations, 13 lanes, interesting target placement, challenging but fun).
Some set-up pics...
There's a frog through a hole in that pile of wood somewhere.
Dan and Barry
Barry
Barry (man, kinda feels like a Barry showcase here. Good time to give credit to Van T for letting me use a bunch of excellent pics that he took, I'm wondering if he was squadded with Barry?)
Me and Colben
Dan
Covid Challenge
The winners of each COVID Challenge received certificates for custom scope wheel packages from JD's Custom Design. Thank you very much for sponsoring the event!
The premise here was simple. Place the COVID target out to 55 yards and let everybody take one shot. Those that knock it down advance to the next round, but first a smaller kill zone is swapped onto the target. Steve Q won the sub 20 fpe challenge after being the only person able to knock down the second target. I believe there were 7 or 8 that knocked it down the first time, but only Steve Q got the smaller kz in round two.
This is what the target looked after the last round of the high power COVID challenge. I had left by this time but I understand Sandy won a scope wheel certificate. She told me later that she was eager to get JD to make her a wheel for her Athlon Midas Tac. That seems like a mighty small kill zone. I think I was told it was a 1/2 inch.
Xtreme Field Target (I was told to start dropping the "E" cuz nothing about XFT is easy.)
We set 5 lanes here, and shot through twice to make the possible score a 40.
A little experiment here to keep the paddle visible. Seemed to work well on the larger KZ targets.
This bear......
Was between these small pines (1.75" kz at 43 yards)
Fishy zoomed out
Fishy up close
Froggy (1.75" @ 60 yards)
This quail was the looooonnnnnggggg one (3" at 93 yards)
same quail as above but pic taken from about 20 yards away.....
same quail as above but pic taken from shooting station.....(yeah, where's the target?)
And the aftermath of the 93 yard quail... (looks like the wind was maybe left to right here...)
Lane 1 (1.5" deer @ 43 yards and 3 inch bear @ 63 yards)
Xtreme Dan, Van, Ben
Xtreme Colben
Xtreme RAW
Xtreme Dan and Van
Xtreme Rex
Xtreme Steve M, Abbie, Will, Kent
We used the timers and had 3 minutes to take 4 shots. The timers really add a cool element to the competition. I'd personally like to see timers used at monthly regular FT matches more often as they truly add some extra excitement to an event.
Talk about a 180 degree different environment in which to be shooting XFT, compared to the desert down at Phoenix Rod and Gun club where all the monthly winter XFT matches have been held. Very enjoyable match.
I heard some comments that it seemed easier than matches down at Phoenix Rod and Gun so I worked up the numbers.
Average Near distance = 46.4 yards
Average Far distance = 74.6 yards
Highest Extreme Troyer = 49 (1” @ 4 9 yards on lane 2) I wanted to see hit rates on this target but many of the scorecards don't say what lane people started on so I couldn't calculate them.
Furthest target = 3” @ 93 yards on lane 4
Overall Extreme Troyer Factor = 33.32 (ETF only takes into account the kill zone size and distance. This number is actually quite comparable to matches we shot at PHX Rod and Gun all winter. Just goes to show how much harder it is to knock down long range field targets in an environment with very little vegetation to give hints about what the wind is doing (like at PHX Rod and Gun). Up here near Aspen Mtn the trees and grass gave lots of visual cues about what the wind was doing out at the targets.
Van's van (well trailer really)
Van has been renovating this van for nearly a year. And it turned out awesome. The detail in the exterior paint is pretty impressive. It has cool scenery from all over the state of Arizona (Weaver's Needle, Four Peaks, Monument Valley, etc). The inside is pretty amazing too. Great job Van. I think we should call it the field target mobile.
Just some random cool pics...
And finally,
Huge thank you to Rex, Steve Q, and Ben for running all of the above super-fun insanity. Marathon weekend of airguns and every bit of it was great. Also, huge thank you to Airguns of Arizona for donating prize money and to JDs Custom Design for donating the scope wheel prize packages. Those types of donations create excitement around events and that is a good thing, for all of us. Thank you to everyone who attended, I enjoyed the time with all of you. Congrats to the winners, some crazy-good scores were turned in, especially when taking the difficulty into consideration, truly impressive shooting.
and finally finally,
We had a couple new shooters, Larry and Will. Both decided to fully commit to the weekend and they were camping with all of us diehards. Was great to get to know those two and hope to see them at future field target events. To anybody interested, come on out-it'll be worth it.
.
. I did not have my own gun in time for the event but I am fortunate enough to be friends with Rex who generously let me have full use of two of his primo rifles so I would be able to shoot the event. A big thank you to Rex for that.
