At the end of the month, I'll be relocating from Omaha, NE to San Diego, CA. Having recently acquired a GA Precision Crusader, I decided to enter a Mid-Range League competition at my local shooting range (Eastern Nebraska Gun Club). My main reasons for doing this were: 1) having had the Crusader out to the range several times, I had a pretty good idea what it was capable of; and 2) I wanted the opportunity to shoot in my 1st competition in familiar conditions around people I have known for a while, rather than a completely new range and people I'm not familiar with after relocating to SoCal.
For anyone not familiar, the setup for this match was slow fire, 3 trips to the firing line for each shooter, targets set at 600 yd. Each trip to the line started with two sighters followed by 20 rounds for score. A total of 28 shooters attended, with 5 shooters including myself in F-Class. Because of the small number of competitors in F-Class, the two different subgroups all competed together in the same group. Three of the F-Class shooters were in Open class, which allows an adjustable front rest and a wider range of calibers (one shot 6 mm, another .260, the third I don't know). There was one other shooter with myself in F-T/R class, which is restricted to .223 or .308, a bag or bipod in front. At 600 yd, the F-Class X-ring is 3" in diameter (~0.5 MOA), the 10-ring is 6" (~1.0 MOA), the 9-ring is 12", and so forth.
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Conditions</span>: Temp = 90-94 F, Humidity = ~70%, Air Pressure = 29.75" Hg (S), Altitude = ~1066 ft, Wind = 4-6 mph from ~7:00 (stage 1), 5-7 mph from ~3:00 (stages 2 and 3).
<span style="font-weight: bold">Equipment</span>: GA Precision Crusader in .308, Nightforce NXS 8-32x56 with NP-R1 reticle and 0.125 MOA turrets mounted in Badger 1.125" alloy rings, Atlas V8 bipod, Red Tac Gear rear bag (Triad Tactical),175 gr Tactical load from Applied Ballistics.
Here are a few photos taken during various stages of the competition:
<span style="font-weight: bold">Target line @ 600 yd</span>
<span style="font-weight: bold">Firing line during 1st stage setup</span>
<span style="font-weight: bold">Firing line during 3rd stage (me with the Crusader in front)</span>
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Results</span>
My scores for the 3 individual stages were as follows:
1) 199/200, 5X
2) 196/200, 7X
3) 197/200, 9X
My total score was 592/600 with 21X, which was good enough to place first out of the 5 F-Class competitors, and 5th out of all 28 shooters in the various classes. It really should have been a little better, but I started off stage 2 with 2 - 8's because the wind had shifted over from the right and I didn't make a large enough adjustment after my two sighters. After a 2nd adjustment, I did much better on the next 18 shots with 12 - 10's and 6 - X's.
Overall, I have to say the competition was a lot of fun and a valuable learning experience. I'm sorry I didn't get involved in competition sooner, but I will continue to do it now that I've gotten the first one under my belt. I'm sure the results are not that impressive to those with high level competition shooting experience, but given that this was my first competition and that I was shooting against people with a lot more experience including Open Class shooters, I take a modest amount of satisfaction in the results I was able to achieve. To be honest, I really didn't have to do very much. Shooting the GA Precision Crusader with Bryan Litz' 175 gr Tactical load made it pretty easy and George and Bryan's workmanship and attention to detail really deserve most of the credit. Along those lines, here is a final pic that pretty much sums it all up:
For anyone not familiar, the setup for this match was slow fire, 3 trips to the firing line for each shooter, targets set at 600 yd. Each trip to the line started with two sighters followed by 20 rounds for score. A total of 28 shooters attended, with 5 shooters including myself in F-Class. Because of the small number of competitors in F-Class, the two different subgroups all competed together in the same group. Three of the F-Class shooters were in Open class, which allows an adjustable front rest and a wider range of calibers (one shot 6 mm, another .260, the third I don't know). There was one other shooter with myself in F-T/R class, which is restricted to .223 or .308, a bag or bipod in front. At 600 yd, the F-Class X-ring is 3" in diameter (~0.5 MOA), the 10-ring is 6" (~1.0 MOA), the 9-ring is 12", and so forth.
<span style="font-weight: bold">
Conditions</span>: Temp = 90-94 F, Humidity = ~70%, Air Pressure = 29.75" Hg (S), Altitude = ~1066 ft, Wind = 4-6 mph from ~7:00 (stage 1), 5-7 mph from ~3:00 (stages 2 and 3).
<span style="font-weight: bold">Equipment</span>: GA Precision Crusader in .308, Nightforce NXS 8-32x56 with NP-R1 reticle and 0.125 MOA turrets mounted in Badger 1.125" alloy rings, Atlas V8 bipod, Red Tac Gear rear bag (Triad Tactical),175 gr Tactical load from Applied Ballistics.
Here are a few photos taken during various stages of the competition:
<span style="font-weight: bold">Target line @ 600 yd</span>
<span style="font-weight: bold">Firing line during 1st stage setup</span>
<span style="font-weight: bold">Firing line during 3rd stage (me with the Crusader in front)</span>
<span style="font-weight: bold">
Results</span>
My scores for the 3 individual stages were as follows:
1) 199/200, 5X
2) 196/200, 7X
3) 197/200, 9X
My total score was 592/600 with 21X, which was good enough to place first out of the 5 F-Class competitors, and 5th out of all 28 shooters in the various classes. It really should have been a little better, but I started off stage 2 with 2 - 8's because the wind had shifted over from the right and I didn't make a large enough adjustment after my two sighters. After a 2nd adjustment, I did much better on the next 18 shots with 12 - 10's and 6 - X's.
Overall, I have to say the competition was a lot of fun and a valuable learning experience. I'm sorry I didn't get involved in competition sooner, but I will continue to do it now that I've gotten the first one under my belt. I'm sure the results are not that impressive to those with high level competition shooting experience, but given that this was my first competition and that I was shooting against people with a lot more experience including Open Class shooters, I take a modest amount of satisfaction in the results I was able to achieve. To be honest, I really didn't have to do very much. Shooting the GA Precision Crusader with Bryan Litz' 175 gr Tactical load made it pretty easy and George and Bryan's workmanship and attention to detail really deserve most of the credit. Along those lines, here is a final pic that pretty much sums it all up:
