Thanks Scott , Nick , Tad, the Tillard 55 Ranch and everyone else that had a part in the making of the 2020 Nightforce ELR Steel Challenge! To me it's the best matches in the country as far as testing a shooter's wind reading abilities, the rife's capability to perform in dust/dirt and having that rifle tuned, through great reloading practices, to shoot larger capacity cartridges (compared to typical precision rifle (PRS/NRL) matches) over a 75-150 round match. All stages are prone, so for a shooter it's all in the wind calls and fundamentals behind the rifle. With an average target engagement of 1180y and furthest shot of 2091y, if you fail to do something right it shows quickly!
Going into this match I hadn't shot a national level 2 day match since the NF ELR match in 2016, 4 dang years! I have had 2 beautiful daughters and started a business during that span and my time has been focused there rather than driving around the country to rifle matches. I procrastinated getting my 25 SAUM tuned up for this match and ended up switching to ADG brass 2 days before leaving for the match and never had a chance to shoot that load further than 630y. However I still had very high confidence in my load and rifle to perform.
My cartridge choice: The 25 SAUM launching the Blackjack Bullets 131g ACE @ 3280 FPS performed fantastically. 26" Hawkhill custom marksman contour 1:7.5” twist barrel. Surgeon 591 short action, Manners T6a elite, Hawkins bottom metal, Rings and Brake. Kahles k624i scope. This combo came in at 14.1 pounds. Shooting a 14# rifle, the very light recoil is a huge advantage for me to stay in the glass and spot hits/misses and know what I need to do for the next shot as well as not wearing me out physically.
I have had several people say to me after the match something to the tune of "If you would have shot a heavier bullet you probably would have been able to buck the wind a little better". But I don't buy into that at all and if you use an electronic ballistic solver (phone app, AB/4dof kestrel, Ect.) You don't ether! Ballistically no one had an advantage on me (possibly a couple 375's or really hot 338's but they had to deal with 10x the recoil). The only thing that could have improved my score was ME. For example at 9k DA @ 2100y and 10 mph 90* wind, my Dope is 17mil E and 2.3min W. A 300WM running 215's @ 3000fps on the same target Dope is 20 mil E and 2.8mil W.
Day 1: I started off doing pretty decent Saturday morning, fighting 10-15 mph headwinds early and then a little before noon we switched firing directions 180* with a tail wind. The wind picked up significantly 25-35 mph after lunch time and my lack of practice really showed its face. My score mostly suffered from not making large enough corrections and I finally realized I was making wind corrections to the edge of the target rather than the center and missing second shots by just a hair on quite a few targets. After day one I went through that in my head and told myself that I wasn't going to make the same mistakes day 2.
Day 2: My squad made the hike up a pretty good hill to stage 9. Wind readings were 22-30mph right off the bat, we were on the edge of a very steep slope that was compressing the wind so wind calls had to be made through the spotting scope as we couldn't trust what we were reading at the shooting location. The winds never let up for the entirety of shooting day 2. I used anything from 20 to 39 mph to make impacts on every stage. My plan for making better wind corrections paid off and had better average scores per stage in, what I felt, more difficult conditions than day 1.
Max stage scores ranged from 6-8 points (other than the shotmarker tie breaker stage which was 3 points)
Day 1 : I had 40 points on the 12 stages we shot plus 3 on the shotmarker (3.3 points/ stage excluding the SM)
Day 2 : I had 35 points on the 8 stages we shot (4.375 points/ stage)
("what if" alert)
These stats make me mad that I didn't make a change earlier, but that's what I get for not shooting much in the last few years. If I could have pulled even a half a point higher stage average on day 1 I would have won the Hunter division by 2 points and came in 8th overall. Hats off to the guys that didn't make these mistakes and they for sure earned their spots.
My results:
I managed to squeeze out 3rd place in Hunter division and 19th overall with my 14# 25 SAUM of course shooting our 131 ACE Blackjacks at 3280fps. The majority of other shooters that I saw were shooting magnum 7mm's or 30cals with 180-230g bullets. I didn’t have a single equipment issue all weekend which allows me to focus on what I’m doing. Thanks to Matt Parry for the friendship and skills on the lathe to make it all shoot great and function flawlessly.
The Hunter division classification was just a rifle weight restriction. The rifle, equipped with glass, sling, mag and bipod had to weigh less than 16#.
We also shot a tie breaker stage with ShotMarker and I laid down a 2.7” group at 953 yards in a pretty stiff wind. So needless to say, all my misses were on the nut behind the bolt (me).
Blackjack Bullets offers a large incentive to shoot this match with the 131g ACE. $2,570 dollars to the top Blackjack shooter and $10,000 if you win the match overall! This year Miles, shooting his 257 Weatherby open gun at ~3400 fps got the top Blackjack shooter with 79 points, I was one point behind with 78. However we presented the Big check to Austin as he came in the top (non-owner) Blackjack shooter with 76 points running our 257 Blackjack cartridge.
The 9 shooters that chose to run the 131g ACE: with only 4.7% of the field of 191 shooter. And taking 12% of the top 25 is a pretty good showing if you ask me.
Overall it was a fantastic match and it was great to get to see some people from all over the country that I hadn't seen in years. Also super cool to meet some new friends and customers that I had talked with through email and phone for the last couple years. Hopefully I get to hit a couple more matches this year but if i don't, You can count on seeing me at the NF ELR steel challenge 2021! only 355 days to go.....
Going into this match I hadn't shot a national level 2 day match since the NF ELR match in 2016, 4 dang years! I have had 2 beautiful daughters and started a business during that span and my time has been focused there rather than driving around the country to rifle matches. I procrastinated getting my 25 SAUM tuned up for this match and ended up switching to ADG brass 2 days before leaving for the match and never had a chance to shoot that load further than 630y. However I still had very high confidence in my load and rifle to perform.
My cartridge choice: The 25 SAUM launching the Blackjack Bullets 131g ACE @ 3280 FPS performed fantastically. 26" Hawkhill custom marksman contour 1:7.5” twist barrel. Surgeon 591 short action, Manners T6a elite, Hawkins bottom metal, Rings and Brake. Kahles k624i scope. This combo came in at 14.1 pounds. Shooting a 14# rifle, the very light recoil is a huge advantage for me to stay in the glass and spot hits/misses and know what I need to do for the next shot as well as not wearing me out physically.
I have had several people say to me after the match something to the tune of "If you would have shot a heavier bullet you probably would have been able to buck the wind a little better". But I don't buy into that at all and if you use an electronic ballistic solver (phone app, AB/4dof kestrel, Ect.) You don't ether! Ballistically no one had an advantage on me (possibly a couple 375's or really hot 338's but they had to deal with 10x the recoil). The only thing that could have improved my score was ME. For example at 9k DA @ 2100y and 10 mph 90* wind, my Dope is 17mil E and 2.3min W. A 300WM running 215's @ 3000fps on the same target Dope is 20 mil E and 2.8mil W.
Day 1: I started off doing pretty decent Saturday morning, fighting 10-15 mph headwinds early and then a little before noon we switched firing directions 180* with a tail wind. The wind picked up significantly 25-35 mph after lunch time and my lack of practice really showed its face. My score mostly suffered from not making large enough corrections and I finally realized I was making wind corrections to the edge of the target rather than the center and missing second shots by just a hair on quite a few targets. After day one I went through that in my head and told myself that I wasn't going to make the same mistakes day 2.
Day 2: My squad made the hike up a pretty good hill to stage 9. Wind readings were 22-30mph right off the bat, we were on the edge of a very steep slope that was compressing the wind so wind calls had to be made through the spotting scope as we couldn't trust what we were reading at the shooting location. The winds never let up for the entirety of shooting day 2. I used anything from 20 to 39 mph to make impacts on every stage. My plan for making better wind corrections paid off and had better average scores per stage in, what I felt, more difficult conditions than day 1.
Max stage scores ranged from 6-8 points (other than the shotmarker tie breaker stage which was 3 points)
Day 1 : I had 40 points on the 12 stages we shot plus 3 on the shotmarker (3.3 points/ stage excluding the SM)
Day 2 : I had 35 points on the 8 stages we shot (4.375 points/ stage)
("what if" alert)
These stats make me mad that I didn't make a change earlier, but that's what I get for not shooting much in the last few years. If I could have pulled even a half a point higher stage average on day 1 I would have won the Hunter division by 2 points and came in 8th overall. Hats off to the guys that didn't make these mistakes and they for sure earned their spots.
My results:
I managed to squeeze out 3rd place in Hunter division and 19th overall with my 14# 25 SAUM of course shooting our 131 ACE Blackjacks at 3280fps. The majority of other shooters that I saw were shooting magnum 7mm's or 30cals with 180-230g bullets. I didn’t have a single equipment issue all weekend which allows me to focus on what I’m doing. Thanks to Matt Parry for the friendship and skills on the lathe to make it all shoot great and function flawlessly.
The Hunter division classification was just a rifle weight restriction. The rifle, equipped with glass, sling, mag and bipod had to weigh less than 16#.
We also shot a tie breaker stage with ShotMarker and I laid down a 2.7” group at 953 yards in a pretty stiff wind. So needless to say, all my misses were on the nut behind the bolt (me).
Blackjack Bullets offers a large incentive to shoot this match with the 131g ACE. $2,570 dollars to the top Blackjack shooter and $10,000 if you win the match overall! This year Miles, shooting his 257 Weatherby open gun at ~3400 fps got the top Blackjack shooter with 79 points, I was one point behind with 78. However we presented the Big check to Austin as he came in the top (non-owner) Blackjack shooter with 76 points running our 257 Blackjack cartridge.
The 9 shooters that chose to run the 131g ACE: with only 4.7% of the field of 191 shooter. And taking 12% of the top 25 is a pretty good showing if you ask me.
Overall it was a fantastic match and it was great to get to see some people from all over the country that I hadn't seen in years. Also super cool to meet some new friends and customers that I had talked with through email and phone for the last couple years. Hopefully I get to hit a couple more matches this year but if i don't, You can count on seeing me at the NF ELR steel challenge 2021! only 355 days to go.....
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