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On Saturday I made it down to the National Pistol Championships at Camp Perry, OH to visit my dad (Ron Granroth), old shooting buddy Bob Gardner, and the Springfield Armory/Ottowa Sportsmen’s Club Junior Pistol team. Congratulations to the junior team … Continue reading
Today I shot an 824-19X out of 900 at the match at the Flushing Rifle & Pistol Club. I definitely shot better than my last match, a 785 shot at Grand Rapids.
I’m still getting these crazy fliers that really sink the scores. Most of my fliers were high and right, although a few were off to the left.
Here are the targets.
The scores were 89 and 88 for slow fires. 86, 91, 94 for NMC. 96 and 91 for timed fire. 97 and 92 for rapid fire.
The slow fires were good scores for me, but the rest was too erratic. It’s those fliers. I’m shooting too fast. Some of the timed and rapid fires I probably shot in 6 or 7 seconds. I forced myself to hold the gun up for the whole rapid fire string, even though I finished shooting. I could’ve fired another 2 or 3 shots.
For the next match, I intend to hold the slow fires about where they are, but shoot nothing lower than a 95 for the rest. I’ll do that by slowing down so I can take each shot when it’s ready, so as to do away with those fliers.
Finally, I competed in a real pistol match.
Throughout the 1990s I competed regularly, but in about the last ten years I’ve competed in only one sanctioned bullseye pistol tournament. That was about three years ago. Sure, I’ve shot in some pistol leagues here and there, but it’s not quite the same.
This one was a couple weeks ago at the Grand Rapids Rifle and Pistol Club. The match was called well, the indoor range was in great shape, and it was a neat surprise that 9-time National Champion Brian Zins showed up to compete. That was cool.
At 785 of 900 possible, my own shooting was a bit of a, well, a debacle. 
That’s an 87.2 average, for a middle-of-the-road Sharpshooter score.
I still had a good time. I really like being on the firing line, and I’ve been more driven since that match. Next time, I’ll be a bit more competitive.
I’ve been dry-firing, and in a league shoot this past Tuesday, I broke out of a 4-week rut of scattered groups and fired a 284 in a 300-point National Gallery Course. That’s a 94.67 average, which is an excellent match for me. I’d like to see that level of shooting become normal.