Dave
(Or shooter number 88...
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drizzico |
2008 Carolina Cup When are you shooting? |
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Ok, the Cup is less than two weeks away. What squad are you shooting in. I'm in Squad 18 and will be shooting Friday Afternoon and Saturday Morning.
Dave (Or shooter number 88... |
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Peter R |
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Thursday, squad 3. I am really looking forward to this match. Hopefully the match lives up to the hype. Everyone I know that has shot this match raves about
it.
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Bubba |
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Wow... Frank has gone to squads? Interesting. This has always been Open squading. Man I wish I could be there. Work is killing me this year.
Have a great time down there. Give my best to Frank & Paula. Tell um Bubba said.... Beef r BBQ.... Pig r bacon.
Bubba
http://www.dbl-tap.com |
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Bill Nesbitt |
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Friday morning. Squad 9.
Bill |
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Dragoon |
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Squad 23 - Friday PM - Shooting with the Italians!
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esp38super |
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I am shooting Fri. pm and Sat. am in squad 20.
Tom a08281
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Glockaholic Girl |
The Cup | ||
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I'll be shooting Wednesday & will see all of you at one point or another.
Good luck to everyone!
Kitty Richards
Si vis pacem, para bellum - Flavius Vegetius Renatus Guns are like shoes - a woman should have one in every caliber "Dude, you say 'militia' like it's a bad thing..." |
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MadcapMagician |
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Squad 16, Friday AM.
Looking forward to this! Anyone else staying at the Comfort Inn at Creedmoor?
Sean M.
SSP & CDP/MA ESP/EX now ESP/MA!! Who Dares Wins |
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drizzico |
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MadcapMagician wrote: Unfortunately I'm not, but I am staying at the Econo Lodge in Oxford. Dave |
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Bill Nesbitt |
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Is the smoke going to be cleared out in time for the Cup? There are fires to the East that are creating bad air quality.
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johes |
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It's been pretty clear today. I think next week should be fine. Sounds like it's going to be cooler, anyway. I went up Wednesday to help with setup and
there's going to be some great stages this year,
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Scuba Simpleton |
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There was no smoke at all until yesterday when the wind direction shifted. The smoke was very noticeable yesterday, but much better today. Actually, the
density of the smoke is pretty localized and variable, depending on the prevailing wind direction. It changed at least twice yesterday. They expect more
smoke in the area overnight.
The weather for next week is supposed to be much better. I have no idea about the wind direction. I would not expect the smoke to be an issue, since it wasn't yesterday or today. The fire will reportedly smolder for quite a while in the peat in the ground. All of the stages are up and target locations are set. Monday and Tuesday were brutal. After the temperatures got out of the triple digits, it seemed almost pleasant. There are quite a few poppers behind paper as activators. Zeros and most -1s will do the job. There are electronically activated pneumatic targets. You will see swingers, winkers, rise and fall, and four stages of bullet eating trees. There are stages that will challenge the masters, but not be impossible for the marksman. There are options. Bob |
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tflhndn |
Carolina Cup - Squad 18... | ||
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I too will be on Squad 18. Look forward to seeing you there.
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Glockaholic Girl |
SOs shot today and.... | ||
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...can I just tell y'all that this was the most fun I've had with my clothes on?????
Frank & crew are amazing. Well run, organized match, fabulous hospitality, and deceptively simple stages that will kick your booty. The most impressive thing is that all of their props work every time. The folks are a BAD influence on me, however: Bones let me shoot his revolver (I will never admit this to him, but I loved it) and now I want one!! I want it badly! I want it NOW! I want it more than shoes.... I also want a new 9MM (those who know me well can say 'I told you so' - but only 25 times, then it gets old). Seeing so many talented shooters & cool guns makes me think I don't own nearly as many firearms as I should - maybe it's Frank's special peach firewater that is getting to me... See you at The Range!
Kitty Richards
Si vis pacem, para bellum - Flavius Vegetius Renatus Guns are like shoes - a woman should have one in every caliber "Dude, you say 'militia' like it's a bad thing..." |
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Mathew NJ |
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The match course of fire is amazing. I mean unreal, what looks like a
real simple stage ended up kicking my butt. And it is nice to see every stage go off exactly as designed. No mechanical failures of moving props. The SOs were equally as good, with the usual amazing calls that were spot on, peppered with the occasional you have got to be f-ing kidding me calls. Judgment calls that defy logic tend to be the sour notes in every IDPA match, a problem I wish I could offer a positive suggestion for improvement, but I think this tends to be too ingrained to the sport, and may be the type of thing that drives shooters away from participation.. Time will tell. Some of the areas that could use improvement include: Right sizing the squads, we had to wait an average of ONE HOUR at every bay as the squad in front of us was nearly twice the size of ours. I am so glad I brought a newspaper to read, The REPETED suggestions/requests to improve the wait by allowing our squad to 'play through' to one of the TWO open bays up ahead, or splitting the big squad in two continually fell on deaf ears. And I was rather surprised that after paying a match fee of 150$, we were be expected to pay for lunch, Plus the match provided no water for the shooters. I am well aware that the match puts a BBQ on at the end, and kudos to them for that, however I still find that a tad unusual. Again, the competitive side of the match far exceeded my expectations, and was outstanding. I just can't offer the same accolades at the execution; perhaps I have an unreasonable standard for a match at this level, but I think this event fell short. The end result has me ambivalent about shooting it again. Please don't tell my mother
I'm a pilot, she thinks I play piano in a
whorehouse.
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loomis1266 |
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" wait an average of ONE HOUR at every bay " + "one of the TWO open bays up ahead"
That would totally messed my mojo up... Rich |
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Peter R |
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loomis1266 wrote: It really hurt Steve's. I have never seen him so out of sorts. The actual shooting part of the match was fantastic. Great stages, that were well thought out and provided as stern as test of you shooting skills as I have ever seen at an IDPA match. So from that perspective it was fantastic and well worth the money and the expense of travel. Some of the ancillary stuff detracted from the match experience. I suppose the same could be said of any major match but the long down time made getting in any sort of grove impossible. Personally I had a solid match right up until the last pit where I got sideways and had not one but two failures to neutralize. I was down 44 points through 15 stages and gave up 15 on the last one. The whole water/food thing wouldn't have bothered me as much as it did if it had been communicated to us before hand. Luckily we went to the Walmart in Henderson the night before and bought a case of water just in case. If we hadn't we would have been up the creek without a paddle. A little advanced notice would have been nice. I hope that doesn't sound like I am nitpicking as it was a really good match overall and we had a squad of the nicest people you would ever want to spend 8 hours with. |
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Scuba Simpleton |
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This was about my fifth Carolina Cup, and the squading actually decreased the wait for stages overall. There was one squad on Thursday that became too
large due to walk up registrations. There were also a group of shooters who did not start with their assigned squad, and overloaded the already oversized
squad. That caused a backup behind them for a couple squads. I think I was two or three squads behind them. The "lost" group was reunited with
their assigned squad after a few stages, and order was generally restored. Adding to the delay was the fact that the SOs had not run any squads prior to
Thursday and they were still trying to learn one another and become more efficient at moving shooters. There were SOs from around the country supplementing
the local SOs. Two stages had SOs primarily from other states who may not have been as familiar as the regular NC/SC SOs of how to move large numbers of
shooters efficiently through the bay. In past years, SOs were only responsible for one stage per day. This year, they were responsible for two stages back to
back. In short, shooting assigned squads worked very well and increased the number of shooters who had an opportunity to shoot the match. The down side was
an occassional delay. Routine delays of an hour would shock me. I don't believe it happened, but if it did, it will not again. All shooters finished
ahead of schedule yesterday and today. I have no doubt they will finish ahead of schedule tomorrow.
When I shoot a major match, or any match, I assume I am responsible for everything I need to shoot that match including food and water. If there is
anything provided, it is a pleasant surprise. The match announcement says, "Awards and a Carolina-style
pork barbecue dinner will follow the shooting on Saturday, June 21st. The dinner is free to all shooters and their
guests." Different matches spend their money different ways. Some buy raffle prizes, some spend money on quality stages, allow SOs to shoot for free,
pay for hotel rooms for out of town SOs, and provide a meal for all participants and guests before the awards. There was food and drink available for purchase
on site for a very fair price. That money belongs to the people who ran the concession.
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Mathew NJ |
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Scuba Simpleton wrote: No they were not routine, that would imply that is was the
regular course of procedure, and that is not the case, I can, again, say on AVERAGE, it was an hour for EVERY SINGLE BAY except the first and the last.
Sometimes it was only 45mins, sometimes well over hour. It was so bad that the running joke in our squad was "they are almost done" (as that was the
claim of the SOs when we would show up and they were 4 shooters into the first of two stages...) .
I stand corrected, the match fee was 125 not 150. With that correction; Being expected to pay for water is merely ridiculous, and no longer ludicrous. "SOs are not paid. "
People make mistakes - but when the arbitration process is generally described as 'if you have a problem bring it to the CSO to give him the chance to agree with the SO' what is the point? It takes someone with more than macadam of humility, to accept that they made an error. And that is rare in any competition, it is even more rare when the disagreement is between the infractor and his cognoscente. This is the problem with IDPA that I reference. This is my first C-Cup, and having been told that previous events had no squadding is something I would love to see,
from a distance. Holy crap is all I can say. I just have a mental image
similar to the 2nd graders playing soccer, just a huge pod of people, moving in unison like a swarm of
bees. That must be interesting…
Please don't tell my mother
I'm a pilot, she thinks I play piano in a
whorehouse.
Last Edited By: Mathew NJ
06/21/08 06:42:34.
Edited 2 times.
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Peter R |
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Bob, I was in Mathew's squad and the wait behind that oversized squad got progessively longer as the day drew on. Not only were they oversized but they
appeared to have several shooters that took forever and a day to get themselves ready to shoot. An hour might have been on the long side but after lunch there
were at least two bays where our wait approached an hour the rest were easily 30 minute waits. We were told that Frank had set aside 50 minutes for each bay
and that the squad ahead of us seemed to easily exceed that at every pit. The entire squad asked several times to shoot through and were told politely no. In
fairness to Frank we only finished the match 40 minutes off the published schedule, but if there were no issues with the squad ahead of us we would have been
two hours ahead of schedule. It really effected some guys in our squad, for me it wasn't that big of a deal as the weather was perfect and the company even
better.
To be clear, no one is attacking Frank, the SO's or the match itself merely making an observation about our experience. If you really question what Matt is saying I can provide you with the names and e-mail addresses of several other shooters in our squad. They will tell exactly what Matt did. Was I surprised? Hell no. I knew going in that going that there would probably be issues from the change in the match format. Change always creates a set of unforseen problems no matter how diligent the match officials are. Acknowledging issues isn't the same as condemning everyone involved with the match. Mathew and I are not a couple of wet behind the ears shooters. Both of us have attended too many major matches to count. Both of us have worked multiple major matches as SO's and CSO's, and both of us spend too much of our free time helping to run two local matches. We are well aware of how difficult a major match is to run, officiate and administrate, and neither of us would ever demean another match or match official. If it seems that way than I apologize. I am sorry that it seems like you have taken our personal observations as some form of attack, but I certainly understand it. As I said before the match was great despite a couple of issues. I think both of us has made that fairly clear. |
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Scuba Simpleton |
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It is too late and I am too tired. It is unfortunate that you followed the squad you did, but for the most part there was little or no waiting. That does not
change your experience since you were behind a slow squad. I was on site for the entire match. I shot Thursday and was free to move from stage to stage
Friday and Saturday at will. What you experienced was unique. Frank was without 3 or 4 of his go to guys simply because they could not make the match or
adapt to the schedule. As I said, lessons learned and notes taken. But don't forget, more shooters participated and on AVERAGE, the waits were shorter.
I checked on the water. There were at least four water coolers out in the bays. There were sun shelters on every bay or shade. Again, I'm sorry your experience was not 100%, but it was not representative of the typical experience. Most of the award winners were there. The drawing and side shoot prizes provided by Smith & Wesson, were very impressive and showed their support of shooting sports. The prizes provided by Blackwater went beyond what was advertised and included several multiple day courses. The barbeque was good with plenty to eat and it was great to see old friends. The rains stayed to the south and the post match festivities went well past dark. Bob |
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