Some folks in Western WI. sure can put on a great event.
A few of us traveled to Durand WI. a bunch of locals put on a shooting event that was fun and challenging. They had 46 folks attending and the equipment used was a variety of bolt action rifles used for hunting to some really impressive stuff.
After everyone signed in they had a pre-shoot meeting at 10:00am and the group was prepared for the day, we were also paired up in a random draw two man teams and then the large group was also split into two groups.
Range 1 – all shot laying on the ground
Group 1 started on a course which you as a individual had to shoot 5 rounds at a paper target at 200 yards in which was scored for the tightest group.
Then you and your partner had to shoot at the small common size .5 water bottles that were set up in a field, each team had two rows of water bottles that were from 100 yards out to 500 yards and set up every 10 yards total bottle count per team 80 and you had 80 minutes and a max of 80 bullets – 40 bullets per team member to hit as many bottles as possible. Another challenge here with 14 teams shooting was to make sure you were aiming at your row of bottles, they had good row markers every 150 yards or so
Then after counting broken and leaking bottles and replacing. We then rotated to range 2 where the 2nd group had been shooting
Range 2 – Also laying on the ground but they did have a portable bench for those that could not lay down on the ground well.
Range 2 consisted of having to shoot at some steel targets that were at – 182, 283, 397, 491 and 577 you were told the distance just prior to have to shoot. The steel plates were 5″ close up to 15″at the 577 if I had to guess. The shooter had 2 minutes to shoot the steel and a max allowed bullet count being 10 rounds. You had to hit the steel target in order to move to the next distance and they scored first round hits different from 2nd, 3rd or what ever it took.
Then after all was finished they had a elimination bracket for everyone where when called to the line you had one minute to get your gun in position pointing at a row of Plaster Casted Prairie Dogs hanging on a panel set at 100 yards. They had two rows of five dogs set up per panel on two different panels allowing 4 shooters to fire when told. So for example Bob and Joe would be shooting it out on the left panel and Mark and Gary would be on the right panel each having 5 dogs to hit. So after getting your gun pointed and loaded you had to stand up behind your gun wait for the call to fire, then drop to the ground aim and fire, if you hit your 5 dogs before your opponet you continued on in the bracket. Here again some very impressive shooting.
All of the events were shot with bolt guns and you had to single feed the rounds per shot. There was mix of shooters Men, Ladies and some very impressive shooting youth. After everything was done they had a whole bunch of grilled chicken and fixings and you could then bring out your refreshments of choice.
I shot my 260 and my partner I had used a 243 and we shot respectable on the bottles getting into the 300 plus yardage range.
The 100 yard dog event I just had a feller that could load, aim and shoot well faster then I could but talk about a lot of fun.
My good feeling moment.
The steel course – 182,283,397,491 and 577 yards all first round hits in 38 seconds, but I did get taken out by someone that got it done in 32 seconds, not bad for single feeding a bolt gun.
It seemed like there were a lot of folks from Western WI.and MN. I spoke with a shooter that came from Rochester, MN. as well.
As stated before some folks can put on a fun and safe event in Western WI. We will be making the trip again next year.
