Several Saturday's ago, Dan Ekstrom and I headed over to Sheridan to compete in a one-day PRS shoot, just west of town. The range they have is absolutely beautiful and a picture wouldn't begin to describe the beauty.
We had 8 to 10 shots per stage on average and most of the time there would be one shot per target for a given shooting position on each stage. PRS matches are known for this and the shooting time is relatively short, especially when using a single shot XP-100. At first, I thought I would use my center grip fast twist 223 HSP, but I was really looking for something that was heavier, and I ended up deciding to use my 20 BR (1-8 twist 15" McGowen barrel/Dell trigger/Aaron Alexander's stock and brake/Burris XTR-III 3.3-18x50 with SCR MOA reticle) that Aaron built. I use the 55 grain Berger, and the muzzle velocity is at 3173 ft./s. It is extremely accurate.
Ckye-Pod bipod, Holland's small rear field bag, and several PRS type bags were used as well.
I had a lot of fun, there are times when I timed out, and was not able to get to shoot all of my shots, from all of the different shooting positions, but that was OK. I didn't go to win anything, I went to learn, have fun, to shoot under pressure and time, which involved weird shooting positions. I did come in at the top half of the group (barely), which made me feel good. When we called to ask about whether I could shoot an XP-100 and the 20 BR itself earlier in the week, he was unsure a little bit at first, for several reasons, but allowed me to come and shoot anyway. Now it's not going to be a problem. The timeframe for each stage was two minutes and 30 seconds for every stage. For instance, on stage one you had to engage from the five different designated positions on the fence and shot each target, which was there two of them one time.
Move to the second shooting position and again shoot those same two targets in the same order, the new to the next place on the fence and do the same.
When I first saw the course of fire several days before the match and noticed on stage eight, where we would be shooting from three different logs, and saw the distances and that there were mule deer, elk, and Whitetail steel targets out there. I thought that one's going to be easy. To my surprise when I got there, I found out that these animals were more coyote size and did not resemble anything size wise of an actual big game animal except for the outline. I should've known better.
For what it's worth, every animal that was listed as a target, was smaller than its actual size.
These shoots at Sheridan, and at some other places that are within about a 2 or 3 hour drive from Gillette are one day shoots on Saturdays, for the most part. I want to be able to do some more of these in the future. It was just too much fun.
What made it so fun, was the men and women that were participating in it. It was a family friendly environment. A big shout out to Dan. Dan attended this match in March. He's the one that invited me to come to this one. I wouldn't have known it was going on unless he had been checking, and had invited me. On a side note, Dan had a rough day, as his gun was definitely having issues, and he has still have not figured it out yet what's going on with that. When one of Dan's guns is shooting an inch and a half group at 100 yards, you know there's a problem. I also got to see a number of folks from Gillette area as well, and some of them I haven't seen in several years-Good times.
We had 8 to 10 shots per stage on average and most of the time there would be one shot per target for a given shooting position on each stage. PRS matches are known for this and the shooting time is relatively short, especially when using a single shot XP-100. At first, I thought I would use my center grip fast twist 223 HSP, but I was really looking for something that was heavier, and I ended up deciding to use my 20 BR (1-8 twist 15" McGowen barrel/Dell trigger/Aaron Alexander's stock and brake/Burris XTR-III 3.3-18x50 with SCR MOA reticle) that Aaron built. I use the 55 grain Berger, and the muzzle velocity is at 3173 ft./s. It is extremely accurate.
Ckye-Pod bipod, Holland's small rear field bag, and several PRS type bags were used as well.
I had a lot of fun, there are times when I timed out, and was not able to get to shoot all of my shots, from all of the different shooting positions, but that was OK. I didn't go to win anything, I went to learn, have fun, to shoot under pressure and time, which involved weird shooting positions. I did come in at the top half of the group (barely), which made me feel good. When we called to ask about whether I could shoot an XP-100 and the 20 BR itself earlier in the week, he was unsure a little bit at first, for several reasons, but allowed me to come and shoot anyway. Now it's not going to be a problem. The timeframe for each stage was two minutes and 30 seconds for every stage. For instance, on stage one you had to engage from the five different designated positions on the fence and shot each target, which was there two of them one time.
Move to the second shooting position and again shoot those same two targets in the same order, the new to the next place on the fence and do the same.
When I first saw the course of fire several days before the match and noticed on stage eight, where we would be shooting from three different logs, and saw the distances and that there were mule deer, elk, and Whitetail steel targets out there. I thought that one's going to be easy. To my surprise when I got there, I found out that these animals were more coyote size and did not resemble anything size wise of an actual big game animal except for the outline. I should've known better.
For what it's worth, every animal that was listed as a target, was smaller than its actual size.
These shoots at Sheridan, and at some other places that are within about a 2 or 3 hour drive from Gillette are one day shoots on Saturdays, for the most part. I want to be able to do some more of these in the future. It was just too much fun.
What made it so fun, was the men and women that were participating in it. It was a family friendly environment. A big shout out to Dan. Dan attended this match in March. He's the one that invited me to come to this one. I wouldn't have known it was going on unless he had been checking, and had invited me. On a side note, Dan had a rough day, as his gun was definitely having issues, and he has still have not figured it out yet what's going on with that. When one of Dan's guns is shooting an inch and a half group at 100 yards, you know there's a problem. I also got to see a number of folks from Gillette area as well, and some of them I haven't seen in several years-Good times.
