Finding a shoot near me.

[shenck]

I need help locating a shoot near me. Recently my youngest son has shown interest in shooting competition. He wants to shoot rim fire pistol. The NSSF steel challenge looks to be just the thing to get started. I thought a Google search would show me an abundance of places to take him to, but I couldn't locate any. I live almost dead center PA. if you can give me some info it would be greatly appreciated. We just want to watch a match or two before he competes.

 

[Armored farmer]

I would bend backwards to help you find a shoot if you're bringing a kid.
Unfortunately, im into trapshooting, not steel.
Im sure you will get some tips.
There are "where to shoot" apps available.

 

[shenck]

Amen on the kids. I bought my youngest son a 22/45, and in march I had to qualify, he asked if he could come along. The instructor allowed him to shoot. He out shot two veterans. 944 out of 1000. He was hooked. He asked about shooting competitions. We made some mods to his pistol. We were shooting this evening, and he is improving every time. I think the next step is to watch a shoot. I have a grandson that is showing interest also, this could get expensive. ☺

 

[egd]

Go to Practiscore.com and click on matches. You can narrow the search down to X miles from your home. The steel challenge shoots would be a good place to start.

 

[shenck]

Thank you egd. I think I found one to go to. Much appreciated. If anyone else has suggestions please let me know. Who knows maybe I'll get the urge to complete.

 

[Hoser]

www.uspsa.com has a club finder that will show you clubs in your area.

Many USPSA affiliated clubs have steel challenge clubs associated with them.

 

[thomas15]

He wants to shoot rim fire pistol. The NSSF steel challenge looks to be just the thing to get started. I thought a Google search would show me an abundance of places to take him to, but I couldn't locate any. I live almost dead center PA. if you can give me some info it would be greatly appreciated. We just want to watch a match or two before he competes.

PA is as close to steel shooters heaven as it gets....

National HQs:

https://steelchallenge.com/

http://www3.nssf.org/rimfire/
see this for matches http://www.rimfirechallenge.org/

Some PA area shoots:
https://sites.google.com/site/midatlanticshootingsports/

PA Steel League www.steelshooters.com

East Coast Steel Challenge http://eastcoaststeelchampionship.com/

Some PA clubs that have shoots:
http://www.blueridgesportsmanclub.com/events-3/

https://pricetowngun.org/

http://www.keystonesportsmenassociation.com/

http://fscweb.org/

http://www.blueridgesportsmanclub.com/
^^ near harrisburg, not to be confused with...

http://brcv-rodgun.org/
^^in the Poconos


FOR EXAMPLE: I'm shooting a steel match Tomorrow (5/26/18) the next day (5/27/18), Next Saturday (6/2/18), the following Sunday (6/3/18) and so on.

PM me if I can be of any assistance. I can put you in touch with other venues or people in just about anywhere in PA, I can also help you get your son ready by letting you know what you need to know, how to prepare and so forth.

For rimfire all you need is eyes and ears, a semi-auto rimfire pistol, at least 5 magazines (6+ for new shooters is better) and a case/rug to take the firearm to the line (no holsters for rimfire). Also need a chamber flag ( a zip string will work). As another poster said set up an account with Practiscore www.practiscore.com Most matches in the area use practiscore to register for matches.

Tons of youtubes on this, but take your gun don't watch, shoot the match its fun. Be prepared, rimfire (in particular open rimfire) is highly competitive but still a lot of fun for the beginner, I highly recommend it!

I know that SCSA just added a new club in Pine Grove (Tulpehocken Rifle and Pistol Club).

As a point of clarification, USPSA owns the Steel Challenge. Steel Challenge (SCSA) is probably the largest static steel sanctioning body in the US. NSSF runs matches under Rimfire Challenge, similar to SCSA but obviously just rimfire. SCSA allows both rimfire and center fire, so either organization will work for you.

The East Coast Steel Challenge Championship Match in September is held in PA (near Allentown) it is the largest SCSA match in the world (bigger than the Nationals and World Shoot). Most of the top names attend this match.

 

[thomas15]

BTW shenck, in rimfire pistol the two most popular handguns are the Ruger (mark 3 or 4, 22/45) and the S&W Victory. Most shooters run open but still many iron sight. The gun you have will take your son far if he does his part. SCSA and/or Rimfire Challenge is all about speed but accuracy is important as well. The biggest issue new shooters face in my opinion is they spend too much time clearing jams/stovepipes. It is a good idea to make sure you have ammo that works in your gun and stay with that proven ammo. Saving money on a good ammo deal can be a disaster. Your time is your score.

I shoot mostly revolver in SCSA (both open and iron) but dabble in open rimfire. Not an expert on rimfire by any means but I RO and shoot a lot of matches and my advice is find a particular ammo that works and when your certain it works buy a couple 1000 rounds of it. Even as a dabbler I keep 5000 rounds of my favorite (Federal Auto-match). Take at least twice the expected amount of ammo to matches, cheap insurance. I keep 8 magazines in my range bag. Read over the rules for the particular event also.

I'm on staff at the East Coast Steel Challenge Championship Match. Last year there was a young lady age 7 on the same squad as a gentlemen in his 80s. Fun for all ages.

You mentioned up thread that you have made some mods to the gun. May I ask what mods? Not sure about Rimfire Challenge but in SCSA a compensator will put you in open even with iron sights. Iron Sights in Open is not competitive. Trigger jobs or fiber optic sights are ok in iron sight division.

Who knows maybe I'll get the urge to complete.

I know the answer to that comment.

 

[Jim Watson]

I shoot a little steel. Nearest club has shifted from own Speed Steel to regulation SC. I will find out about that tomorrow.

Reliability is important. I shoot Rimfire Pistol Irons. My old M41 is reliable with CCI Standard Velocity and is convincing me with Aquila SV which is thus far reliable and less expensive.

 

[thomas15]

^^^Aquila SV is my back up rimfire ammo. CCI Mini-Mags also but more money and harder to locate.
Remington anything will not work period. I have 1000s that I cannot use in my pistols but can in my rimfire AR

 

[shenck]

The mods are hammer bushing, to remove the mag disconnect. Slingshot slide stop, and reflex sight. This pistol was originally purchased just for teaching purposes. It's a shooter, while shooting in the sight, it was printing one hole three shot groups, with bulk ammo. If this pans out there is a mark 4 in our future.

 

[shenck]

I want to thank everyone for all the information. It's much appreciated. I have found a shoot near me, I will update as things progress.

 

[shenck]

Now I have another question. There is pistol and rifle. Do you have to shoot both? I do have a rifle that would do, but nothing fancy. If I have many more questions, I will start a new thread, now that finding shoots has been solved.

 

[egd]

If it's steel challenge-no. And you have the choice of shooting iron sights or optics on either rifle or pistol.
And if you're really a glutton for punishment, and if the match director allows (doubtful), I guess you could shoot all four. Several people shoot both a pistol and a rifle around here. I usually shoot my 9mm pistol and my pcc.

 

[thomas15]

Some matches will allow the shooter to shoot more than 1 gun at a single session others will not. This morning I shot in a steel challenge match, iron sight revolver and open revolver. I had to do them in the same order each time. As egd implies you cannot mix them up, in other words if you sign up for rimfire pistol open then all of those strings and stages must be shot with an open gun. If you register another gun, say rimfire iron, then those stages are also iron sight. So it is up to the Match Director if allowable to shoot multiple guns in the same squad/session.

Generally if you are allowed to shoot multiple guns you will probably have to do it in a way that doesn't require a change of holster/belt assembly. Of course not a problem with rimfire rifle or pistol. The reason for that is the shooters are supposed to pick up brass and paint the targets between shooters so having a bunch of shooters on a squad futzing around with several belts really slows the match down. In many matches, especially local ones, one of the shooters on your squad runs the timer, another is the score keeper. So its an all hands on deck kind of operation. All of this will make sense once you get to your first match.

A lot of shooters that travel a long distance for a match want to shoot more than 1 gun, happens all the time. The question becomes one of it being a good idea? As a beginner, I feel that learning and mastering 1 gun first is a good idea, others have a different approach. Your first match will be an eye-opener. Using steel challenge as an example, each stage consists of 5 strings (except outer limits-4). The slowest string is thrown out, add the times of the remaining 4 and that is your score for the stage. Most good open rimfire shooters can put in 4 sub 3 second strings and 8 or 10 second stages are not impossible. I shot in a local 8 stage SCSA match a few weeks ago, the top shooter in open rimfire pistol scored 79.43 seconds. That is 155 hits in less than 80 seconds, or 1 hit on average 1/2 second.

If your gun has a compensator and/or dot sight you are in open class. For your Ruger you are in Rimfire Pistol Open if you have a dot. That and rimfire rifle open are prolly the most competitive (but fun) divisions. For rifle most use either a Ruger 10/22 or S&W M&P AR-15-22 (rimfire) or variants of those.

Most steel competitions are run on a cold range. If your not sure what this means let us know.

In addition to static steel there is also falling steel. Palmyra has this and anther club near Harrisburg (name escapes me) as well as others in the state. There you have a bunch (say 30-45) steel plates/poppers/texas star/tombstones that you hit causing them to fall. There obviously you will have to do reloads but generally those are for center fire guns but not always.

Look forward to hearing about your experience.

 

[shenck]

Thanks for that info. He primarily wants to shoot pistol, but as I started looking into it, I discovered that competitors were shooting both pistol and rifle. I wasn't sure if rifle was required. But now that he knows about the rifle class, he seems interested in that also. There is a match in Lewistown June third, we are going to watch. I will keep you posted.

 

[egd]

Please, just take your gun and shoot the match. I just watched my first match and kicked myself that I didn't bring a gun. And I sucked at shooting a pistol. But I still had fun. In fact, after only a few stages I calculated that I could improve my time by just shooting the stop plate first thing and not even trying at the others.I didn't have guts enough to do it but....

 

[shenck]

Thanks for the advice. But it's my son that's interested in shooting, I wouldn't throw him into a football game without at least watching one. Don't get me wrong, but if he sticks with this, I will want to join in.

 

[egd]

Yeah, I forgot it was mainly your son that wants to start. But, depending on his age/maturity he could still just go ahead and shoot. Either way, you both will enjoy it I believe.

 

[shenck]

Here is an update. My son and I went to the Lewistown pistol club today. First thing is the guys there were first rate people, friendly and informative. Second thing edg, you were absolutely correct, I should have taken his pistol. One competitor loaned him a pistol, and they left him shoot one of the stages just for fun. Like I said they were first class people. We are in hook, line, and sinker. We are going to shoot the steel challenge there next Sunday. Thank you guys for your advice.

 

[egd]

Glad to hear you both had a good time. Thanks for the update.

 

[thomas15]

We are going to shoot the steel challenge there next Sunday.

It's all downhill from here LOL!

 

[Hoser]

Excellent news.