Difference between bullseye and free style shooting?

What is the difference between these 2 shooting sports? I see free style pistols are single shots.

If you mean "Free Pistol", then the biggest difference is the scoring rings are about half the size of an NRA target and its 60 shots slow fire.
Its kinda line NRA slow fire, but with .22 only.  By "free" it means there are limited requirements for the pistol outside of open sights only and .22 RF.  Too bad its not an Olympic event anymore.
CR

Free Pistol is f*cking difficult.

Sincerely,

Some guy who just "won" a "National Championship" in a Free Pistol event.

(First time I've won anything in Free Pistol since 1997, IIRC. I'm as surprised as you are.)

Congrats John,

That's fantastic. I'm thrilled when I am in the black

John, do you find Free Pistol more difficult than Air Pistol?

Free Pistol is...

• 60 shots in 75 minutes (IIRC)
  
• Sighters allowed
  
• 22LR only
  
• Single shot. I am pretty sure if you use a repeater you have to single load
  
• Longer barrel allowed
  
• Open sights only
  
• Longer sight radius allowed
  
• No minimum trigger weight but must be actuated by a finger on the shooting hand and no release triggers allowed
  
• Wrap-around grips allowed
  
• The Formula 1 of shooting. Shame on IOC for eliminating the pinnacle of shooting from the Olympics!
  

Outthere wrote:John, do you find Free Pistol more difficult than Air Pistol?

I think all who have shot both would agree that Free Pistol is definitely more difficult than Air Pistol. Speaking for myself, my average AP scores are about 30 points higher than my FP scores.

-Free Pistol time is two hours.
-The unlimited sighters are fired within that two hour time, up front, so once you take your first record shot, you are not allowed any more sighters.

Hopefully Ted Carter will chime in! I believe he was really involved in this type of Shooting

SteveT wrote:

• The Formula 1 of shooting. Shame on IOC for eliminating the pinnacle of shooting from the Olympics!
  

This has been discussed to death on other forums.
The shame lies with the ISSF, Continental Confederations, and the National Federations for continuing to hold Free Pistol as a men's only sport.
The IOC demanded the following of ALL sports:
- No increase in the number of events.
- Equal number of events for men and women. Meaning one woman's event for every men's event.

In 2016 there were 9 men's events and 6 womens events. So to meet the criteria, two men's events needed eliminated, one woman's event needed to be added, and a mixed team event needed to be created.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_at_the_Summer_Olympics)

If the ISSF had made women's free pistol an event years ago, there may have been the chance to add an event to shooting events to make them even. Then there wouldn't have to be the elimination of a men's event and the creation of a mixed team event to reach gender parity.

Shame lies with the national federations for not promoting all manner of ISSF recognised events and not pushing the ISSF events to to all become gender neutral.

That push should have been made back in the late 70's after the Olympic shooting events in '76 were mixed and some medals were won by women.

That all said, I do enjoy shooting my Drulov 75 with a set trigger and wondering what having a proper modern Free Pistol would be like...

To bad they don't shoot it in the Olympics. It just takes to much time to shoot the event.

smsnyder wrote:To bad they don't shoot it in the Olympics. It just takes to much time to shoot the event.

The time required has nothing to do with why the event was dropped by the ISSF for the Olympics.

This makes me sad. As a woman just starting out in competitive precision shooting, I would be very excited to be able to aspire to Olympic level skill if I knew there was opportunity.

The shooting events were “gender neutral” for many years.  All that changed when Cpt. Margaret Murdoch almost won the 50 Meter smallbore rifle event in Montreal.  Her team mate Lanny Bassham suggested a shoot off, but the officials “Creedmoored” Murdoch from the win.  Lanny Pulled Margaret up to the 1st position on the podium when they played the Anthem.

After that Olympics the ISU and the Olympics separated shooting by sexes ; I believe this was insisted on by the Russians.

valbern67 wrote:This makes me sad. As a woman just starting out in competitive precision shooting, I would be very excited to be able to aspire to Olympic level skill if I knew there was opportunity.

You have the opportunity to shoot Ladies Sport Pistol (same course of fire as Men's Centerfire) and Ladies Air Pistol. Please look into it. We could use some new blood out there and from what I've seen you have great potential. If you choose to pursue shooting these events, I highly recommend getting a coach to teach/train you how to correctly approach shooting them.

So you can still be an Olympian!

Jon

Re difficulty, consider...

The scoring rings of a scaled 50 foot FP target are almost identical to those of a 10M AP target. And the distance is roughly 50% further.

Yeah, it's kinda hard. Especially with a single loaded sport pistol.

WesG wrote:Re difficulty, consider...

The scoring rings of a scaled 50 foot FP target are almost identical to those of a 10M AP target. And the distance is roughly 50% further.

Yeah, it's kinda hard. Especially with a single loaded sport pistol.

Beat me to it.

Plus, free pistol has the highest ratio of "that shot felt good" to "WTF?" of any shooting sport I've attempted.

Second place is 600 yard service rifle prone.

Also high ratios of "I hope that was in the black" to "holy s*it that was a 10" in both of the above.

john bickar wrote:Beat me to it.

Plus, free pistol has the highest ratio of "that shot felt good" to "WTF?" of any shooting sport I've attempted.

Second place is 600 yard service rifle prone.

Also high ratios of "I hope that was in the black" to "holy s*it that was a 10" in both of the above.

Strange.  I never had issues at 600.  When I got back to 600 I could almost guarantee a solid 190 or better.  Even with M118 “Special” Ball.  My biggest inconsistency was 300 Rapid.  Groups would shift all over.  Never could really get it dialed in.

.

john bickar wrote:
Beat me to it.

Plus, free pistol has the highest ratio of "that shot felt good" to "WTF?" of any shooting sport I've attempted.

Second place is 600 yard service rifle prone.

Also high ratios of "I hope that was in the black" to "holy s*it that was a 10" in both of the above.

Somehow, I don't think you've ever enjoyed the confidence booster of your first shot hitting the target carrier ;-)

And the World Record is ...

I did actually shoot my 150 recently after getting some LH grips on it. I was really surprised how sharp the recoil was compared to a SA or revolver.

As for prone, try 1k with irons. Or worse, F-Class off a Harris bipod. 'Hey, that looks like a pretty good shot'. 'Wait, how can *THAT* be a 7?'

Wobbley wrote:The shooting events were “gender neutral” for many years.  

After that Olympics the ISU and the Olympics separated shooting by sexes ; I believe this was insisted on by the Russians.

Not entirely true. Shooting was exclusively a men's sport until 68 when they were mixed for the 68, 72, and 76 Olympics (I stand corrected on when the first mixed events were). Not so sure about the validity of saying it was because a woman almost won. The Olympics in 1980 were in Russia and the events were also open to men and women. But only 5 women participated. In 84 the unbalanced womens program was added.

The sports weren't just separated though. The ISSF rulebook is unbalanced in which events are men's and which are women's.

The mishandling of splitting the genders after '80 directly led to the elimination of Free Pistol as an Olympic event now. Free Pistol will not be an Olympic Event again until:
- Free Pistol is recognised as a women's sport by the ISSF.
- International competition is held with significant international participation in women's Free Pistol.
- Olympic shooting drops a man's and a woman's discipline to add men's and women's Free Pistol.

The focus on the Olympics is nonsense. Once the focus is only at a prestige event, the sport is on a downward spiral. Focus has to be on regional, national, continental, and international world cups. The ISSF focus on Olympic events is probably why the initial unbalanced womans program in 1984 was justified (need to have sufficient high level participants) but the subsequent failure to develop womens participation in all sports leading up to and following '84 is inexcusable.

Without grassroots participation there are no athletes with which to run an Olympic program.

The basis of the Olympics was showcasing amateur sport. And whether amateur or the current mix of professional, most ISSF shooting events unfortunately doesn't really meet the requirement of having wide international participation. Turning national and continental federations focus away from the Olympics and towards supporting and growing the sport is going to be very difficult.

The current national Olympic programs to focus on podium possibilities first is going to hurt all sports except for those with large public appeal following current fads in the end.

On a side note, I called many shooters to task on the whining that was surrounding the elimination of men's 50M rifle prone from the Olympics. How they could complain that the event was critical to the development of 3-position while ignoring the fact women never had a rifle prone event in the Olympics showed a deep ingrained bias.

Jon Eulette wrote:I think with all the anti gun crap going on around the world that that was part of the removal of 50m pistol from the Olympics. Modern Pentathlon uses laser pistols now. Running Target went by the way side. Unfortunately politics has too large a roll in all of this.

Lack of firearms culture around the world has led to the development of air pistol and air rifle events.

The only politics in FP and 50m prone removal was:
- no more althletes
- no more events
- equal number of events for men and women

Can't blame anti-gun politics for the sad level of all the ISSF sports in the USA or Canada or other places. Practical shooting thrives in all sorts of places that ISSF events struggle or don't exist. Practical shooting will have more claim to be an Olympic sport shortly (if it doesn't already) than the traditional shooting events.

Modern pentathlon going to that laser toy was more driven by graft, I think.  When only one company sells the equipment...you can reach your own conclusions.

Politics does have too large a role, but the real problem is that the IOC is effectively a wholly owned subsidiary of NBC Sports.  Which suffers an obscene left-wing bias, and is terribly myopic about sports to boot.  Their mindset is that "sport" involves balls and money.  The gripes the shooting community has are echoed by the fencers...and a whole lot of other people.

I personally think the IOC needs to break up the Summer Games into a Spring Games with indoor sports, a Summer Games with water sports, and an Autumn Games with outdoor sports.  The logistics of a Summer Games as currently constituted are daunting.

Follow the money.

Olympic Committee wants as much for the broadcasting rights as they can get.   Broadcasters know how much they can get from advertisers. Advertisers want to pay for ads that people will see.  People don't want to watch "paint drying sports", ergo shooting sports out and beach volleyball gets 50% of the airtime.

There isn't only the Olympics weenies...

Check out some better sport competitions:

2019 Military World Games

Shooting at the 2019 Military World Games