New Bullseye shooters?

by jjbhonn 8/10/2024, 10:29 am

The Turkish Air Pistol shooter Yusuf Dikec has been embraced by fellow non-shooting Olympians for his appearance, style and form. I wonder if the Bullseye community can take advantage his appeal to attract new shooters to our sport.

by BE Mike 8/10/2024, 10:51 am

jjbhonn wrote:The Turkish Air Pistol shooter Yusuf Dikec has been embraced by fellow non-shooting Olympians for his appearance, style and form. I wonder if the Bullseye community can take advantage his appeal to attract new shooters to our sport.

The best way to attract new shooters to Precision Pistol is to invite someone to try it out and to have a welcoming atmosphere. Once or twice, I was ridiculed at a match, but stuff like that rolls off my back, like water to a duck. Others may be turned off by that. One-on-one is the best way. Precision pistol shooting is difficult and isn't for everyone. International Pistol Shooting is even harder and isn't popular in the US.

by SingleActionAndrew 8/10/2024, 11:11 am

I've been asked tens of times about that guy now, from family and work friends who know my past time. It's certainly been positive for the perception of our sport and I hope more take it up with the good publicity.

by jjbhonn 8/10/2024, 6:45 pm

We all know the intricacies and difficulties of this sport and at my advanced age, the endurance required. Perhaps we can start with baby steps: talk about the simplicity (t-shirt and regular glasses) of one-handed pistol shooting and follow the lead of non-pistol shooting Olympians who have embraced its beauty without highlighting what we endure to achieve our goal.
But should we wait for potential new shooters to ask if Bullseye is compatible to Olympic Air Pistol, or should we be proactive and let the young people know what we are all about? I think publicity is the right word.
Over the years, I have witnessed a trickle of new shooters while watching many leave the sport. Is it possible to initiate a campaign to invigorate our sport, following what we have recently witnessed? What do you think?

by troystaten 8/11/2024, 6:00 pm

One suggestion for new shooters would be just to keep score, even if they are shooting at 12 yards holding with two hands and shooting a wonder 9mm. Just the idea of keeping score can encourage people to expand their horizons.

by jjbhonn 8/13/2024, 12:20 am

I was not as clear as I could have been. I was not thinking of adding one or two shooters at a time. I was thinking of several new shooters at multiple clubs, across the country. Yes, I am thinking Big! Let me try again.

Perhaps we can initiate a campaign to produce a 20 - 30 second TV commercial showing a youthful bullseye shooter at the bench: 1) dry fire one shot, 2) load 5 rounds of .22 rimfire, 3) shoot 5 rounds RF (shots heard), 4) have the camera view the target (most hits in the X ring), 5) have the shooter say "Are you interested?", 6) display a banner below the shooter reading "Contact ........ for more information". One possible audience could be Outdoor Channel TV programing such as Air Gun Challenge, Shooting USA, American Rifleman, etc.

Funding for this campaign would come from voluntary contributions from Bullseye shooters & Forum members who want to attract new shooters to our sport. I would be first in line to contribute to the campaign.

Assuming such an undertaking would be in alignment with Bullseye Forum Mission as well as from a tax and legal perspective, it would require buy-in from Bullseye Forum Leadership and necessitate volunteers to form a committee to develop and plan such an undertaking, prior to final Leadership approval.

Honestly, I do not have any experience in such an undertaking and have no idea what something like this might cost; however, I believe a few of you may. Let's hear your thoughts and ideas.

by BE Mike 8/13/2024, 9:07 am

jjbhonn wrote:I was not as clear as I could have been. I was not thinking of adding one or two shooters at a time. I was thinking of several new shooters at multiple clubs, across the country. Yes, I am thinking Big! Let me try again.

Perhaps we can initiate a campaign to produce a 20 - 30 second TV commercial showing a youthful bullseye shooter at the bench: 1) dry fire one shot, 2) load 5 rounds of .22 rimfire, 3) shoot 5 rounds RF (shots heard), 4) have the camera view the target (most hits in the X ring), 5) have the shooter say "Are you interested?", 6) display a banner below the shooter reading "Contact ........ for more information". One possible audience could be Outdoor Channel TV programing such as Air Gun Challenge, Shooting USA, American Rifleman, etc.

Funding for this campaign would come from voluntary contributions from Bullseye shooters & Forum members who want to attract new shooters to our sport. I would be first in line to contribute to the campaign.

Assuming such an undertaking would be in alignment with Bullseye Forum Mission as well as from a tax and legal perspective, it would require buy-in from Bullseye Forum Leadership and necessitate volunteers to form a committee to develop and plan such an undertaking, prior to final Leadership approval.

Honestly, I do not have any experience in such an undertaking and have no idea what something like this might cost; however, I believe a few of you may. Let's hear your thoughts and ideas.

The military and to a lesser extent the police were big contributors to bullseye way back in the day when bullseye pistol shooting was THE competition. Their participation drew in a lot of civilians, too. When that support dwindled, so did participation in the sport. Not a lot of folks feel comfortable going into a strange setting cold. Not all clubs are welcoming to novices. That's why I favor one-on-one. I see what you are saying, but with the competition from other pistol shooting disciplines, i.e. IDPA, IPSC, Cowboy Action, Steel Challenge, etc. I don't see a TV ad campaign showing someone standing, shooting one-handed at 25 & 50 yards as exiting and bringing in large numbers to the sport, especially when one considers how few local Precision Pistol matches there are these days. Throwing money at the problem won't do it. It takes individuals getting involved at the local level. The volunteering of time is one thing that is really tough to get people to do.

by jjbhonn 8/13/2024, 10:08 am

Thanks, Mike, for your insight and opinion. I think you are "spot on" identifying the major causes. Lack of participation from the military and police have had a significant impact on our sport, probably because of the financial constraints imposed. The run-n-gun sport, with its short energy burst of shooting followed by lots of wait time has recently had its impact too. Not sure of what can be done to reverse them.

I don't have the answer; however, I am willing to volunteer to work with others to search for a solution. Anyone else out there interested?

by JRV 8/13/2024, 11:32 am

The only realistic thing people can do is talk about the sport with other shooters, invite folks to matches, and be good ambassadors in real life and online.

Bullseye participation is down historically because (1) there are more options than ever for match shooting and (2) neither CMP nor NRA has taken the initiative to direct clubs to host matches in Practiscore, where everyone that has started shooting in the past twenty years goes to locate matches. More competition plus easier to access the competition. Put the matches on Practiscore and they’ll get onto young shooters’ radar.

A commercial isn’t going to do anything if people still have to register for local matches through ancient email listservs or by scouring local gun club Google calendars for match dates.

I am pretty sure military and police participation has meant nothing for match attendance for decades. Practical shooting like USPSA and 3-gun was popular without service team attendance and would stay popular if service teams never showed up.

If anything, the draw runs the other way—service team shooters want to go to major practical matches so they can hobnob with the best shooters in the games.

by **Wobbley** 8/13/2024, 11:49 am

With today’s 15 second attention span, a better approach would be to create a 15-20 second ad with images of 10m and 25m shooters and assorted Bullseye shooters in snippets. Showing them having fun and being serious. You have 4-5 seconds per image. Start with the Turk air pistol guy image. Narration says “this guy was identified as ‘cool’. Yup we are”. Then show people shooting pistols at 50 & 25 , then say “Just how cool is that?”

by chiz1180 8/13/2024, 11:55 am

JRV wrote:The only realistic thing people can do is talk about the sport with other shooters, invite folks to matches, and be good ambassadors in real life and online.

This 100%

A few other things that can help:
-ditch the elitist attitude
-don't bad mouth the other shooting disciplines
-stop equipment shaming (calling glocks junk for example)

by Grouse 8/13/2024, 12:50 pm

chiz1180 wrote:This 100%

A few other things that can help:
-ditch the elitist attitude
-don't bad mouth the other shooting disciplines
-stop equipment shaming (calling glocks junk for example)

LOL ...went I first tried bullseye at our club...Seemed like the older shooters at the club were doing these 3 things! You had to qualify to shoot indoors at 50 ft....and that qualification was the worst thing since Parralel Parking on a drivers test or a prostate exam to experience. Because of this, I was really hesistant to ask questions about Bullseye. This stuck me in a liminal phase of the sport for an extended period of time... til I fouind the right resources and references to utilize.

by jareds06 8/13/2024, 9:58 pm

use social media like youtube to get the word out about bullseye and traditional shooting sports.

by john bickar 8/13/2024, 11:42 pm

jareds06 wrote:use social media like youtube to get the word out about bullseye and traditional shooting sports.

Jared, you obviously neglected to notice how damn old I am. Apparently my charm and rugged good looks belie my age. Laughing

I'm about 15 years too old for YouTube, and about 30 years too old for TikTok.

by speedy1544 8/14/2024, 9:01 am

For what it is worth. Two Clubs I belong to have over 1400 members each. They shoot limited Bullseye, but many other disapplies too. Getting new B/E shooters is a challenge, for many reasons only guessing. I try again to offer a clinic in the evening when we shoot, and there are many nice people with the correct nice target pistols. It's a challenge to do one handed, so had to feel good shooing. But we keep trying. I will try to post what I post at the Clubs.

Looking for new shooters' B/E Clinics Precision Pistol [ Bullseye] Shooting NRA Bullseye shooting is a long-standing sport, geared to shooting .22s and or .45 cal. pistols at targets to achieve a possible score of 300. This is done standing, with one hand shooting! Bullseye is shot inside at 50 feet, outside it can be shot 25-50 yards. At SaraSpa we shoot inside at 50 feet with .22 cal. pistols. There are 3 stages of fire. Three different targets. Slow fire- is 10 shots in 10 minutes. Timed fire- is 2- 5 shot strings, shot in 20 seconds each. Rapid fire- is 2- 5 shot strings, shot in 10 seconds each. A .22 cal. pistol with at least 2-5 mags, usually 100 rounds of standard velocity ammo. Open, or best red dot sights. It takes patience, trigger control, breathing control, and timing. Also, you learn what equipment works best, and all skills apply to most other forms of firearm shooting! If interested please E-mail Frank @ speedy1544@hotmail, put Bullseye in the heading.

Upstate NY

by jjbhonn 8/14/2024, 4:57 pm

Thanks, jareds06! I knew someone would have a better idea: Use social media to deliver the message!
Do-it-yourself with little to no cost. I have no idea how it works, but I'll bet someone knows how. All we need it a group of bullseye shooters to get together, develop a plan and make it work! What do you think?

by jareds06 8/14/2024, 5:19 pm

john bickar wrote:
jareds06 wrote:use social media like youtube to get the word out about bullseye and traditional shooting sports.

Jared, you obviously neglected to notice how damn old I am. Apparently my charm and rugged good looks belie my age.

I'm about 15 years too old for YouTube, and about 30 years too old for TikTok.

I thought us bullseye shooters weren't about making excuses! If gunblue490 can do it, so can you

by chiz1180 8/14/2024, 6:33 pm

I still believe if people want to see bullseye (and other high precision shooting sports) grow, you need to make personal connections with people and encourage them to try it. Social media or commercial quite frankly is not the answer, all that does is give people sitting on their couch or chair a "that's neat" introduction. If you truly want to see participation increase at a local level (that potentially could translate to something bigger down the line), you need to actively talk to an invite people to try.

This topic comes up rather periodically, and very few people actually put forth any effort to give new folks the joy of shooting a perfectly centered shot to frustration of getting so close to the center, but not quite. I 100% understand that it is difficult to get people to try this game, honestly it is easier to shoot a clean a target than to get someone to try and shoot one handed at 25 yards let alone 50 yards.

In general social media is not receptive to guns or shooting sports. Same with television broadcasts. I honestly can say that every in person conversation that I have had with people in person has been more meaning full than anything that has been said/posted on the internet. If you want to see the sport grow, get out to your local range and talk to people. This is not a game for every one, but it could just take one simple in person interaction that gets someone involved.

I don't typically like talking about my own "achievements" but as an example, I had zero interest in air pistol when I was introduced to it. A friend that I had made while shooting bullseye strongly encouraged me to try for quite some time. Well I did. How did it turn out? Well turns out I shoot air pistol well and by comparison to bullseye, my success with air could be considered greater for the amount of effort applied.

As a challenge, I would encourage everyone to try and get at least one person to experience shooting bullseye, even at an elementary level. If people cared about getting people involved half as much as "making expert", "making master", "getting distinguished", ect. more firing lines would be full. If you really want to tackle the real challenge in bullseye, look at figuring out ways to help others succeed rather than yourself.

by bruce martindale 8/15/2024, 7:36 am

Even among gun club members, few realize what their potential is and settle for mediocrity. A fellow next to me yesterday was shooting 2 handed at about 7 yards , with a 9 and trying to adjust sights to counter the Low Left. He was running out of adjustment. I suggested some grip changes and he improved, l then suggested trying one hand and he shot even better. I suggested getting a 22 and practicing with that, it’s cheap and accurate (precise). So he bought my book and I think I have a new convert. One soul at atime

by Blazin 8/15/2024, 8:50 am

Lot of good info above. I love this sport, and want to see it flourish, and think there's a lot to this question. Few random thoughts:
1. Bullseye is hard and takes a long time to get good at. Today's lifestyle is much more centered around getting things fast. IDPA or USPSA is much more instant gratification than going to a Bullseye match and shooting poorly.
2. My kids are 30 and 24 and they would never sign up for any event via email and then wait for results for a week+; said another way, I'm 51 and it seems very old school how matches are ran. Other shooting sports use Practiscore.com, which simplifies a lot of the signup and results. Also, and it pains me to say this because I love the CMP, but their CMP Comp Tracker looks 1990's state of the art (which I know would probably take a boatload of $ to update). Point to all this is I think Bullseye needs to modernize how it's administered.
3. Lack of clubs that offer Bullseye anymore, or maybe I should say, closer clubs that have action shooting.
4. Other shooting sports viewed as more practical than Bullseye.

I like how JaredAF on YouTube portrays the sport....high IQ, crazy level of precision with one hand, etc. I vote for him as our spokesperson.

by jareds06 8/18/2024, 8:55 pm

Blazin wrote:I like how JaredAF on YouTube portrays the sport....high IQ, crazy level of precision with one hand, etc. I vote for him as our spokesperson.

That kid is so annoying!

As for the rest of your comment, I think the bullseye community would benefit from putting their matches on Practiscore and for the CMP competition tracker to implement some kind of map based system. It's just so much more intuitive and easier than the very oldschool web design using check boxes and filters without any sort of visual. It's also really annoying have to sort by state because guess what, you might have a match across a state line that is closer than one in your state.

If you're a match director, it might be worth to put your matches on practiscore. At the very least, it's going to show up in front of more eyes, which means there is more eyes on our sport and it's sat there next to the other popular types of matches. you have to set your net if you want a chance to catch at least one fish. who knows, maybe someone might accidentally find their way into a bullseye match and have a good experience, get taken into the fold.

If you run matches through NRA, the NRA website should basically be destroyed, it's next to useless. No one will ever find a match through it. The only way anyone will find an NRA match is through word of mouth, so I think those would benefit most from being put on practiscore. The CMP's website is at least 10 times better and it's still very outdated.

It's amazing how flush with cash the NRA can be for so many years compared to any other shooting sports/gun rights organization in the US and can not manage to make a website that at least pretends to have been designed this side of the millenium.

by bruce martindale 8/19/2024, 6:41 am

Go look at njpistol.com, match calendar.

They also have a phone based scoring system. Bang in the target values and save it. No messy illegible scorecards and the match directors work is minimized. We need more of this

by chiz1180 8/19/2024, 10:46 am

bruce martindale wrote:Go look at njpistol.com, match calendar.

They also have a phone based scoring system. Bang in the target values and save it. No messy illegible scorecards and the match directors work is minimized. We need more of this

Bruce,

I run matches at a 12 point range, typical good turn out is 6-9 shooters, but not unheard of for 10-11. About 25-30% of my shooters do not have a smart phone (or patience to use one)or adequate cell coverage at the range to use a internet based app. Using a rough average of that I would need to provide 3-4 phones/tables at $60-100/each (including cases/charging accessories) meaning I would have to come up with $300-350 of equipment (excluding any potential network requirements) at bare minimum to use a phone/tablet base scoring system (and still require some shooters to have their own phone/tablet). Realistically I would probably need double that plus I would need to maintain the equipment. Where would the funds for that come from? The club covers range maintenance and targets with the current match fees. In order to implement I would have to significantly increase my match fees which (which people already complain are too high at $30) would effectively eliminate participation.

I seriously did a feasibility study on doing just this a few years ago. In my particular case (and likely others too) it is far too expensive in implement.

by **Wobbley** 8/19/2024, 12:07 pm

A suggestion to implement it.

Require Tablet/smartphone from each competitor, if the person does not have a tab/phone they can rent one for a $25.00 deposit with $20 returned at the end of the day. Use your base computer as a Wi-Fi hotspot. Have scores put in by a program and emailed to your base computer via something like an app like Bullseye Match. Connect the tablets to your base system each morning .

The $5 takes care of the maintenance fees and tablet replacement…the $25 deposit is about right to a) encourage people to get their own, and prevent pilferage. Use older tablets that are cheaper. The functionality needed is minimal. Just Bullseye Match app, email,and minimal operational items.

Otherwise the competitor can pull the target and replace them each time. I have found than marksmen (those who get impacts needing pasters) can really slow the scoring time while they paste all those holes. So reface with a full face if more than one paster is needed.

by chiz1180 8/19/2024, 12:42 pm

Wobbley wrote:A suggestion to implement it.

Require Tablet/smartphone from each competitor, if the person does not have a tab/phone they can rent one for a $25.00 deposit with $20 returned at the end of the day. Use your base computer as a Wi-Fi hotspot. Have scores put in by a program and emailed to your base computer via something like an app like Bullseye Match. Connect the tablets to your base system each morning .

The $5 takes care of the maintenance fees and tablet replacement…the $25 deposit is about right to a) encourage people to get their own, and prevent pilferage. Use older tablets that are cheaper. The functionality needed is minimal. Just Bullseye Match app, email,and minimal operational items.

Otherwise the competitor can pull the target and replace them each time. I have found than marksmen (those who get impacts needing pasters) can really slow the scoring time while they paste all those holes. So reface with a full face if more than one paster is needed.

As I have plenty of time to maintain a small network of machines on top of everything else going on. I have done the network administrator thing, got the t-shirt. It would only take one failure for the system to not work, I would rather spend match time shooting than playing network engineer while someone waits for their device to get fixed/work correctly.

The only downside to paper is it can get tricky when wet, but I doubt too many people would volunteer their phone/ tablet to get wet either.

Some things are better kept simple.

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