Getting started back...

Quit competing in '96, the year my daughter was born...  Shot hard from '78 to '96.  Standard stuff: Master class, Distinguished, Chief's Fifty, All National Guard Shooting Team.   Retired from the NG in '95 but had acquired all I needed to compete as a civilian.   Retired from my real job in '12 and started working part time as a range master in '13.  Been working at shooting one handed again.  Planning to shoot a match this spring.  Just spending time on the trigger.  Found that I got tired and my groups suffered after about 30 rounds of slow fire. Put the slow fire targets up for now. Shooting rapid fire.  Limiting myself to 50 rounds a day, three days a week.  On a bad day I drop 10-11 points.  On a good day 4-5.   Basic groups seems to be improving and the fliers aren't so wide.  Current plan is to shoot slow fire at a timed fire cadence.   Nothing new, any of you guys who shot around the Army MTU shooter Tom Woods in the 80s should remember his shooting slow fire at a similar speed.   Looking forward to a nice warm spring day and shooting a match. 

welcome back!

Hello Axehandle, My story is very similar there just seems to be a longer space in the middle. Shot for 7th Army in 72, Shot All Army 72,Master, stayed in service till 76 but was burned in 72 so never made it back to Army.Shot on a local league till 76 Got married raised a family and took 35 years off from shooting.Just like you I still had the guns but not the eyes or the concentration anymore. I can put all the rounds in the black timed fire but my slow fire is really hurting. Now I take a chair to the matches and fire my slowfire in 2 minutes.That sure works better for me.The chair is for me to sit on while the slow pokes finish up.It sure is nice having a sport that has no age limit.Like DavidR said welcome back.

Most civilian shooters won't understand the concept of being "Burned."   It is a wonderful process to make the old shooters keep training new ones but it can sure make it hard to stay on a high level team.  I think the service pistol team match at Camp Perry is the only place civilian teams need a new team member shooting each year.  FWIW I'm glad I still have a steady hand. Lots of guys my age start getting a little quiver in their hand.  I may get tired quick but starting out I am as steady as I ever was.  That chair is a good idea.  I've been using a 3 foot long pincher to pick up brass on the range.  Sure helps out this old back.  I'll  have one of those with me when I shoot too..

I also have a long pincher I picked up at Bi-Mart. If you haven't got one yet a good brass catcher is a must have.When I first started shooting again I looked around me and just shook my head. Where were all these goodies back when?Of course back then I would have shook my head and thought "why do we need that" Age changes our perspective. I showed up on the range with my old model 41 (no dot) and my old Gold Cup (also no dot) and proceeded to shoot Sharpshooter scores. I have all the goodies now. I carried that old 45 so long as my carry gun that I loosened it up big time. Roddy Toyota took the pistol and made it sing again.The 41 just needed a dot to get it back up to snuff. I picked up a few more to play with but those two pistols will do.Hope you enjoy your first match as much as I did. Our first 2700 0f the year is coming up fast. March 8th in Sherwood OR. It is the "Cold toes and runny nose "match. I expect it will live up to its name.

First match under my belt...  853-20 in the 22 match, 840-20 in the centerfire match, and 818-20 in the 45 match.  Shot a few good targets and a few fair targets.  No really BAD targets.  Best I can tell I was just tired in the 45 match.    Nice to see targets turn again.  High spot from my timed fire cadence slow fire was a 94 out of the first 10 shots out of the gun with the 22.   Low spot was trying to shoot regular flow fire in the 45 match.  After three white shots I went back to a timed fire cadence.   Now I just need to continue to practice and try to get in one match a month..