Fort Wayne Rifle and Revolver Club

Saturday April 18^th was our High Power Clinic and we had a great turnout of 10 Junior students and 4 adults.  We had a very good group from the Concordia High School rifle team accompanied by their coaches John Hoham and Alan Conrad.

While the attendance was great, the weather definitely took a turn for the worse as the nice Spring weather we had seen for most of the week turned rainy, windy and cold! During the morning class session it rained – from a steady downpour to a fine misty drizzle.  But, when we took our lunch break the weather radar maps made it look like we had about an hour’s break and we decided that we would have a 100-yard shooting session to practice some of the things we had covered in class.  We decided to work on sight picture, trigger control and learning the mechanics of handling the AR –style rifles; for this session group size and scoring wasn’t a big emphasis.  Those would need to wait for a better day.

FOOLED US – just about the time we started the misty rain resumed and shooters, guns and mats got good and damp.

Even the Old Guys were bundled up

Figuring out a sling the first time isn’t simple

Offhand in the wind and rain is a challenge

As the shooting session closed, we broke out the big gun – the M1 Garand; and several of the students took an opportunity to shoot the Old Wooden Gun.  There is nothing like the grin on the face of a girl with a Garand!

“That was awesome”. Note where her trigger finger is laying.

And, when it is time to put things away – young legs come in handy!

It was a good day – in spite of the rotten weather – and it looks like several of the Juniors are going to come out and shoot with us this summer. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!

April 11th was supposed to be a sunny, clear Spring day – but once again Indiana weather fooled us.  The day started out more like a Winter Offhand day – moderately cold and damp.  To add insult to injury, the heater in the clubhouse didn’t light off because a bug had come out of hibernation and build a nest in the gas valve.  (It took Marty Didion and Jim Sweeney most of the morning to evict the little booger).  Nevertheless, we had 14 shooters show up for the match – almost two full relays.

Scores were pretty good for a first match of the season, with occasional lapses showing that skills do get rusty over the winter.  We had two Junior girls shoot 50-round National Match courses; Aria Hobbs was top shooter with a 459-7X score.

The “Adults” went to the high end of the line to shoot their match.

In the group that fired the 80-round Regional Match, Marshall Rohrbach didn’t show much winter rust – firing a 782-17X for first place honors.  Jim Jackson followed with 779-25X, a really great X-count.  Ashley Stevens, a visitor who made the trip over from Toledo, cleaned the Sitting Rapid stage on the way to her 770-18X third place finish. Kudos to Junior Tayt Shaffer for his best match to date with a 744-6X

And, in the Iron Man category – Mark Walters shot the 1000 point match with his M1 Garand in .30-06 tallying an 808-6X total.

It was interesting that the four Juniors went down to the low end of the line and set up for their own match.  The four of them had a great morning – as a group they shot an aggregate score in the Expert category. And, if you have never listened to a group of Juniors trash-talk each other – you have missed a real show!  They fit into the High Power community very well.

The Juniors went down to the low end of the line and shot their own match.

And, those who sit and shiver also contribute to the match.

We finished up at about 12:15; and as we walked off the line – the sun came out and the bright, warm day we had expected started. Oh well, it was a nice afternoon to do yard work at home.

Our next activity is a High Power Clinic on Saturday April 18th.  This Clinic is free to Juniors and with some late cancellations, we still have seats available.  The Clinic starts at 8:00 AM, so if you have an opening that morning, come on out.

The High Power schedule gets busy in May.  High Power practice starts on Thursday, May 7th. The range closes at 3:00 PM for mowing and setup – with practice starting about 4:30 PM.

On Saturday May 9th we have our next 50/80/100 Across-the-Course Match. Registration and setup starts at about 7:45 AM with the first shot going downrange at 9:00 AM sharp. 

On Wednesday, May 13th we have our first Juniors Only practice at 4:30.

Saturday April 4th was the Clean-Up Day for the rifle ranges – the pistol group had a work session a couple of weeks ago to get their facilities ready for the upcoming season and today was our turn.

The weather was threatening – every forecast predicted that we would have a rainout, but we had a goodly number of folks show up and there were enough hands available to make light work of the tasks we could get to on a wet soggy day.  Aside from a very light sprinkle about 8:00, we had dry – if not clear weather for the morning’s work.

Electronic target frames were repaired and firing point markers on the 200 and 300-yard firing lines were moved about 2-feet north to give a bit more room on the low end of the 200-yard line and to move the impact points in the bunker.  Horizontal support rails for the 25 and 50-yard target frames had the bent nails installed.  After we walked around in the mud from the recent rains, an impromptu drainage project was undertaken – adding a drain channel on the high side of the bench rest firing points to maybe keep mud from overrunning the concrete.

Grown-ups digging ditches and playing in the mud like a bunch of kids…

Gravel was hauled around to fill the washouts in the road going down to the pistol pits – more involved roadway repair will be done as things dry out a bit.  A couple of brave souls took a ladder and cleaned out the gutters on the east side of the clubhouse – there were some interesting things growing in there!

A crew went to the high power pits and dug out one of the counterweight tubes to repair a broken target frame cable that was making a target sit cock-eyed in its frame.  That target will cycle up and down much smoother now.

Sticks were hauled off – the major job of trimming bushes back will have to wait – it was just too wet to get back and forth to the burn pile today.

And – last but not least – a crew of our Juniors took it as a task to do a spring cleaning of the clubhouse. They cleaned the dead critters out of the window tracks, vacuumed up the dead spiders and their webs and swept up all of the winter crud that had been tracked into the building. And – to top it off; they washed the windows and now you can actually see through them again.

They really do know how to go clean a room!

After the work closed out, it was time for pizza – Old Folks and Juniors as well did a job on the pizza.  It was a good day.  I am not going to try to name everyone who came out – but Thank You.  It is this sort of inglorious, unglamorous work that makes our range such a great place to shoot – one of the premier ranges in northeast Indiana.

Feeding the poor, starving children

The Old Coots didn’t miss out on their meal, either

And, oh-by-the-way. We finished just in time.  Literally as the gate was locked behind the last person – a torrential downpour set in! 

I just have to comment on this. Someone thought they needed to drive across the soft ground to put up targets at the 50-yard target frame. These ruts will be there for years!