September 7, 2002

T HAD BEEN A LONG TIME since I'd been to a match with Old Hickory Regulators in Rocky Mount, and the club had made some big changes since then. A shooting bay dedicated to Cowboy Action Shooting had been constructed, with two false-front permanent buildings, hitching posts, wagon wheels, etc. It looked very good and I was looking forward to shooting the scenarios staged there. I was on my own today, since Pixelwiz remained at home with The Boy, but it was a gorgeous day to go play.

Several of my good shooting partners showed up, including Royal Barnes, Carolina Leadfoot, Tatonka, J.M. Brown & Wicked Wanda, Wendover Kid, Father Time and a few others. Royal and I were on one posse, placed in the first and second shooting position. We were both shooting black powder, (though Royal was in the Gunfighter class — Leadfoot was shooting in the Frontier Cartridge class with me, but he was on the other posse) so I guess the idea was to get our smoke out there to give everyone else a little haze to shoot through.

We started on the "open" range first, and would end the day by shooting our last three stages in and around the new buildings, which was fine with me. Carolina Leadfoot wrote stages 4-6, where we began.

Stage Four:
These three stages were based around a narrow wall prop with a window cutout, with a barrel to the right which would hold the long guns. After Royal finished smoking up the place, I began standing behind the barrel. I said the line (which I think was "I wanna be the sheriff!"), then drew my left pistol to sweep the five pistol targets, holstered and repeated the sequence with my other revolver. I missed twice with my right hand. I picked up my carbine and triple-tapped the three rifle targets, then hit each of the two shotgun swingers twice.

Stage Five
For this scenario, I began with the Winchester in hand at port arms, standing behind the wall looking through the window. I think the starting line was "I'm comin' in!" and after the timer beeped I shot the three rifle targets with a nine-round Nevada sweep. Securing the carbine, I drew my left pistol and I shot the first three of the five targets 2-2-1. The next pistol mirrored the sequence, starting on the far right target and working inwards, 2-2-1. To finish the stage, I moved right to the barrel, picked up the shotgun and blasted each swinging target once. No misses this time!

Stage Six
There was an interesting twist to this scenario involving a rifle reload. I began again behind the window, Winchester at port arms. I yelled "I see you all!" and began a nine-round Nevada sweep across the three targets, double-tapping each one. That meant I needed to reload the rifle for the last round on the last target, which I did. I like those reloads, it makes for a different and interesting stage. I made the rifle safe and drew my gun from the left-side holster, sweeping the five pistol targets from left to right. The second revolver was shot in the reverse order, a sweep from right to left. A pair of shells on each shotgun swinger finished the stage, happily another clean one for me.

Stage One
After a short break for lunch, we began the next three scenarios in the newly-constructed shooting berm. I stood in the doorway of one of the buildings on the right side of the berm, holding the Winchester. At the beep, I triple-tapped each of the three rifle targets, then secured the gun. I ran around the porch to the left, where I drew my left-side gun and shot the three targets from left to right, 2-2-1. The right revolver was shot in the opposite manner, from right to left, 1-2-2. I holstered the pistol, picked up the shotgun and blasted the two swinging targets once each. I missed once with the rifle, which surprised me — I was trying to shoot too quickly and didn't get a good sight picture on one target. I also missed once with the revolver in my right hand. Dang it!

Stage Two
We stayed at the same building for this scenario, and I began in the same location as before, standing in the doorway with my rifle in my hands. When the timer beeped, I shot a nine-round Nevada sweep on the three targets downrange and secured the gun. I ran around to the left and shot a pair of Nevada sweeps on the three pistol targets with both revolvers. The stage ended with two shotgun blasts on the swingers. A nice and clean stage.

Stage Three
The last stage of the day moved us over to the building on the left, which had a raised deck running around its two sides. I began at the window on the left rear side of the structure, rifle in hand. The timer buzzed and I swept the four targets twice, double-tapping each one. I set the Winchester down and ran around the right side of the building to the end of the deck, where I shot the four pistol targets, sweeping 1-4 and then hitting P1 again with the last round. The second revolver was a repeat of the first, except that I missed the two smaller pistol targets (with my right hand, of course). Argh. I hit the two swinging targets with my scattergun and the day was done.

And now for the numbers:

J.M. Brown (SASS #27309) won the Duelist class (no surprise there) with a time of 275.34 seconds and an overall ranking of 6. In a contest that came down to the very last stage of the match, Cape Fear Kid (SASS #31238) squeaked past Deputy Gene by just over 2 seconds to win 1st place overall and also the Traditional class with a time of 206.31 seconds.