Urban Action Match from 8/3/2008
My Sunday started unusually early... See, instead of my usual two aspirin brunch (is it still brunch if you eat at noon?) followed by a rousing cold shower, I found myself curbside at 7:00 AM waiting for JG to pick me up! We were headed up to the Conservation Club of Kenosha County range at Bristol after a quick breakfast at the most excellent Wilmot Cafe to shoot the Urban Action match run by the guys at Action Shooting Sports Association (ASSA). I should take the time to mention that these are the same folks that'll be running the NRA camp this September with our pals at the State Line Rifle Association. (so, if you know anyone interested, send 'em there...) Price for the match was $15.00 for CCKC members and $18.00 for non-members.
So what is Urban Action? Urban Action is an offshoot of cowboy action shooting (CAS) that allows the shooter to use modern firearms. They usually focus on shooting steel, but Sunday was different as their group has been calling for more challenging stages with things like obscured targets and reloads on the run. Scoring in Urban Action is simple, it's the time you took to run the course + any penalties you incurred (misses, no-shoots, etc...). In fact, there is a refreshing lack of rules in the game, but I digress...
Keeping in step with the CAS roots, most of the matchs are based around 2-gun (shotgun and pistol) stages with the provision to shoot additional 3-gun courses using a pistol caliber carbine. Being Wisconsin, where fun toys are legal, they see some SBR's and suppressors.
I should mention that 22's are allowed under the semi-22 class and I ended up shooting a Advantage Arms conversion kit almost exclusively. A few folks used Ruger 10/22's for the carbine stages and one other competitor was shooting a nice old Buckmark pistol.
I'll make an aside here and talk about the Advantage Arms kit: It is very accurate (if you don't count the GLOCK trigger, that is) and it is very reliable, though, almost all 22's have some issues with failure to extracts, feeding issues, etc... I look at these "bugs", when they occur, as chances to work on tap-racks. A lot of folks question the usefulness of conversion kits, but they shine for working on the draw stroke and fast sight acquisition. I add too that once a shooter learns to manage the recoil of a larger round, the shooting isn't based on focused perception of the recoil and more of it hinges on keeping clear focus on that front sight. The big win is, of course, that 22 is CHEAP and, with today's ammo prices mirroring those of smokes and gas, its real plus to be able to compete without going into foreclosure.
They group ran two stages on three courses of fire. The first stage was split into a pistol course and a separate shotgun course while the second stage had one course of fire for both pistol and carbine. Both stages were challenging, forcing the competitor to deliver Mozambique-triple taps to the targets. Stage one's pistol course ran about 35 rounds while stage two ran about 60 rds! Both stages required a few mandatory magazine changes, which bought the interest level up. At the end they held a stress innoculation style steel "shoot off" elimination where competitors deliverd double taps to two plates and then shoot a popper. The poppers crossed and the one on the bottom was called the winner.
I'll definitely be back next month for some more fun with this group!
Posted 11:52AM Aug 05, 2008 by MCSA
