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Aaron’s Voigt Match Day 2 AAR
So, pack up all our stuff from the hotel and back at Loop Ranch before 8:00am. After a delay (Mike Voigt said that the delay was in getting some targets set up and logistics) we got to shooting.
We started on Stage 12 Got Wood. 4 targets, 2 shots each, ranging from 511 to 698 yards. Jennifer, Danny and I got 4 hits each, Jeff and Ben 2, Henry didn’t score. We can see from this that the cartridge matters, Jeff Ben and Henry were the only shooters in the comp with 308, and the 40% higher wind drift was really hurting.
Stage 13 The Pipes was with equipment unloaded and at the end of a 10 or so foot long plastic drainage pipe around 3 foot diameter. 3 rifle targets with 2 shots each, and a pistol spinner with a 90 second par time. I was glad that I brought a 45. Spinning the pistol spinner was 4 points, no points for not spinning (hit didn’t count). We waited for the previous squad to finish up the stage, then got going. I recall that several in our squad didn’t get through the rifle stage fast enough to get a pistol shot off. Here, I was glad I brought a tall bipod, I used it to get the elevation I needed, because a stop board was placed maybe 6 inches away from the end of the plastic pipe. The pipe was really slippery, so keeping the bipod on the pipe instead of the dirt several inches lower just wasn’t a good option. I got through the rifle with 1 miss, then with 20 pistol shots managed on my second to last shot to mis-time it and instead of swinging the plate over I stopped it. Mike Voigt gave a demo just before I shot with another competitors gun (competitor claimed that spinning the target with a 9mm was impossible). Mike flipped it in maybe 7 shots or so, bottom, top, bottom, top… and over it went. Definitely can use some more pistol practice. So our results were Jennifer and Danny with 6, myself Ben and Henry with 5, and Jeff was not on his game with 2.
Stage 14 From Tree to Tree was 3 targets at 264 yards, where either the competitor or competitor’s rifle must touch a tree. 3 shots per target, 3 shots at target 1 from the first tree, 3 shots at target 2 from the second tree and so on. After examining this for a few minutes, we all determined that shooting prone wouldn’t work due to the grass in the way. I’m sure that was part of the stage. We used a pack for support with various methods depending on the competitor. Henry had the high score of 8, I got 7, Ben 6, Jennifer 5, and Danny 4. I missed the one because I forgot to set my dope from the previous stage (was set at 3.1 mil, needed to be 2.1 mil).
Stage 15 The Long and Winding Road. 5 targets from 400 to 1053 yards, 2 shots each. All of us got close shots, but none of the really long ones. I sucked on this stage with 1 hit. Jennifer, Danny and Henry (with a 308) got 4, and Jeff 3. Ben wasn’t feeling it and didn’t score.
Stage 16 Know Your Limitations. Using the same rack from Stage 4 but at 523 yards, you miss you zero, stop when you feel like. This was the only other stage where a hit could be higher than 1 point. Jeff got the high score for about 10 seconds before he took another shot and zeroed. We all zeroed on our first shot, there was some crazy wind in this canyon. I held about .5 mil left (left edge of the plate) and missed. Danny was hoping I would hit and he could use my wind value for his shot. And so on. The target was amongst a bunch of trees, we couldn’t feel or see the wind (I racked my focus a couple of times looking for mirage and didn’t see any). Jeff held about 1 mil left for his hit, but the funny thing was that since the rack was on relatively flat ground, misses would hit a few hundred yards farther downrange about 3 feet or so to the right.
Break for lunch, a really awesome chile. Cornbread, a big cookie handed out by the cutest little girl now called cookie girl.
Stage 17 - 9 The Hard Way. The RO instructions were that if we asked and it was deemed OK then we could do it. If not asked and not OK then that was a competitor fault (I assume that would result in zeroing the stage). 3 targets from 172 to 403 yards, starting with the rifle muzzle touching an orange traffic cone and butt on hip. No staging of equipment, all items in stowed position, all items off the ground. First position is standing (feet on ground, no other body parts on the ground. Second position sitting or kneeling for 3 more shots, and final position anything you want to do. Danny got our squad high score of 5, I got 2 and Henry and Ben 1 each. This is one of those stages I would like to re-run. My plan (common to many competitors) was to shoot 3 shots standing quickly, to get to more stable lower positions. I folded down really good, but didn’t glass the targets enough to memorize their references, so 2 hits on the wrong target = no points.
Stage 18 South By Southwest. Originally supposed to be 4 targets ranging from 325 to 418 yards, but reduced to 3, 2 shots per target. Danny got the squad high score of 6 hits, Jeff Ben and I got 5, Jennifer 4, Henry 1.
Stage 19 Crossfire. 3 targets, 2 shots each from 678 to 731 yards. Jeff (with a 308) got the squad high score of 3 hits, Henry and I got 2 each, Danny got 1. The wind had picked up and we just didn’t have it down.
Stage 20 Protect the LZ. Ranging from 734 to 957 yards, and named after the helicopter landing pad we shot from the previous day. Now, the last target was at the landing pad. We were shooting in the same canyon as the previous day, but in the opposite direction. Oddly enough, the wind dropped considerably due to a storm cloud nearby, so most of us didn’t hold any wind and were making hits. One of my misses was from adding a wind correction when I should have held dead center, I saw my dust splash exactly where I was aiming. Danny got the squad high score of 8, I hit 6, Ben 4, Jeff and Jennifer 4 each, Henry got 3.
Stage 11 Up The Ridge. For some reason our whole squad was not in the game, Jeff got the high (and only) score of 1 hit. The wind was crazy fast, we were shooting upslope through the pipe fence and the targets were on a ridge. Jennifer hit the strap holding the middle target, and Jeff hit the farthest target with a miracle shot. The targets ranged from 393 to 653 yards. We had to shoot through a pipe fence like the day before, and this time I used my tall bipod on my backpack to get the up-elevation needed. I just kept missing due to the wind. The funny thing is the last target was placed on a high spot on the ridge, and the bullets were impacting much farther back and out of sight so we couldn’t correct for wind because there was no bullet splash to reference. This was our last stage, so we head back to the gathering spot and were the second squad back.
Day 2 scores for our squad were: Jeff 20, Jennifer 27, Henry 24, Me (Aaron) 32, Danny 38 and Ben 24.
Final tally Jeff 38 , Jennifer 47, Henry 38, me 70, Danny 68 and Ben 42 snagging top 308.
Some snacks and score posting/dispute period. Then, prizes were laid out. Finally, scores were posted, and the winners from first to last called out and on to the prize table.
Prizes: The prize table was laid out, lots of nice stuff. I picked up a set of Dueck offset sights, they will be perfect for my AR that I’m gathering parts for. Top scores all went to Team GAP. They really killed it, Ryan’s high score of 130 is so far away. Congrats Ryan!
So a complete AAR needs to review what went right and what went wrong. This is mostly my list, with a few things from my squad members that I picked up.
Stuff that went right: When allowed, spotting and calling shots for each other was a huge help Calling wind the few times we could see it was a benefit. Sharing DA, wind holds and corrected ranges (corrected for slope) helped. Collaborating on strategy helped. Borrowing equipment helped (for instance I borrowed Henry’s backpack for the tree to tree stage because it would stand up by itself whereas mine would fall over). Figuring out that Jennifer’s dope chart wind numbers were about 1/10 not enough helped. Having trustworthy equipment was huge, my rifle was still running well and now has 2330 rounds through it. Having needed equipment on-hand was a big bonus, I used my taller bipod about ¼ of the time. Having a dope card attached to the rifle was a huge help, so much more comforting and faster to glance at a sketch or dope numbers right there where you are looking anyway. In general (coming from the RO’s) the better shooters would make a shot, spot their correction, and make the rest of their shots as fast as possible before the wind conditions changed.
Stuff that could have been better: There were some stages where we could have spotted for the first and second shooters but didn’t have our act together until about the 3rd shooter. My tendency to overthink setup got me on the pipe fence stage the first day, I spent the whole time setting up and never shot anything. On the pistol stuff, I didn’t take my time to make good hits and started blasting away, not a good plan. I forgot to set my dope twice and blew 2 easy shots. I pulled the trigger twice that I remember when I was just off target, missing 2 shots that should have been easy hits. I over-gamed the stand, kneel/sit, any position stage. In general, I feel like I could have scored about 15 points or so higher if I didn’t make any of these mistakes. The only equipment issues I had was that my backpack is starting to fall apart, and my bipod spun on the rifle on one stage, slowing my down a bit to fix it.
So, this concludes my AAR, see you all next time!
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