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Rock Your Glock August 9, 2014 at Lincoln Izaak Walton League

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tstuart34:
Fly

Has anyone recommended a short safety briefing at sign up? Have who ever is working registration go through some safety rules with the people as they sign up?

How you want them to show clear how to bag the gun. These would be the.match expectations and procedures

JTH:

--- Quote from: tstuart34 on August 10, 2014, 06:36:20 PM ---Has anyone recommended a short safety briefing at sign up? Have who ever is working registration go through some safety rules with the people as they sign up?

How you want them to show clear how to bag the gun. These would be the.match expectations and procedures

--- End quote ---

The problem is that sign up continues for about four hours, with people walking in at any time.  Repeating the safety briefing 70 times over four hours (and I'm not exaggerating for effect) just isn't workable.

Truthfully---if someone is going to shoot a competition, it is their responsibility to know enough to be safe with their firearms.  There might be issues with rule specifics---but keeping the gun pointed in a safe direction, not handling firearms behind the firing line, keeping your finger off the trigger while loading/reloading/unloading---these things should NOT have to be explained by the match staff.

I do think it might help if the general "routine" of a stage was typed up and posted at registration, so that people could read it and have some idea of how things go.  The problem with that, of course, is the fact that (based on my prior experience with shooting competitions) people won't read it, and will either do whatever they want, OR ask match staff questions that were clearly answered in the posting.

Sorta like how there are lots of questions here on the forum about how Steel Challenge matches go, even though there is a post pinned to the top of the Shooting Sports sub-forum titled "Introduction to Steel Challenge."   :(

[sigh]

If signup/registration all happened at once, having a safety/new shooter briefing before the start of the WOULD probably help a lot.  But with walk-in registration over four hours, it gets a lot harder.

OnTheFly:

--- Quote from: tstuart34 on August 10, 2014, 06:36:20 PM ---Fly

Has anyone recommended a short safety briefing at sign up? Have who ever is working registration go through some safety rules with the people as they sign up?

How you want them to show clear how to bag the gun. These would be the.match expectations and procedures

--- End quote ---

I was talking to the Match Director about what we could do.  As jthhapkido has said, there are many complications.  The match personnel are all volunteers, as is the case with all the local matches.  So we don't have an abundance of people.  Much of the corrections are done on the firing line, and it works.  The intention of the RYG match is to have fun, and hopefully improve individual shooting skills.  It is a bit less of a "competition" and more of a social event.  In that light, we are not as strict as a USPSA match for example.  The most important thing is that participants come with an open mind and work on correcting any bad habits that others point out to them.


--- Quote from: jthhapkido on August 10, 2014, 07:57:32 PM ------but keeping the gun pointed in a safe direction, not handling firearms behind the firing line, keeping your finger off the trigger while loading/reloading/unloading---
--- End quote ---

And those are exactly the things we see.  I was that guy.  The RYG match was my first pistol match and I did the classic "reach for my gun bag while I sweep myself with the muzzle" thing.  Something I WISH I would have thought about and practiced before someone had to tell me. 

The frustrating thing is that we have a few, not very many, that are told they need to correct a bad habit and they come back every match and do the same thing again.  One particular guy had the "I've been shooting for xxx years!" attitude, but most are receptive.  One gentleman pulled the gun out while we were down range scoring.  I told him he needed to wait until he was told to do so, and when he was done shooting, he asked "Besides not getting the firearm out until told to do so, anything else I need to change?".  Great attitude!  I took that opportunity to also tell him that when he opens his gun bag/box and realizes the firearm is not pointing downrange, to turn the bag so when it is pulled out, the muzzle will always be pointed in a safe direction. I'm betting we won't see any more of that with him.

There is one guy though that I am going to have a polite conversation with when I see him.  I've commented how he sweeps himself.  Per my comments in a prior thread, I don't feel there is any difference whether the gun is loaded or unloaded, but if it matters to others here, it WAS loaded and cocked when he did this.  While I've made comments, he doesn't seem to be taking it to heart.  His response is not "screw you".  Rather he seems quite humble.  However, I'm wondering if anyone has explained what needs to be done to fix his bad habits.  Hopefully I will be able to help him make some neuron connections and he will improve.

I want everyone to have fun.  By our final count on number of guns shot at the last two matches (around 100), people are enjoying the event.  First and foremost is safety of course.  The chance of me getting shot in the back while I'm downrange scoring, or for a competitor to injure themselves is slim.  But if you haven't guessed yet, I'm the "wear your seatbelt" type of a guy.  I would rather see the odds of and accident reduced to darn near zero.

Fly

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