Well, sorry about the slow posting, but I have been on the road through the Southwest making tracks to and from the 2010 Double Tap Championship in Wichita Falls, Texas.

The smoke has cleared and I would like to report that the 2010 DTC went off without a hitch. the weather was perfect, the guns ran perfectly, and everything ran smoothly.

That’s what I’d like to report.

In truth, the only words I can use to describe this year’s DTC are cold and miserable. The stages were great, the R.O.’s were friendly, but the weather on Saturday totally ruined the match for Dad and I.

North Texas weather is unpredictable. the shooters who shot all 12 stages on Friday had 75* weather and sunny. Those who shot Saturday and Sunday( Dad and I included) had 30* with wind and snow. Yeah, no joke, Texas, March, snow. I wish I had the pictures to show you how miserable it was, but neither father nor son wanted to take their gloves off to get into their camera gear. Dad did manage to get the picture with his cell phone, though.

Windy, snowy, muddy, humid and COLD!

Anyway, there was no way anyone shooting the Saturday/Sunday match could win because of the 10 pounds of churned mud stuck to their shoes, caused by melting snow. So Dad and I gave it our best shot.

Which kinda stunk. On our first stage(rock quarry) I had to do a reload. My hands were so cold I could not push in the magazine release button on my Limited division STI 2011. This caused a 10-second jam on that stage, which pretty much zeroed out my hit factor. The following stages were an improvement, but not great. My last two stages were much better, bordering on what I was doing in practice.

Sunday was much better. The morning was still pretty cold, but not nearly as windy as Saturday. And all the mud was frozen solid, which saved us the trouble of scraping our cleats off every few minutes. Not only that, but we could run much faster without tons of mud weighing our feet down. At about 10:30 Sunday it got blessedly warmer, actually bordering on comfortable. But, with warmer weather came more mud. Apparently it wasn’t so bad though, as I had one of my better runs on a tough stage, Stone Bowling. The mud dried unexpectedly soon, the weather got even warmer, And the shooting got MUCH better. In fact, on the stage “Jurassic Parts” I had a total time of 18.62, which put my hit factor at 64% of the stage winner, Manny Bragg.

Our squad finished shooting around lunchtime. Most of the squads were done, but some shooters from warmer climates(SoCal, mainly) or who had brought insufficient cold weather gear had requested to shoot through most of the stages Sunday, which held up the scores. Scores were posted, however they were all broken down stage-by-stage so that shooters could compare the confirmation score sheets we were given to what the Scores Guy put on the results. By the way, ALWAYS check the confirmation sheet BEFORE you sign it. Dad learned this the hard way when, checking the scores online on our way home, he discovered that one of the R.O.’s had accidentally input the wrong number into the Palm scoring system that was used at the Double Tap. Instead of a time of 39.97, his time wound up at 937.97. Oh well, live and learn. Speaking of learning, I added a few words to my dictionary…

And of course, one cannot run an awesome IPSC match without an equally awesome Prize Table! and the Double Tap definitely had an AWESOME prize table. Not only was there a random drawing for prizes such as Dillon RL-550b reloading machines, STI slides(to build your own Race Gun with), and the like, there was also a “second chance” prize table. Sorry, did I say prize table? I meant prize CONEX! Every shooter who didn’t win something at the random drawing was allowed to pick a bucket full of goodies out of a conex full of awesome stuff. There were no “bad” prizes, either, as I was almost the last one into the conex and I still got a $100 gift certificate to MGM targets(manufacturers of steel targets) and a 50$ certificate to ERGO grips, not to mention a Brass Sorter and 1000 bullets, courtesy of The Bulletworks.

In conclusion, the 2010 Double Tap Championship could have been a totally awesome match, had it not been for the weather. I heard rumors that next year’s DTC will be in May or June. That’d be awesome! Thanks to Match Director Robert Porter, Scores Guy Lee Neel(especially thanks for sending SUPR several Palms), All the excellent R.O.’s, and especially one brave lady who, after breaking her collarbone on Friday night, showed up and endured the cold and misery on Sat/Sun as an R.O. Also thanks to all the great Match Sponsors.

Remember these Sponsors when you decide to make your next purchase… Click on a Logo to go to their Web Site