Miculeks Dominate Superstition Mountain Mystery 3-Gun
Here’s proof that the family that shoots together, wins together. Legendary shooter Jerry Miculek, his wife Kay, and their daughter Lena, all took home top trophies at the 2013 Superstition Mountain Mystery 3-Gun Match in Mesa AZ, March 22-24, 2013. The annual event hosted by the Mystery Mountain 3-Gun Club, included more than 300 shooters.
Jerry took top honors as the Match Champion, High Senior. Kay was the Women’s Open Champion and Lena won 2nd place in the Ladies Tactical Optics division and was also High Junior. That’s a great across-the-board performance for the Miculek clan. Learn more about them at Miculek.com.
Jerry says: “You get to the next level by being the first one on the range and the last one to leave.”
The Next Generation — Lena Miculek
Lena Miculek, the daughter of Jerry and Kay Miculek, was born and raised on Shootout Lane. Lena claimed her first National title at the Sportsman’s Team Challenge when she was only ten years old, and has since won four more National titles in both the Junior and Sportsman’s A divisions. In 2010 Lena followed in her fathers footsteps, competing in the USPSA Revolver Division.
Lena’s main focus is now on Multi-Gun competitions, specifically 3-Gun Nation events. Lena had a very successful first year of Multi-Gun shooting, culminating in a class win at the 3-Gun Nation shoot-offs in Vegas during the 2013 Shot Show. Lena also had a huge break-though in her shooting career at the 2012 IPSC Shotgun World Shoot in Hungary, where she was crowned the Ladies World Champion (Standard Division).
Today’s the day — Shooting USA airs its annual one-hour SHOT Show Special today, Wednesday, March 20th, starting at 3:00 pm Eastern (12:00 pm Pacific). Other broadcast times are listed below. You won’t want to miss this hour-long show filmed at the Sands Convention Center in Las Vegas where thousands of exhibitors had their wares on display. Jim Scoutten and his team of reporters feature new products introduced at SHOT Show.
You’ll see new pistols, new rifles, new optics, and other shooting accessories introduced this year. Featured products will include Bergara Barrels, Bushnell Scopes, Les Baer pistols and rifles, Ruger rifles, Savage’s new B.Mag in 17 WSM rimfire, beautiful new handguns from Smith & Wesson’s Performance Center, and many other products.
Here are broadcast schedules for all time zones. If you can’t watch Shooting USA’s SHOT Show Special today, the hour-long show will be re-broadcast early Saturday Morning (Friday Night Pacific Time).
The Shooting USA Hour on Wednesdays:
Eastern Time 3:00 PM, 8:00 PM, 1:00 AM
Central Time 2:00 PM, 7:00 PM, 12:00 AM
Mountain Time 1:00 PM, 6:00 PM, 11:00 PM
Pacific Time 12:00 PM, 5:00 PM, 10:00 PM
The Shooting USA Hour on Saturday Morning/Friday Night
Eastern Time 2:30 AM Sat
Central Time 1:30 AM Sat
Mountain Time 12:30 AM Sat
Pacific Time 11:30 PM Fri
On March 14, 2013, 550 employees of Colt’s Manufacturing Company traveled to the Legislative Office Building in Hartford, Connecticut. They came in strength to show support for Connecticut-based firearms manufacturing, and their message was direct: “Save our Jobs.”
Last week workers from two Colt operating companies (successors to the famed Colt Armory), boarded buses bound for the Legislative Office Building, in Connecticut’s state Capitol complex. They came to participate in a General Assembly committee hearing on a large number of gun-control measures under consideration in the wake of the Sandy Hook tragedy. Michael Holmes, Colt United Auto Workers Shop Chairman, testified at the hearing, as did NSSF Director Government Relations, State Affairs Jake McGuigan, Joe Bartozzi from O.F. Mossberg, and Mark Malkowski of Stag Arms. Though not all the proposed additional gun-control legislation will move forward for eventual votes, action on some of the measures is expected within days.
To celebrate its 90th Anniversary, Lapua has developed a special new web site with many cool features including contests, product videos, and an interactive shooting game. You’ll find an interesting historical timeline recounting the history of Lapua starting in 1923. The timeline covers development of the factory, important product releases, competition successes, and other important milestones.
Submit your “Best Shot” and Win Prizes
On the site, Lapua invites readers to submit a short description of their “best shot” made with Lapua ammo or components: “Sometimes things just click. When did you have your moment of absolute precision? Share it with us…” Prizes will be awarded each month for the most impressive “best shot” stories submitted by readers. CLICK HERE for more info.
Play Interactive Biathlon Game
Site visitors can play an interactive shooting game featuring Biathon rifles and Lapua Polar Biathlon .22LR Ammo (other rifles and shooting disciplines will be added in the future). You’ll want to visit the Biathlon Game Page to see all the features, but we’ve embedded a sample here so you can see how it works. NOTE: you may have to use the scroll bars at the bottom and right sides. (This is because the game format is larger that our Bulletin “real estate”).
Report by Kyle Jillson for NRABlog.com
This year you can catch all the action at the 2013 NCAA Rifle Championships in real time thanks to a live stream from the match venue in Columbus, Ohio. Just hop on over to the NCAA Live website and dive right in. (The NCAA also provides live streaming coverage of other winter championship events.) The individual finals are set to stream live at 4:30 pm Eastern time.
Relay #3 is underway now (as this story is released) and the finals begin at 4:30 PM Eastern. In Relay #1, Alaska-Fairbanks’ Ryan Anderson took the lead with a 586-35X. After shooting a perfect 200 from prone, Anderson faltered slightly while standing and shot a 191, dropping nine. In kneeling, the final leg, he warded off the other shooters in his relay with a 195 to stay at the top.
This week (March 8-17) the U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit (USAMU) hosts the Army Strong Collegiate Shooting Championships at Fort Benning, Georgia. More than 300 elite junior and collegiate shooters are expected to compete. This event involves six distinct championships: the NRA Intercollegiate Pistol Championships; the NRA Intercollegiate Rifle Club Championship; the Scholastic Steel Challenge (SSC) Collegiate Championship; the Scholastic Clay Target Program (SCTP) Challenge; the Scholastic Pistol Program (SPP) Collegiate Championship; and the Association of College Unions International (ACUI) East Coast Clay Target Championship.
Colleges and Universities competing at this year’s championships include Clemson, Ohio State, Univ. of Michigan, U.S. Military Academy, U.S. Naval Academy, Penn State, and the Virginia Military Institute. Junior shooters from Georgia, Tennessee, Kansas, Massachusetts, and other states will compete in the SCTP Challenge. The Scholastic Steel Challenge (SSC) provides the opportunity for junior and collegiate shooters to participate in the exciting and challenging family sport of “speed steel.” The competitive format is based on the Steel Challenge, the nation’s most successful handgun competition. West Point will be among the favorites at this year’s SSC match.
The USAMU’s facility at Fort Benning “is the ideal location to hold a shooting competition of this magnitude,” said Lt. Col. Don King Jr., USAMU commander. “These collegiate and junior championships are on par with the World Cups, Olympic Trials and National Championships we have hosted throughout the years here at the ‘Home of Champions'”. For a complete schedule of events, go to www.usamu.com.
The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) has produced a video in which management and employees of three Connecticut-based companies, O.F. Mossberg & Sons, Stag Arms, and Ammunition Storage Components, talk about the importance of their jobs and how their companies contribute to the Constitution State’s economy.
This video was produced in response to Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy’s recent call for severe new gun control laws. An NSSF statement noted: “We are troubled by the Governor’s apparent change in attitude[.] We do not believe a rush to quick-fix legislation is likely to produce real public safety solutions, while it holds the clear potential to hurt good-paying manufacturing jobs in our state.”
NSSF and member companies based in Connecticut and western Massachusetts have been working for several weeks to help educate legislators, the media and the public not only about the economic impact of the firearms industry in the Constitution State, but also what measures are most effective at keeping firearms out of the hands of criminals and unauthorized individuals. To that end, NSSF President Steve Sanetti authored an op-ed in The Hartford Courant, entitled “Focus on Gun Access, Not Gun Ban”.
Connecticut has a long tradition of arms-making. In 1848, on a site overlooking the Connecticut River in Hartford, Samuel Colt built the Colt’s Patent Firearms Manufacturing Company factory. A larger factory, called the Colt Armory, was added in 1855. The 1850s were a decade of phenomenal success for Colt’s Connecticut-based enterprise.
Colt’s Mfg. was the first to widely commercialize the total use of interchangeable parts throughout a product. A leader in assembly line practice, the company was a major innovator and training ground in manufacturing technology. Colt’s armories in Hartford trained several generations of toolmakers and machinists, who had great influence in American manufacturing. Prominent examples included F. Pratt and A. Whitney, and Henry Leland (who would end up at Cadillac and Lincoln).
Coonan Inc. offers an interesting new handgun, a single-stack semi-auto that fires the .357 Magnum rimmed cartridge. Though the Coonan pistol is similar in appearance to a m1911, it has a linkless barrel, and a pivoting trigger. To feed the rimmed cartridges smoothly, Coonin employs a proprietary magazine with an “articulated follower”. This gun is available in both standard and compensated versions. With these Coonan pistols you can shoot a very powerful defensive round that has a much higher velocity and up to 80% more energy than a .45 ACP. You can also shoot .38 Specials (with a different spring).
The .357 Magnum is a very effective self-defense round, offering much higher velocity and energy than the .45 ACP. Consider this, the Coonan can launch 180gr Corbon .357 Mag ammo at 1288 FPS. At that MV, the 180gr bullet delivers 663 ft-lbs of energy. By comparison, a .45 ACP round with a 230gr FMJ running 850 FPS delivers just 359 ft-lbs of energy (at the muzzle). That’s a huge difference — the .357 Magnum delivers nearly 80% more energy (calculated at the muzzle).
The “Coonan Classic” .357 Magnum with 5″ uncompensated barrel starts at $1375.00. For $99.99 more you can get a 5.7″ threaded barrel. For $249.99 more you can get the compensated version. Many other options are offered, such as Black Duracote finish with laser-etched black aluminum grips ($299.99 extra). The gun in the video below features the Digital Camo Duracoat package with milled black aluminum grips ($549.99 extra).
American Rifleman Reviews Coonan .357 Magnum Pistol
“The .357 Magnum cartridge was developed for a revolver where it could headspace off the rim. Traditionally, feeding of rimmed center-fire cartridges is problematic in box-magazine-fed firearms. That problem, however, has been addressed well with the Coonan. The cartridges are staggered, with the rim of each cartridge in front of the one below it in the magazine.”
“Although the Coonan’s gripframe is larger than that of a standard M1911 … even those with average-size hands had no trouble reaching the trigger.”
“We function-tested the pistol with several different .357 Mag loads, with bullet weights from 125 grains to 180 grains. It ran well with most, but did not function properly with reduced-power ‘personal defense’ ammunition. When the gun was fed full-power .357 Mag ammunition designed for handguns, it ran fine.”
Coonan Pistol Shoots .38 Special Also
While the Coonan pistol is designed to run with .357 Magnum ammo, the manufacturer says the guns will also shoot .38 Special and .38 +P ammunition, provided a different spring is used. Coonan provides a 10-lb spring for use with .38 Spl ammo. This is used in place of the 22-lb standard spring. (Spring exchange procedure is shown in Video above.) Coonan cautions: “A 10-pound spring is supplied with the firearm for use with .38 Special ammunition. We recommend using .38 +P or .38 Special ammunition. The firearm may not cycle with .38 Special ammunition until broken in (approximately 200 rounds).”
If you own an RCBS ChargeMaster 1500 electronic powder scale/dispenser, or are thinking about purchasing one, here are a few tips that can cut your loading times and eliminate some petty annoyances.
Mute That Annoying Beep
Some ChargeMaster users complain about the loud beep at the end of each cycle. There’s a simple way to silence the beep — and you don’t have to cut any wires or permanently disable the speaker. To mute the beep, simply hold down the Zero button until “beep off” displays. Repeat this procedure to restore the beep function.
Activating the Auto-Dispense Mode
You can set the ChargeMaster to automatically dispense your pre-programmed charge as soon as you put the pan back on the scale. Simply press and hold the “Enter” button. The code “Auto” should then appear on the display. At this point, push “Disp” to dispense the first charge. When you replace the pan, the unit will automatically dispense the same charge. For some people this is an added convenience. You can always go back to the default manual dispense method by changing the dispense mode using the “Enter” button again.
Use a McDonald’s Straw to Reduce Over-Throws
Jaco Brink provided another useful tip to avoid “over-throws” (excess charge weight): “The RCBS employee advised me to take a McDonnell’s straw (because it is thicker than a normal straw), cut off about a half inch piece and put it into the tube where the powder exits. This caused the last part of an extruded powder to cluster less, and reduced the amount of overthrows dramatically.”
Instructional Video
The video below shows how to set up and calibrate a Chargemaster 1500. Be sure to level the unit carefully, both left to right and front to back. Starting at the 1:44 mark in the video you can see the unit dispense a 50-grain charge in 30 seconds. The slow, final trickle stage takes about half of the total time.
How to Shorten Dispensing Times
The last tip is for advanced users only. You can alter the programming settings to speed up powder dispensing dramatically. One user reported that, by re-programming his machine, his cut his dispensing time for a 30-grain load from 22 to 13 seconds “with no overthrows”. WARNING: once you change the parameters, there is no “restore” command to set everything back to the defaults. So proceed carefully. The speed enhancement procedure is described on the pages linked below:
Article based on story by Kyle Jillson for NRABlog
Kirsten Weiss was the 2012 NRA Women’s Smallbore Three Position (3-P) Champion. In this video, Kirsten condenses ten years of competitive shooting experience into an easy-to-understand segment about the fundamentals of aiming, head position, and proper cheek placement. Kirsten explains, “proper aiming is a relationship between the eye, the sights, and the target. Head position on the stock is the basic prerequisite to good aiming. And the cheek placement must be consistent every single time.” Kirsten also has a tip for scope fitting: “Once your cheek placement is comfortably achieved… make sure the scope comes to you — don’t move your head to the scope, [which requires] changing head/neck position. Adjust your scope to your eye in a comfortable way.”
So why are the fundamentals so important? Kirsten explains: “Even elite snipers and top-level competition shooters go back to basics to review and refresh their knowledge every once in a while. This reinforces knowledge, ingrains proper technique, and polishes out developmental flaws.”
Kirsten Weiss of Cornwall, PA was the 2012 NRA Women’s National Champion at the NRA Smallbore 3-P Championships held at Camp Perry, OH. She won the 2012 3-P smallbore championship in only her second trip to Camp Perry. Her first came nine years ago.
Back then she was still learning what it takes to be a top competitive shooter. Her skills still raw, she placed second in the Sharpshooter Category. Not good enough. She resolved to get better — and she did.
Weiss would go on to earn a spot on the Nebraska Cornhuskers rifle team. Her tenacity and techniques would garner recognition from USA Shooting and a sponsorship from Lapua Ammunition after a top eight finish at the Olympic Trials. She also has a been involved in hunting since age twelve. In fact, it was in the field that the foundation of her shooting skills began.
The Next Generation — Lena Miculek
Today’s the day — 
You’ll see new pistols, new rifles, new optics, and other shooting accessories introduced this year. Featured products will include Bergara Barrels, Bushnell Scopes, Les Baer pistols and rifles, Ruger rifles, Savage’s new B.Mag in 17 WSM rimfire, beautiful new handguns from Smith & Wesson’s Performance Center, and many other products.
The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) has produced a video in which management and employees of three Connecticut-based companies, O.F. Mossberg & Sons, Stag Arms, and Ammunition Storage Components, talk about the importance of their jobs and how their companies contribute to the Constitution State’s economy.
If you own an RCBS ChargeMaster 1500 electronic powder scale/dispenser, or are thinking about purchasing one, here are a few tips that can cut your loading times and eliminate some petty annoyances.
Kirsten Weiss of Cornwall, PA was the 2012 NRA Women’s National Champion at the NRA Smallbore 3-P Championships held at Camp Perry, OH. She won the 2012 3-P smallbore championship in only her second trip to Camp Perry. Her first came nine years ago.
