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March 10th, 2012
 Intro Training Programs in CA and FL
More than 300 first-time shooters came out to six ranges in California and Florida this past weekend to attend NSSF’s First Shots events. The 20 filled-to-capacity seminars in these two areas served as yet another demonstration of the growing interest in gun ownership across America. “[We give] a sincere thank you to the ranges, their staff, volunteers and participants for making these events a huge success,” said Tisma Juett, NSSF’s First Shots manager. “First Shots also thanks Remington for providing all of the .22 ammo and Birchwood-Casey for the Shoot N See targets.”
Florida ranges offering First Shots Programs included: Hollywood Rifle & Pistol Club (Dania Beach), Arizona Shooting Range (Fort Lauderdale), and National Armory (Pompona Beach). California ranges that held events were Sacramento Valley Shooting Center (Sloughhouse), El Dorado Shooting Range (El Dorado), and United Revolver Club (Sacramento). Learn more about First Shots at NSSF.org/firstshots.
Story tip from EdLongrange. We welcome reader submissions.
March 9th, 2012
The March 2012 edition of Target Shooter Magazine is now available for online viewing. This issue is full of informative articles, with excellent photography. If you prefer the convenience of print magazines, you’ll like Target Shooter’s “eZine” format. Target Shooter displays like a print magazine — so you can enjoy large, wide-format photos, and you can flip pages just like a regular magazine. There is also a handy index (just like a print mag) so you can quickly access all the articles of interest.
This month, you’ll find many stories worth reading. Starting off, Laurie Holland hot-rods a Rem 700 SPS tactical rifle. After fitting the rifle with a new 26″ 1:7.9″-twist barrel and Manners Composite stock, Laurie shows that impressive accuracy can be achieved from the upgraded Remington SPS (chambered in .223 Rem). Laurie also continues his on-going series about reloading for the .308 Win. This month he tests Lapua small-flashhole brass with a variety of powders. Other highlights include a comparison test of air-splitters and tuners for airgun benchrest, and a guide to competition optics. Readers can download previous monthly editions plus a Shot Show supplement from the Target Shooter Magazine homepage, found at TargetShooter.co.uk.
March 8th, 2012
The National Shooting Sports Foundation has launched GunVote, a voter education website at NSSF.org/gunvote. The new GunVote website provides links to voter registration information for all 50 states, a guide to political races in voter districts, the latest polls, and a selection of news articles covering the campaigns. GunVote also spotlights Candidates’ positions on Gun Rights and the Second Amendment.
“It’s great to see that so many individuals have become firearm owners, but these freedoms require constant support from elected officials at the state and federal levels,” said NSSF President/CEO Steve Sanetti. “Votes on legislation and appointments to the courts have profound effects on our firearms freedoms.” Sanetti noted that two landmark Supreme Court decisions reaffirming the individual right to own firearms — D.C. v. Heller and McDonald v. Chicago — were both decided by 5-to-4 votes.
COMMENTARY — Why You Should Participate in Upcoming Elections
The votes of target shooters, hunters and gun owners can make a huge impact in the 2012 election. Participating in the upcoming election begins by making sure to register, then becoming educated about the candidates running for office and discussing choices with family and friends so that they understand the importance of voting. The final step is going to the polls and (when necessary) helping others to get to the polls, too.
More Gun-Owners Need to Register and Vote
In the 2010 Congressional election, only 46.2 percent of women and 45 percent of men 18 and over reported voting, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Gun owners tend to be more active at the polls than this average, but there is a lot of room for improvement. Sanetti adds: “More gun owners need to vote. It’s critical that they do, and that they consider closely what candidates are saying… about our firearms freedoms.”
March 7th, 2012
 We’ve upgraded the AccurateShooter.com Forum, giving it a bigger, faster server. The new dedicated Forum server has a faster processor, more storage space, and more memory — all of which improves the user experience.
The switch-over was accomplished yesterday at 1630 hours (Pacific Time). All existing threads and posts have been preserved. Post counts and buy/sell feedback have also been retained. By all indications, everything is going well so far. Forum users report that pages load faster and searches take less time: “Things move along very fast now!” (Frank G. aka 40X Guy).
Join a Community of Nearly 17,000 Serious Shooters
If you haven’t visited our Shooters’ Forum yet, log on to Forum.AccurateShooter.com and check out one of the best Message Boards for precision shooters on the web. We now have nearly 17,000 Forum members including many National and International Champions. For example, this morning 2011 NRA National High Power Champion Carl Bernosky was logged in. And UK and World F-Class Champion Gary Costello (aka “GLC”) regularly visits our Forum. If you want advice from guys who really know their stuff — it doesn’t get better than that.
March 7th, 2012
 SSG (Staff Sgt.) Ty Cooper, a service rifle shooter/instructor with the U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit, was selected as the Military Marksmanship Association (MMA) Soldier of the Year (SOY) for 2011. MMA president Lt. Col. (Ret.) Robert Harbison made the announcement at the MMA Annual Membership Meeting. Harbison presented the Soldier of the Year Award to Cooper — a .45acp pistol donated by Smith & Wesson. Other MMA 2011 SOY nominees were: PFC Matthew Sweeney from the Action Shooting team; SGT Lawrence Cleveland from the Service Pistol team; SFC Thomas Rose, International Pistol; Shotgun team member SSG Josh Richmond; SFC Eric Uptagrafft from the International Rifle team; and SPC Billy Hankins from the Custom Firearms Shop.
Cooper Wins Big Matches After Deployment to Afghanistan
Ty Cooper had a remarkable year on and off the range. Cooper claimed his first Interservice individual championship at Quantico in July. He also won the long-range individual championship and was a member of the overall team champions, making it a clean sweep. A few weeks later, Cooper won the National Service Rifle Championship at Camp Perry, Ohio. All of this success was accomplished despite a deployment to Afghanistan that stretched into the spring.
SSG Cooper (center) with Lt.Col. R. Harbison (Ret.) (left) and Lt.Col. D. Hodne USAMU Commander (right).
“Looking back over the whole year I really am proud of being able to maintain the level of consistency it took to stay right there at the top,” said Cooper. “I think the thing I am most proud of was winning the two biggest matches that we have in our season in the same year. My goals kind of progressed as the summer went. I had never won an Interservice Championship and that was top of the list. I [also]had a burning desire to prove myself at the NRA Nationals and I won the Service Rifle National Championship.” When not shooting in competition, Coopper serves as a lead instructor for the service rifle team.
March 2nd, 2012
This article originally appeared on the USA Shooting website.
As the National Governing Body (NGB) for the sport of Olympic-style shooting in the United States, USA Shooting (USAS) welcomes the dialogue created by the recent article in the Wall Street Journal by Mark Yost titled: Taking Aim at an Old Debate: Can female athletes compete against men?. In shooting, yes — but not in the Olympics. In this article, Yost points out several interesting facts and observations about our sport. This dialogue allows us to engage the shooting community, expand our thinking and establish pathways for bettering our sport for the future.
You will get little argument from many of today’s top shooters, both male and female, as to the shooting abilities of women throughout USA Shooting’s ranks. The success of the collegiate programs like TCU and many intercollegiate programs in the U.S. only echo these beliefs as do some of the sport’s elite shooters like Kim Rhode, a four-time Olympic medalist in trap and skeet shooting, or Katy Emmons, a three-time Olympic medalist from the Czech Republic who is married to [U.S. Olympian] Matt Emmons.
“I am a born competitor and whether it is men or women I want to win,” said Jamie Gray, a 2008 Olympian in Rifle. “In a sport that is equal between men and women I would most definitely enjoy the competition. I started out only knowing that men and women compete against each other. It wasn’t until I learned shooting was an Olympic sport that I realized men and women didn’t compete against each other. It is exciting to me that there are still sports out there that men and women can be equal, however for other reasons it may be better that there are different categories for each.”
From 1968 through the 1980 Olympic Games, Olympic shooting events were mixed, with opportunities for women and men to participate regardless of gender. At the 1980 Games in Moscow, there were six shooting events contested. At the upcoming Games in London, there will be 15 events contested. Opportunities for women to compete in Olympic shooting have not shrunk with the dissolution of “mixed” events, but rather have grown as a result not only in our brand of shooting but across all platforms of the shooting sports. In Olympic competition, 14 women got the opportunity to compete in shooting at the 1980 and 1976 Olympic Games combined. Since that time, the numbers have risen from 77 in 1984 to 145 female competitors at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing.
 Shan Zhang Won Gold in 1992
Recent history also suggests that woman can perform alongside men in shooting competitions. At the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona, female competitor Shan Zhang of China became the Olympic gold medalist that year in mixed-event skeet, topping a field of both men and women. Over two days of competition she produced a score of 373 out of 375, a new Olympic and world record. She also became the first woman in the history of the Olympic Games’ shooting competition, to beat all the male shooters in her event. Since that time, no mixed events have been held in an Olympic shooting competition.
“As a proud American female citizen, participating in a sport where gender-specific characteristics are not advantageous, I would overwhelmingly favor a chance to compete in a mixed event — or at least a women’s event with an equal number of targets as the men,” said Kelsey Zauhar, a USA Shooting National Team member in Shotgun.
 “I think that anytime you have competition where size or strength is not a factor, females can absolutely compete with the males,” said USA Shooting National Team Pistol shooter and USAS Board member Sandra Uptagrafft. “The fundamentals of executing a good shot work the same regardless of gender, size or age. The question of why females no longer compete with males or why we have differing number of shots in the same events comes up often when I explain our sport to new people. It does seem sexist, but the fact that we have separate events from males in the Olympics actually is a good thing since more females can compete this way. There can only be so many people on the shooting line at one time. I personally am just happy to have a sport like shooting in which I can excel.”
FACTOID: Research by the National Sporting Goods Association shows female participation in target shooting grew by 46.5% between 2001 and 2010. And an October 2011 Gallup Poll found 23 percent of women own a gun. According to the National Shooting Sports Foundation, from 2001 to 2010, female participation in hunting grew by almost 37 percent.
March 2nd, 2012
 In today’s economy, Free is good. Here’s a list of older shooting books that can be downloaded for FREE from Google Books. This list, created by German Salazar, includes many classic treatises on marksmanship that still have value for today’s competitive shooters. In addition, we’ve included illustrated firearm histories, such as Townsend Whelen’s fascinating book, The American Rifle, and The Gun and its Development (9th Ed.), by William Wellington Greener.
In the list below, the title link will take you to the Google Books page for each book. You can read the entire book online, or you can download it to your computer as a PDF file* and save it (or print it). You can also create your own Google Library and save the books there for access from any computer.
The Bullet’s Flight From Powder to Target, Franklin W. Mann, 1909, 384 pages.
Irish Riflemen in America, Sir Arthur Blennerhassett Leech, 1875, 216 pages.
The American Rifle, Townsend Whelen, 1918, 637 pages.
Suggestions to Military Riflemen, Townsend Whelen, 1909, 243 pages.
Modern Rifle Shooting From the American Standpoint, W. G. Hudson, 1903, 155 pages.
 The Gun and its Development, William Wellington Greener, 1907 (9th Ed.) 846 pages.
Manual for Rifle Practice: Including Suggestions for Practice at Long Range, George Wood Wingate, 1879, 303 pages.
How I Became a Crack Shot — With Hints to Beginners, W. Milton Farrow, 1882, 204 pages.
Cartridge Manufacture, Douglas Thomas Hamilton, 1916, 167 pages.
Description and Rules for the Management of the United States Rifle, Caliber .30, Model of 1903, United States Army Ordnance Dept., 1904 (5th rev. 1914), 72 pages.
CLICK HERE for more FREE, downloadable Classic Shooting Titles.
*To download a book, first click the title from the list above. Then, once you’re at the Google book site, look for the icon that looks like a gear in the upper right-hand corner. Click that and a pull-down menu will appear. Select “Download PDF” from the menu — this will bring up a security question to make sure you are a human. Respond to the security question correctly and your normal download prompt will appear. Choose a location to hold your new e-book, and click “save”.
February 29th, 2012
 Effective immediately, Leupold & Stevens, Inc. (“Leupold”) has appointed Jim Clark as Chairman of Leupold’s Board of Directors. In addition, Dr. Don R. Kania and Dennis Spindler were appointed as new Board Members. Jim Clark was appointed board chair following the retirement of Don Gobel, who served on Leupold’s board for 16 years, the last four as chairman. During Gobel’s tenure, Leupold’s gross sales more than doubled.
A sales and marketing expert, Jim Clark has 20+ years of executive experience for small and large corporations with a strong outdoor recreation focus. For many years he served as CEO of Yakima products. Clark has been involved in numerous outdoor organizations, and he has served on Leupold’s Board of Directors since 2007.
Dr. Kania has been appointed to the Leupold & Stevens board to fill the position vacated by Clark’s appointment. Dr. Kania is the president and chief executive officer of FEI Company, an Oregon-based manufacturer of electron and ion beam microscopes, and instruments used in nano-scale applications in many industries.
Dennis Spindler comes to Leupold after retiring from Big Rock Sports, where he was the senior vice president of purchasing and merchandising. Spindler provided key merchandising and purchasing leadership in his time at Big Rock, and during his tenure company sales more than doubled. He is widely known throughout the sports optics and fishing industries.
February 27th, 2012
 Based on their showings in 10m Air Rifle Olympic trials, four athletes have been nominated to the U.S. Olympic Team. The Men’s 10m Air Rifle nominees are two-time Olympic medalist Matt Emmons and 2011 Pan American Games silver medalist Jonathan Hall. The two women nominated to the U.S. Olympic Team are Sarah Scherer and 2008 Olympian Jamie Gray. Olympic Team selection was based on the aggregate of four courses of fire and two best finals. All athletes nominated to the 2012 U.S. Olympic Team must now be approved by the U.S. Olympic Committee.
Matt Emmons, already nominated for Men’s 50m Rifle Three Position, led the selection with a total of 2587.7 points. Matt note: “I’m happy to earn another nomination to the team and shoot another event at the Olympics. At the same time, I know the scores that I shot throughout Trials are not going to be competitive at the Games and I know what I need to do to get there.” Close behind Emmons, Jon Hall finished the 2012 Trials with 2586.7 total points. Hall, a senior at Columbus State University in Georgia, finished third in the 2008 U.S. Olympic Airgun Trials, barely missing the team in 2008. Hall said that making the 2012 Olympics team is “a relief and an exciting moment — I’ve been working towards this my whole life.”
In Women’s 10m Air Rifle, 21-year-old Sarah Scherer and 2008 Olympian Jamie Gray received nominations to the 2012 U.S. Olympic Team. Scherer is now the second member of her family to earn an Olympic berth. Scherer’s brother, Stephen, was a member of the 2008 Team, and passed away in 2011. “Honestly, thank you Lord. Without him I could not have made it through this match,” said Scherer who battled a severe head cold throughout the weekend. “The only thing that I had left in my shooting that was still me was my focus and concentration. I couldn’t hear or see as well as normal and my heart rate was all over the place. I’m just so thankful that I made it through.”
Gray, already nominated to the 2012 U.S. Olympic Team for Women’s 50m 3P Rifle, is “looking forward to shooting two events [in London].” Jamie, the wife of USAMU SSG Hank Gray, will continue her training at the USAMU’s ranges in Fort Benning, GA, as well as the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado.
Airgun Course of Fire Explained
In airgun competition, male and female competitors shoot 60 and 40 shots respectively during a single course of fire at electronic targets 10m (32.8 feet) down range. The maximum number of points available is 600 for men and 400 points for women with 10 being the highest score possible per shot. Athletes qualify for the finals by placing in the top eight after an aggregate match score. The final for both events consists of ten shots. The scoring in the finals is unique because decimals are counted, so the maximum number of points a competitor can earn is 109 points with 10.9 being the highest score possible per shot.
 In related news, two 10m air pistol shooters secured Team nominations at the Olympic Trials held at Port Clinton, Ohio this past weekend. Now set to compete with Team USA are three-time Olympian SFC Daryl Szarenski, and 2008 Olympic bronze medalist Jason Turner. SFC Szarenski is the 2011 Pan-American Games Men’s 10m Air Pistol gold medalist. Daryl came into the weekend with an 18-point advantage over his nearest competitor and finished atop the standings with 2537.4 total points.
February 23rd, 2012
 Hornady Manufacturing has recalled seven lots of 500 S&W 300 grain FTX® Custom™ pistol ammunition. Hornady ballisticians have determined that some cartridges from Lot numbers 3101327, 3110256, 3110683, 3110695, 3110945, 3111388, 3111885, may exhibit excessive chamber pressures. These lots were shipped between September 9, 2010, and October 17, 2011. Use of this product may result in firearm damage and/or personal injury.
Recalled Lot Numbers: 3101327, 3110256, 3110683, 3110695, 3110945, 3111388, 3111885. The Lot number can be found printed on the lower portion of the box label.
If you own any of these Lot numbers or have any questions regarding this recall, Call Hornady at 800-338-1242 right away. Hornady Manufacturing Company will make all arrangements associated with the return and replacement of this product.
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