Something interesting took place in St. Louis, Missouri this weekend — F-Bench competitors shot next to Sling, F-TR, and F-Open prone shooters and all had fun. We like events that bring shooters together from multiple disciplines, and we like matches that allow F-Class folks to shoot from the Bench for a change. (We’d love to see a 300-yard match that allows short-range PPC and 30BR shooters to compete side-by-side with F-Class shooters — the more the merrier.)

Read 2016 Sierra Cup Match Comments in the AccurateShooter Forum.

New, Experimental Sierra Projectiles Perform Great
Two Sierra staffers competed this year, shooting prototype Sierra bullets in the final stages of testing. Congrats to Sierra’s Tommy Todd who took Second Place in F-TR class, and to Sierra’s Mark Walker who finished third in F-Open. That bodes well for the new, experimental Sierra bullets. Based on Tommy’s and Mark’s results, the new Sierra bullets appear to be very accurate indeed.

Forum member Drew R. (aka SkiUtah2) drove all the way from North Dakota to attend the Sierra Cup:

“This was my first time at BRRC and it was as anticipated — a great place to shoot. I met many gracious and talented shooters. I love getting to try new ranges and meeting people from the AccurateShooter Forum. It’s fair to say that even the guy from North Dakota was chilled when we started on Saturday. The warm welcome helped take the edge off.

Organizing a match of this caliber takes a lot of work even with an army of people behind the scenes, and without a core group herding the cats it doesn’t run well as this one did. Thanks Brett, Joe, and everyone who made this match run so smoothly. Coordinating with sling, bench, F-TR and F-Open shooters’ needs must have been remarkably challenging and you made it look effortless.

It was a fun time. I can highly recommend this range and this match to everyone wanting an enjoyable and memorable experience. Conditions on Saturday were definitely not a trigger-pulling contest, and (for me) that adds to the fun. The amenities are top tier. Many of the ranges I shoot at do not even have running water, much less showers onsite.

Thanks to Sierra for the sponsorship and very generous prize table. And thanks for the award waiving my entry fee as the ‘Long Distance Shooter’ for my trek. That was classy and completely unexpected.” — Drew R.

On Friday, Jerry shot his 21.5-lb F-Open rifle. On Saturday and Sunday he used that F-Class rig in Heavy Gun, and shot a converted Palma rifle with a .284 barrel in Light Gun. Jerry was loading H4831sc with Berger “orange box” 180gr hunting bullets in both guns. Jerry’s 21.5-pounder has a really long throat allowing Jerry to “hang the bullets way out there” and load more powder. That gives him higher velocity, about 90-100 FPS more than his shorter-throated .284 Light Gun. Jerry tells us: “The long throat is working really well. You’d be surprised at how little shank I’m running in the necks, but the accuracy is there, and you can get a lot more velocity when you adjust the load for the increased boiler room”. Jerry has also long-throated a .308 Win rifle for shooting the 185s and he is getting “really good velocities for that bullet in a .308 Win”.

Jerry Tierney with Awards from 2013 NBRSA Long-Range Nationals. Jerry, now a gentleman wine-maker, presented some of his Tierney-bottled “Sin & Zin” Zinfandel as prizes in the match.

In winning the F-Bench Match and SloughHouse 1000, Jerry racked up another five NBRSA Hall-of-Fame points. He is now the leading NBRSA HOF’er with 20 points. When asked for his successful match strategy, Jerry replied: “watch the flags and keep ‘em in the middle”. Perhaps the 600-yard competitors are lucky that Jerry had Jury Duty earlier in the week so he could not participate in the NBRSA 600-yard Nationals, won by Richard Schatz. Jerry was certainly “on his game” Friday through Sunday.

Jerry says the winds were unusually light (for Sacramento), on the weekend: “There was never any real bad wind — we had plus/minus 1 MOA most of the time, never more than three minutes of windage”. However, the winds were tricky. Jerry says: “It seems like every time we’d finish our sighters, the wind would flip to another direction. That caught many shooters by surprise.”

Editor’s Note: We will augment this story with full match results as soon as they are available. If any readers have a copy of the final results, or photos from the match, please send them to us. Our email address is: mailbox [at] 6mmbr.com.

The 600-yard Nationals (aka Sloughhouse 600), calendared April 24-25, concludes today. Guys are probably finishing up their final 600-yard relay as this story goes to press. On Friday, April 26, the NBRSA will hold a 1000-Yard “F-Bench” match. This is a popular new discipline which allows guys with F-Class rifles (up to 22 lbs.) to shoot off the bench. It’s a good idea that encourages participation from shooters who might not otherwise come to the Nationals.

After Friday’s F-Bench Match, the NBRSA 1000-yard National Championships (aka the 6th Annual Sloughhouse 1000) will be held April 27-28 (Saturday and Sunday). NOTE: It’s not too late to sign up for the 1000-yard match this weekend. Long Range National Fees are $50 a day, Late fee applies. For more information, visit www.NBRSA.org and www.SacValley.org. Below are Match Application Forms, in MS Word format (right click and “save as”).

F-Bench Match Application | Sloughhouse 1000 Application | Sloughhouse 600 Application

PREVIEW New NBRSA RuleBook

The NBRSA is updating its Official Rulebook and By-Laws. The newly revised Rulebook (version 38) is in the process of being printed. However, the NRBRSA has uploaded a PDF file you can now preview the the latest (version 38) of the Official Rulebook.

CLICK HERE for NBRSA Revised Rulebook (vers. 38) PREVIEW (PDF File, 1.7mb).