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Practically Shooting

Bugout Rifle Match


BarryinIN

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A week ago, a friend and I held a bugout rifle match. We were shooting on his family's property in July and said he'd like to do a match there sometime. This place has a bluff that runs from 100-150 feet tall along one side that makes a perfect natural backstop. It's 300 yards across the short way, and we can get 600+ by shooting from the corner. It also joins another property belonging to an IPSC shooter in the family, where they made a pistol bay and 100 yard rifle bay.

He talked about a precision match at first, but it quickly evolved into a bugout match. We decided to take advantage of what we had and use it all, and add some close/fast shooting to the longer range shooting.

Competitors would have to walk 1-2 miles carrying everything on them, so it made sense to go the bugout route anyway.

I was really interested in seeing what people chose to shoot. There is no single rifle that's ideal for all of this type of shooting, so you had to compromise somewhere. Carrying it all over hills, crossing railroad beds, and walking creeks influenced decisions too.

We spent three months getting ready, and here is what we came up with:

When the competitors arrived, they signed in, and dumped their rifles and gear in a trailer. We couldn't make people bring a pack with shelter and three days of supplies, but we encouraged it to take advantage of the time to test it out. Most did, but a couple just brought ammo and water. One competitor had to walk out of hurricane Andrew, and he used a shoulder slung duffle.

We would begin using pistol only, as carried daily.

Stage 1:

This was handgun only. It was also a blind stage- you couldn't see any of it until you entered past the hung tarps.

The situation was the S had HTF, and you had to leave work/shopping/whatever to get to your car where either your rifle was kept or to get home to your rifle. We tried to replicate a parking lot. Barrels represented concrete posts, and snow fence on frames were cars. Five steel targets awaited, hidden throughout. They had shirts, so the steel area and location was concealed. Start at the entrance, get to the exit and if you survived you got your rifle.

A "fight your way to he rifle stage".

This was untimed, so shooters would use cover and pie corners correctly for a change.

Get through this, and you went to...

Stage 2:

The trailer with everybody's gear was parked by a table. You had to put on all your gear (vest, warbelt, pack, etc) while on the clock. This came from times I've been in carbine classes and I've watched people spend 20 minutes getting their gear on before class each morning. That is fine for an LEO on a raid team, but that's not most people. When asked why they took the class, they almost always say it's to prepare for the sound of breaking glass at 3am. Well, of your plan to respond to bumps in the night is to spend 20 minutes getting cool-guy gear on, it's a bad plan. I truly think some people don't realize how long it takes them to put in what they think they "need".

These guys in the match were sorted out, but it was still good to give them a frame of reference.

You couldn't cheat and throw a belt with a couple of mag pouches over your shoulder and say "done", because however you left this stage was how you had to shoot the next stage. You went straight to it without a look, so didn't know what you might need.

Stage 3:

The first actual rifle stage. Another blind stage. You started at the corner of a barn. The scenario was that you were about to start your real walk when you were spotted and shot at by five people. At the signal, you stepped out and dealt with the five (steel targets). We didn't tell them the distance (125-127 yards) or location beyond the general direction. They had five rounds, with the idea that if it took more, you'd be shot by then anyway.

There were several ways to do this one. In truth, only one shooter "lived". He turned the corner and dropped immediately. Then he found the targets. Others stood in the open and maneuvered as needed to see them all.

Our intent was that you couldn't get all five from one spot. The "survivor" beat us, though. He took the risk of shooting through brush near the targets that obscured two of them. The brush was close enough that any deflection was minimal and he hit them. Good work.

Then we started walking. We had to get to the other shooting area.

Stage 4:

This was the High Angle stage. This was to show the effects of shooting down at a steep angle. We had a choice of steep or distance and compromised. We got 32 degrees of angle and 53 yards distance. We were actually shooting down the face of the bluff that would be the backstop for the long portions.

The scenario was you entered a flat-roofed commercial building to climb up for a look around. You were spotted, and people are coming to enter the building and get you.

We had a VTAC barricade up there, and a line across it you couldn't go below. Basically it forced a standing position. We wanted a small target to illustrate the angle effects. The target was a scaled down humanish silhouette of about 4.5" square. The ten ring was about an inch.

The computer programs show a change of around .1" when shooting at this range and angle. It didn't work that way for anyone. Most shot pretty low and failed to get any decent hits. I used a 50 yard zero setting and didn't try to compensate, just to see how much change it made. I was at least an inch low.

This stage was not much liked. But it was educational.

Then we did some more walking. We had to cross the soybean field to shoot back toward where we just left.

Stage 5:

300 yards. We planned this part to be the easiest of the distance stages. The shooting area was flat, level, and as comfortable as rocks can be. It was an abandoned railroad bed. Target sizes were generous, considering.

We wanted everyone to get a good solid zero here to work from as we moved on. What we didn't realize when we started the planning, was that we would get some pretty skilled shooters.

Let me take a minute to talk about that.

We limited it to eight people, plus us two organizers. We were selective in who we asked. We wanted people with some skills at distance, with a self-defense mindset (that was harder than we thought to find that combination- we knew some of each, but few with both), and we tried to get fairly local people because the date might have to change quickly. We needed the field harvested and had no way to determine when that would be.

We got lucky and got some great shooters. We ended up with seven after some last minute cancellations. Three had been to a Thunder Ranch midrange precision rifle class together on the spring. One shoots 1,000 yard F-class. The rest were not slugs either.

So with the skills these guys had, we didn't really need to have a "starter" stage for long range. This would not have been much of a challenge, except for the fact we had some of the strongest winds in a while. It was usually running around 17 mph, but varying from 3-22 mph. That made it a little harder, but not enough to really hurt them.

The 300 yard targets were steel plates: a 2/3 scale IPSC, 12" round, and 10" round.

Stage 6:

400 yards. Three minute time limit. Targets were steel: Three IPSC silhouettes and two 14" squares. We were able to shot from prone in the bean stubble.

Most didn't use half the time.

Our plan here was to have a plywood wall with a "window" opening. There would be a chair or two, maybe a ladder or something else. The idea was you came across an abandoned house and had to make a position inside it, shoot the steel, and do it under the time limit. We'd hang a tarp here too, to block the view so people wouldn't just copy each other's expedient position.

We simply ran out of time to get it done.

Stage 7:

500 yards: Same time limit, same targets. Same position.

Stage 8:

600 yards. Same thing.

I think everyone learned something.

The wind got tough for some of us at 400 and beyond. If using a scope with mil-dots or similar, they could manage it fine. Those without anything to mark hold off points had trouble.

The equipment choices were varied, as I had hoped.

Four used gee-whiz bolt guns with serious scopes. One of those was a 20" barreled rifle, which I thought was perfect. I think all the bolt guns had Nightgorce scopes- 3.5-22X I think.

Two used SCAR 17s, one with a 1.5-5X scope and one with a 1-4X.

One M1A. He started with a Leupold 1.5-5X but tossed it aside after struggling at 300 with wandering lateral zero. He did great with iron sights after that (old Marine).

And one AR, a 20" with a Leupold 1.5-5X.

All but the AR were .308.

My co-coordinator decided that morning kit to shoot because running it and shooting it was too much. He would have used a Savage .308 with 20" barrel and 6-24X scope.

As expected, the handier rifles did better up close, and the big bolt guns better at distance.

I was one of the SCAR/1-4X guys. I struggled with wind because I had a triangle reticle with no good reference to hold off. Cranking knobs wouldn't work because the wind varied quicker than dialing. I still wouldn't change anything, since I think it's the most universal problem solver.

It was fun. I had trouble walking until Wednesday.

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Some pics:

Pistol target dressed:

Pistol target undressed. Since the milk jug head fit on top, a center chest hit was actually a low hit and might not take it down. We got lots of reminders to keep shooting until the threat was down.

Some teamwork, spotting and calling shots.

View from the 500.

We were tearing down, and this target caught my eye. It was shot at by three guys. They shot it at 400, 500, and 600 yards from prone/bipod. The 15-rd group measures 12" x 11.5". For three people and three distances, and winds varying from 3 to 17 mph, a 2 moa group impressed me.

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