TargetTalk

A discussion thread on the Pistol forum, http://www.targettalk.org/viewtopic.php?t=20607 has developed in part to discussing the effect of ISSF rules and rule changes on the grass roots of the sport.

What opinion do other posters have?

Spencer

It is easy to blame the ISSF, but perhaps the 'problem' is much closer to home.

E.g.

j-team wrote:

Spencer wrote: And the effect on the grass-roots shooter at club level????
Spencer

We are getting way off the MG4 here, so I'll keep it brief.

A club level shooter decides to broaden his horizons and attend a regional/state/national championships. When he gets there someone (maybe in a green jacket?) tells him, you can't wear those shoes, those glasses will have to be modified etc. He goes way feeling like they didn't want him there and tells the other members of his small club what happened. They decied it's more fun just shooting amoungst themselves.

Here in Australia the majority of (not all) pistol and rifle clubs are ISSF oriented, with other codes fitting in to the venue overlay provided by the ISSF range layouts. Together with this comes a degree of 'rule acceptance' and more importantly, the club provides (or should) the needed information to enable a newbie to move into competition without the glitches referred to by j-team.


Spencer

well said. When all the rulles are already followed at club level then it isnt really a problem to go onto compete a higher level

start as you mean to go on...

Leading in from the other thread...

j-team wrote:

Spencer wrote:How so?
Spencer

A rule book that is now 10x thicker than when I started shooting (1986).

Rejoice then, because the 2009 rulebook is smaller (I measured it) by a few mm...

with rules like:
-The size of the blinder
-The length of your shorts
-The logo allowed on your cap
shall I go on?

In fairness, all of those are pretty much forced on the ISSF from the outside by, not to put too fine a point on it, NBC

A club level shooter decides to broaden his horizons and attend a regional/state/national championships. When he gets there someone (maybe in a green jacket?) tells him, you can't wear those shoes, those glasses will have to be modified etc. He goes way feeling like they didn't want him there and tells the other members of his small club what happened. They decied it's more fun just shooting amoungst themselves.

I think if you are new to that type of shoot if you let them know, they (in my experience) try to help not just shout at you, and as has been said the club should give you some guidance - 1) as far as what will or wont be allowed and 2) to give you the heads up that the first time you go, you might have some difficulties of that type...

I'm not an official, but I would think that most people officiating aren't getting paid to do it but because they want to contribute something, and the last thing they want is to decrease the number of people involved in the sport. Or perhaps i'm hopelessly romantic about the whole thing?

It's a shame if you equate 'entered and found out that you needed to change some things' to 'entered and they didnt want me to be there' - perhpas there should be a tick box on entry forms for 'novice'? Some other sports do that and it might help the assimilation process

A club level shooter decides to broaden his horizons and attend a regional/state/national championships. When he gets there someone (maybe in a green jacket?) tells him, you can't wear those shoes, those glasses will have to be modified etc. He goes way feeling like they didn't want him there and tells the other members of his small club what happened. They decied it's more fun just shooting amoungst themselves.

If a club level shooter decides to broaden his/her horizon to attend a championships then it would stand to reason that they should also broaden their mind to research the rules associated with said championship beforehand - I think this is just common sense.

Why would one expect a championship to be run as a Casual/Social event?

Cheers

David

Spencer wrote:It is easy to blame the ISSF, but perhaps the 'problem' is much closer to home.

I agree with Spencer. The options that ISSF rules allow, are not even fully used on grass roots level, and national federations have a very big leeway in suitably adapting ISSF rules on the national or regional level, in inventing new own disciplines etc.

Sometimes the ISSF _are_ at fault (e.g. now in regards to the forthcoming Youth Olympic Games), but sometimes they are not. :-)

Alexander

David no one is suggesting that there shouldn't be rules or that matches should be run casually.

The problem is with rule changes for little or no apparent reason, than with rules in general. Many of these rules have many unintended consequences (I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt that they are unintended).

Are you aware how many times they have changes the rules regarding the clothing in rifle? This is a big problem in the sport, every time they do this they cost competitors lots of money. For one it makes there current equipment basically worthless (like the guys with .22 shorts), and requires them to buy all new gear. This is almost always done to effect the outcomes at the elite level, which it rarely does, but has a large effect on the grass roots. New shooters starting out have no pool of used equipment to buy at reasonable prices, club level shooters think twice about investing in new equipment that will become worthless a faceless organizations whim and may drop out.

Then there is the just down right silly rules, which basically are based on the retarded society that we live in that need a rule (law) for everything.

The crap about it being NBC's fault is total bs. The ISSF has been playing the appeasement game for a longtime, we all know how well appeasement works. NBC has the Olympic TV rights they show probably less than 60% of the games, they aren't forced to show shooting and don't so they could care less.

Richard H wrote:The crap about it being NBC's fault is total bs. The ISSF has been playing the appeasement game for a longtime, we all know how well appeasement works. NBC has the Olympic TV rights they show probably less than 60% of the games, they aren't forced to show shooting and don't so they could care less.

$2.2 billion for the Olympic TV rights, paid by NBC. In Ireland, there's a saying - he who pays the piper calls the tune. NBC wants to see the faces of the finalists? The ISSF gets told, through the middleman of the IOC, and we all cut down our blinders. It is not a matter of 'appeasement', any more than you doing what your boss assigns you to do in work is appeasement.

Or you can stand up and take the consequences thats an option too you know.

Its said that "they wanted to see their face", no one ever said who "they" were it was NBC its assumed, the ISSF could have cane up with the idea that if they can see their faces maybe they would put it on TV, that's just as plausible. If thats the case it would have been just as easy to have a rule that when shooting at the olympics blinders need to be xyz, then that would leave the rest alone. In all honesty who gives a crap about the blinder, I don't think it was mentioned in my post, I doubt NBC has much to say about a jacket being one mm thinner, for TV purposes.

Are you aware how many times they have changes the rules regarding the clothing in rifle? This is a big problem in the sport, every time they do this they cost competitors lots of money. For one it makes there current equipment basically worthless (like the guys with .22 shorts), and requires them to buy all new gear. This is almost always done to effect the outcomes at the elite level, which it rarely does, but has a large effect on the grass roots. New shooters starting out have no pool of used equipment to buy at reasonable prices, club level shooters think twice about investing in new equipment that will become worthless a faceless organizations whim and may drop out.

No, I'm not aware - but then I can't understand why they allow special clothing for rifle anyway. They don't allow it for pistol so why for rifle - would make the whole sport cheaper....... :) I suggest that it has been the allowance of special clothing that has caused the problem in the first place.

The change to .22short was to get of/reduce the number of 600's that were shot as far as I am aware. You can still shoot 22 short but not in competition. But how often does this type of thing happen? I would suggest that Government's firearms law changes are more problematic in this regard.

Cheers

David

higginsdj wrote:[
The change to .22short was to get of/reduce the number of 600's that were shot as far as I am aware. You can still shoot 22 short but not in competition. But how often does this type of thing happen? I would suggest that Government's firearms law changes are more problematic in this regard.

Cheers

David

WR for RFP was 597 with shorts, so no problem of too many 600s there. Prone rifle has a page of people on 600 but they won't dare change the rules there.

RFP was a good spectator sport when the shooters shot one at a time. But the ISSF wanted to get it out of the way quickly so now everyone shoots together. Boring!

I sold my $2000 Pardini for $500. Thanks ISSF!

j-team wrote:
WR for RFP was 597 with shorts, so no problem of too many 600s there. Prone rifle has a page of people on 600 but they won't dare change the rules there.

Don't be so hasty to prejudge. I wouldn't be suprised to see a change in rifle in the next 1 or 2 olympic cycles. The big question is exactly what to do ? I think a clothing or technical change will be the end result but someone could perceive the 'answer' to be to reduce the size of the bull - which won't be easy in air rifle.

RFP was a good spectator sport when the shooters shot one at a time. But the ISSF wanted to get it out of the way quickly so now everyone shoots together. Boring!

I sold my $2000 Pardini for $500. Thanks ISSF!

Unfortunately time is money, and RF has to be shot like the other events, as it would just be unmanageable any other way.

Rob.

higginsdj wrote:No, I'm not aware - but then I can't understand why they allow special clothing for rifle anyway.

A 5.5kg (or 8kg for 50m3P) offset asymmetric load on the spinal column, one would hope. I didn't have a great position when I started air rifle and noone caught it, so now I have a permanently numb patch on my right leg above the knee where the L4 spinal nerve was damaged. So I'm rather a fan of special clothing that protects people from that sort of inconvenience.

The change to .22short was to get of/reduce the number of 600's that were shot as far as I am aware.

As far as I was aware, it was to let people get one kind of 25m pistol to shoot in all the 25m pistol disciplines. There was also mention of the increasing price and difficulty in obtaining .22short ammunition. Not that the change is going to do RF too much good anyway, the numbers shooting it were falling off because one RF firing point takes up four or five normal bays for one shooter and there are a limited number of bays in most clubs and that number isn't going up given the price of land in Europe. So if the choice was 1 person shooting RF or 5 people shooting standard pistol, RF was going to lose out. For example, when handguns came back in Ireland, we started shooting standard/sport pistol instead of RF because that way we could get more people on the line. RF just requires too much infrastructure. Remember as well that ISSF is worldwide - you might have loads of room for RF firing points and massive choice in the firearms you can buy and great ease in acquiring them, but that does not necessarily hold for the other 153 countries in ISSF may not always share in your good fortune in this regard...

j-team wrote:Prone rifle has a page of people on 600 but they won't dare change the rules there.

I think it's pretty much accepted that they have to do something for prone rifle, and elimination of the event from the olympic program in favour of 3x40 which already has a prone element is a fairly logical option.

I sold my $2000 Pardini for $500. Thanks ISSF!

So the ISSF showed up at your door and broke into your house and held you down while they signed your name to the $500 receipt? Or are you saying instead that you shoot ISSF pistol and when ISSF changed the rules, you changed your kit because you think of yourself as an ISSF shooter and took the $1500 hit to maintain that identity? If so, you're not really going to quit ISSF shooting, you just don't want any inconvienence. Which is understandable, but is rather likely to not be fulfilled. Everything changes eventually. And if you want to influence how it changes, well, volunteer for USAS, do some admin, then push to get onto ISSF committees.

RobStubbs wrote:I wouldn't be suprised to see a change in rifle in the next 1 or 2 olympic cycles. The big question is exactly what to do ? I think a clothing or technical change will be the end result but someone could perceive the 'answer' to be to reduce the size of the bull - which won't be easy in air rifle.

No, but moving over to decimal scoring in the qualifying round for air rifle would be doable, and a damn sight easier to manage than this new rule with inner tens to tiebreak which we've already found over here to add a lot more work if you don't have electronic targets.

I asked the ISSF last year if they would allow shooters who don't wear shooting pants to wear a weight lifters body belt to protect the lumbar spine. I based this question around health and safety.
They never had the manners or courtesy to reply.

The ISSF seems to forget that the vast majority of shooters never get to international level but are the shooters who keep this sport alive and its only a tiny percentage of world class shooters that they seem interested in. They need reminding about this in plane and simple terms.

Peeps

I still don't get the need for special clothing. If it is there to help support the weight of the rifle because of possible poor technique/posture/overuse then why not simply allow the rifle to be supported on a stand? The specs for a piece of dowel are quite simple....... Why do the prone shooters need it?

I thought the clothing was there to simply help reduce movement in the body.

Cheers

David

David

The clothes serve a number of purposes, but two in particular: the support the pants and jacket provide the lower back and to dampen one's pulse.

In prone, the jacket provides some support, but the pulse dampening is key. The sling keeper is also pretty important, but it's easy enough to throw one of those together fr a sweatshirt I guess.

As someone who shoots a pretty good amount, I can say that it's possible to shoot the collegiate 20 hours per week without the support of pants or jacket. I can also say that taking the pants and jacket out of it would end up making a lot of people quit the sport because of the amount of exercise that would be needed to prevent injury.

Take my Perry experience last summer. 4 standing targets, 20 shots each, 30min time limit. Because of the wind, I was forced to take a whole heck of a lot of holds. I would venture that I averaged a hold every 20-30sec. This summer I came down to the final minute of my time on all 4 targets. That's 60-90 holds every target, 120-180 per day, 240-360 for Perry without shooting teams. I'm in pretty darn good shape, still doing the workout my college trainers designed specifically for rifle 2-3 times a week, and I was very sore. While beginners would have probably done their 20 shots in about 15min max every target, It still takes conditioning to lift a 12-17lb rifle 25-30 times and then hold it still. Making the use of stands to support the rifle would just lead to another vast development of another piece of equipment and a subsequent price increase.

Take the air pistols I've seen for sale used on this site. Most of them are going for the same as or MORE than air rifles. They're essentially the same machine, just different sizes. The money air pistol shooters save in clothes seems to be going into their guns.

As a general note:

Every sport has it's equipment and it all costs money. I'm a tennis player and I have 4 racquets, a stringer, and over $250 in string on hand at any one time. That totals about $1000 in equipment. Could I have bought one Walmart racquet to play with, ya, but I can confidently say I would not have reached the level of tennis player I am today. The amount of money one invests in a sport depends on their want to succeed in it. Are there Olympic level shooters out there that can't afford the equipment to show their skill, I'm sure there are. If I had a million dollar travel budget each year, I could be a world class shooter, or I could be a world traveling shooter. A guy with a relatively stock Walther won the Prone gold this summer. From what I saw, he has less money on the line than me at a prone match.

My junior program starts kids out in cloth coats with buckles on them, leather slings, and mitt style gloves. Two of those 3 are illegal per ISSF. I have some canvas coats and plan on purchasing more. I loan/assign equipment based on one's commitment level (attendance, effort, commitment to the club). When I loan/assign them equipment is based on shooting ability (no free rifles for beginners). The kids get what they want out of the program. This is the same as those who get into smallbore shooting as adults. I've never heard of anyone rudely turned away from a match for having illegal equipment. We always teach it's your responsibility: score, where that last shot went, what equipment you use. It is one's own responsibility to abide by the rules, no matter where they are arbitrarily laid out. We will always complain about something we feel limits us.

Some people have lots of money, some people have lots of time, and some people have lots of persistence. I've seen all 3 win matches. Who are you?

If I couldn't wear the pants and jacket shooting standing I would have to quit the sport. I have a very bent spine and when shooting standing I have to bend it more to get the rifle above my centre of balance. My back couldn't take the weight without the clothes.

I don't know if much really does need to be changed. Possibly changing the size of the prone target but there are also options of using a decimal system with electronic targets.

I think that now we are seeing that scoring a high qualifying score isn't enough so they are adapting to learning to not just score 10s but score good 10s. They have to learn the art of shooting great finals and the art of possibly peaking your scores in the last two strings in-case of count backs and the like.

If you think about what can be worked on as far as quality of each shot then you will realise that there is still room for improvement. The shooters haven't quite hit the peak of the mountain yet.

Sparks wrote:

RobStubbs wrote:I wouldn't be suprised to see a change in rifle in the next 1 or 2 olympic cycles. The big question is exactly what to do ? I think a clothing or technical change will be the end result but someone could perceive the 'answer' to be to reduce the size of the bull - which won't be easy in air rifle.

No, but moving over to decimal scoring in the qualifying round for air rifle would be doable, and a damn sight easier to manage than this new rule with inner tens to tiebreak which we've already found over here to add a lot more work if you don't have electronic targets.

It would only be doable in major comps with electronics or electronic scoring devices. That alienates the 99+% of shooters who do not shoot in these events. Club and smaller comps would have to be scored differently which is therefore not an option.

I think that now we are seeing that scoring a high qualifying score isn't enough so they are adapting to learning to not just score 10s but score good 10s. They have to learn the art of shooting great finals and the art of possibly peaking your scores in the last two strings in-case of count backs and the like.

Peaking scores at the end is no longer a bonus, since it's all determined on inner tens in tiebreaks.

Rob.