Have you tried Progressive Position Pistol??

[76Olympian]

Have you tried Progressive Position Pistol??

We are in dire need for more pistol junior athletes. Our pipeline of future pistol Olympians is extremely thin, especially for women/junior girls pistol athletes.

Progressive Position Pistol allows a junior shooter to start at ANY age. They begin with two hand supported from a bench.

I have attached an article which was published recently in the USAS magazine if you did not see it or you do not receive the magazine..

PPP requires much less equipment than rifle and is therefore cheaper to start up a junior athlete.

If there is anything that I can help you or your club with, please contact me.

Regards,
Mike Theimer
USA Shooting
michael.theimer@usashooting.org

[NJROTC Inst]

The problem is that almost no clubs shoot it. I am in Utah where we have 2 very active clubs but no place for my 9yo daughter to shoot.

[76Olympian]

You only need 10 meters for PPP. Its an air pistol event. The 'active clubs' don't have at least 10 meters for airguns?

[NJROTC Inst]

The clubs both shoot 10M air pistol and rifle. The issue is that if I took my daughter up to one of the PTO matches (the only kind they have) and said that we were there to shoot, they would all laugh. We can hardly get any junior shooters to come shoot and we have numerous JROTC units with Air rifle teams in the local area. I'll push the idea and see what happens. Maybe I'll volunteer to just run and advertise the junior ppp program myself.

[randy1952]

Have you tried Progressive Position Pistol??

We are in dire need for more pistol junior athletes. Our pipeline of future pistol Olympians is extremely thin, especially for women/junior girls pistol athletes.

Progressive Position Pistol allows a junior shooter to start at ANY age. They begin with two hand supported from a bench.

I have attached an article which was published recently in the USAS magazine if you did not see it or you do not receive the magazine..

PPP requires much less equipment than rifle and is therefore cheaper to start up a junior athlete.

If there is anything that I can help you or your club with, please contact me.

Regards,
Mike Theimer
USA Shooting
michael.theimer@usashooting.org

It is hard enough to get kids to shot pistol, but it would help if their were more matches to go to. The big match for PPP isn't promoted as well as the JOs. I pointed out the problem to USAS 10 years ago with some repeat efforts in the years after about the declining number of junior pistol shooters and I got at best an indifference response. The national organizations are trying to get individuals outside of their organizations to make up the difference because they don't have the resources, but what they don't seem to think about is that we as individuals are even more limited in resources. The cost of rifles and pistols are heading through the stratosphere with our dollar becoming as valuable as the Peso.

The one long term goal that would help tremendously would be if it became an NCAA sport. I have approached USAS and the NRA about it, but I get it sounds like a good idea and it ends right there. I have tried to make some effort, but we as individuals don't have the influence of the large national organizations and until the national organizations make a big push to the NCAA nothing will happen and I'll just be whistling into the wind. You have to give these kids and parents some motivation to shot for and scholarships can be a motivation.

One other thing and it maybe a perception but pistol doesn't get the same support or visual promotion that rifle enjoys. It is hard to convince a kid or parent now days to spend as much money on a pistol which is pretty close to the cost of a rifle if they don't see any possible return except bragging rights. USAS has had another problem for years as many people in this country who don't even know we have shooting as a sport in the Olympics and many of those are firearms owners. I was trying to get more support for our shooting program to one of the local business owners and I mentioned to him some of the Olympic shooters and he was absolutely clueless about the sport and he was a gun owner. This has to change if the long term life of this sport is going to live on.

[NJROTC Inst]

Other than now and then at the OTC, does anyone know of any PPP matches west of the Rockies?

[randy1952]

Other than now and then at the OTC, does anyone know of any PPP matches west of the Rockies?

We could offer the PPP match here in Blackfoot, Idaho all we would need is some advance notification to register the match. We use to offer the PPP match, but we have only gotten one interested shooter in the last five years & so we haven't added to our regular matches. The club at the University of Utah could as well conduct the match all it would take is someone to register the match. It could be done along with their regular air pistol matches.

[409impala1]

just got it introduced into our county for 4H, several matches within 150 miles. We have a lot of kids interested and also in 22 pistol as well.

[76Olympian]

USAS has started the first PPP National Postal matches. There are three per year (Fall, Winter and Spring postals). The summer is for the PPP Nationals which will be 6-8 July in Anniston this year.

I have attached the PPP National Postal program to this posting.

[Nate4Hshootingsports]

We have a 4H shooting sports club and are about to start a pistol program. We just purchased two Crossman 2300s pistols and wonder if they would be competitive in the PPP postal matches? Are there any good coaching resources for pistol you would recommend?

[76Olympian]

You start with whatever you can afford to get.

USA Shooting use to sell the Air Arms Alfa Proj as a 'starter' compress air pistol. We are sold out of those and now Pyramyd Air sells them to our members and affiliated clubs at a discount. I do not know the current price, but it was somewhere around $600 depending on the exchange rate since they are imported.

We have a similar discount with Pardini USA for the Pardini 'Kid' K10 air pistol which the last price I heard was around $930.

The Air Arms is a good beginner to intermediate air gun and the Pardini is a good intermediate to Olympic level. The air gun can be upgraded as the junior develops in skill and into an adult full size Olympic air pistol.

USAS National Assistant Coaches have created a program to purchase air pistols on a two year extended payment plan to help clubs make multiple air pistol purchases affordable.

Send an email to me at michael.theimer at usashooting.org to get more information.