Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies *Update on pg 2 for sling tournament*

[jameydan]

Competitors,
The High Power season is half way done at the Deep Creek Rifle Range just outside of Missoula, Montana. The Deep Creek Range continues to be the home to many world records in other long range shooting disciplines and we have seen 13 new NRA High Power National Records fired there in the last 5 years. The range is atypical for many Rocky Mountain ranges in that the conditions are typically very gentle allowing very high scores and a bunch of NRA National Records fired there since this tournament began five years ago. This past Spring, we held our annual Memorial Day weekend "Ironman" tournament, where there were some 449/450 scores posted in the Palma matches, 995/1000 in the XTC matches and 2 more pending NRA National Records in the Mid Range matches.

In 2013, we had a great demand by competitors to shoot in the September Northern Rockies Regional Tournament and ended up closing the registration with 75 shooters shooting both F-Class and sling side-by-side. For 2014, the high power discipline at the Deep Creek Range Range has been given an additional weekend in the schedule and we have broke the tournament into two weekends, with F-Class on one weekend and Sling firing the other weekend. We are capping registrations at 56 shooters for each weekend and we will run 3-4 relays depending on the total amount that signs up. Right now, each weekend has over 35 shooters signed up and registration is first come, first served. If you want to come experience an opportunity to fire at a great range, enjoy a good catered BBQ from Famous Daves, and enjoy a great crowd of people - get signed up now. You can get registered by sending me the registration form which you can receive by email. Contact me at: jameydan "at" gmail.com for a program and registration.

We are always accommodating to new competitors, and if you have not ever fired in a long range match, contact us with any questions or concerns.


Northern Rockies - F-Class
September 12-14th (Follows the NRA Long Range Regional Course "a")
Friday September 12th, Team match, Palma format with firing starting at 12:00
Saturday September 13th, Individual matches, Palma format plus 20 shots at 1000yds
Saturday Evening - catered dinner
Sunday September 14th, Individual matches, Palma format


Northern Rockies - Long Range (Sling)
September 26-28th (Follows the NRA Long Range Regional Course "a")
Friday September 12th, Team match, Palma format with firing starting at 12:00
Saturday September 13th, Individual matches, Palma format plus 20 shots at 1000yds
Saturday Evening - catered dinner
Sunday September 14th, Individual matches, Palma format

 

[jameydan]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

I took a look at the University of Montana's football teams schedule. Both match weekends for the Northern Rockies are weekends when the Grizzlies have home football games. Thier games are sell outs and the city of Missoula is definitely busy when they are home. If you are interested in coming, and want to stay in town, you might be better off booking a room sooner rather than later. So, take that into consideration when looking for a hotel.

If you are going to look for a hotel, search on North Reserve between Interstate 90 and Mullan Road, or out by the airport - both locations will get you to the range in about 20-25 minutes.

If you want to stay at the range, there are limited water and electric hook ups for $10 night, but there's plenty of dry camping for tents and rvs on the range property (free).


JW

 

[jameydan]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

Hey Everyone,

We would like to fill up both matches that make up this tournament. We had 75 shooters last year which was too many with five relays. This year we were given two weekends on the Deep Creek Range by the Hellgate Civilian Shooters Association and have one as the F-Class regional and the other as the long range (sling) weekend. We currently have 45 F-class shooters on the first weekend for their LR regional and 35 shooters for the sling weekend. We are going to allow F-class shooters or sling shooters to attend either weekend. Although shooting on the opposite weekend would take you out of the regional, we will allow you to compete for awards if there are more than 3 in your division. You will also be eligible for prizes. We will limit capacity to 56 people for each weekend.

We have Night Force scopes, bullets, and barrels to give away. Sportsmans Warehouse and Cabelas in Missoula have also donated prizes. We also have significant discount certificates on actions, barrels and bullets from other generous manufactures. If we get at least 5 juniors attending the either match, we will dedicate one barrel award to their category.

Our goal is fill up this tournament, which will be on back to back weekends in 2015, and work at getting electronic targets in the pits in the future. This is a big expense and good attendance at these matches will help justify the electronic targets.

I hope to see to see you there and contact me if you would like a match program for either weekend.

Jamey Williams
jameydan [at] gmail . com

 

[Jay Christopherson]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

I'm hoping Jamey will post the scoresheets and results soon, but in the meantime, I wanted to give my perspective on this match.

In short, Jamey runs an outstanding match. I've never shot at Deep Creek before, but it's an awesome range and I had a great time shooting it. It took me a relay at 1000 to get a handle on how to read the range correctly (like all new-to-me ranges), but I definitely enjoyed the challenge.

I met a lot of new-to-me shooters - Nik Montin, an excellent TR shooter and a great guy to squad next to. I also got squadded next to Monte Milanuk who was handy to use as a bellwether when gauging condition changes. Andrew McLain, a junior T/R shooter who shot insanely well, right up with the Open shooters. I was squadded with another junior T/R shooter, Hannah Enfeld shooting .223, and she shot extremely well throughout. I was very impressed. It was also interesting to see some BR rigs out there competing (and winning, since I think Robert Hoppe is a BR shooter and he took the win on X's over 2nd and 3rd place) on the line. I learned an interesting technique for shooting conditions on that range from watching them...

I also shot T/R for the first time ever, shooting in the Friday team match. A friend of mine, David Oakes, was nice enough to share his rifle with me and also load a bunch of ammo for me. Hmmm.... T/R....so much less gear... Monte Milanuk coached the team and since I know jack about .308 ballistics, I just had to pull the trigger where he told me to and worry about holding elevation.

There were some great prizes donated by Cabelas, Nightforce, Berger Bullets, Sierra, Benchmark Barrels, Krieger Barrels, Sportsman's Warehouse, just to name a few and I apologize for any I missed.. I'm sure Jamey will post a full list of the supporters if he hasn't already.

Overall, it was a great turnout. I don't know the exact numbers, but I'm sure Jamey will post (hint). Dinner on Saturday was catered by Famous Dave's and was great as well.

I can't recommend this match enough. If you get the opportunity to make the trip to Deep Creek, I highly recommend it.

EDIT: I forgot to mention it, but I believe that Andrew set a new Junior T/R 1000 yard 20-shot record of 199-6X, beating his own, previous record of 194-5X. Pretty outstanding.

 

[Dgd6mm]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

Sounds like I live in the wrong part of the country.

 

[Keith Kilby]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

Ditto on the match at Deep Creek Montana this past weekend. Jamey and his crew ran as smooth a match as I've ever shot. Conditions were challenging for me as a rookie F guy but I still managed to shoot a personal best 197-6X at 1000 .
Wonderful range, wonderful bunch of guys, wonderful match. My shooting partner and I drove over 7 hrs one way to attend and we will be back !

Keith

 

[jameydan]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

Guys,
Thanks for the kind words about the Northern Rockies Tournament! Each year things seem to better in the many small ways that make a match run smooth. I am linking the prelim. match bulletin and will be emailing them out to the competitors as well. I will post some pictures and a write up in the next day. One piece of exciting news is that another NRA national record was set again!

Link to the Northern Rockies F-Class Match Results: http://1drv.ms/1tZlXwm

Also, do not forget the second half of this tournament (sling portion) is in two weekends and we will award another barrel to a junior if there are at least 5 juniors attending.

More soon!

Jamey

 

[memilanuk]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

Great match, very interesting range. Jamey and his staff ran a very well organized event, and I got to meet a lot of new folks. Lots of new shooters too, which is always a good sign. Well worth the drive (7+ hrs pulling a trailer) in my mind. Already penciling it in on my 2015 schedule....

 

[LCJM]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

I would like to thank everyone helping assist the new Junior competitors during the tournament and another thanks to Monte for donating a Berger bullets certificate to the Lewis and Clark Junior Marksmen (LCJM) F-Class club. A special thanks to Jamey for orchestrating the tournament. Congratulations to the Open and T/R winners. Way to put an exclamation point on the Regional T/R repeat Andy.

Don

 

[jameydan]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

I even recognize one of the names, congratulations Robert, and everyone else.

Tom, it was an interesting battle at first between brothers Hoppe, but Robert overtook his twin Roger with some fine shooting at 1000yds!

JW

 

[jameydan]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

Here are some of the high lights from the F-Class portion of the 2014 Northern Rockies tournament:

Friday's Team Match - Both F-Open and F-TR teams participated and the conditions were fair to good that afternoon, although some wind kept scores down in the mid 140's (out of 150) for most shooters. The top F-TR team was the Washington State F-TR Team and consisted of Oakes, McRoberts, D'Arcy and Christopherson. The team was coached by Milanuk and they shot their way to 1667-26X. The top F-Open Team, The Mongrels, was mixed and consisted of one F-TR and three F-Open shooters. That team of Frisbey, Kilbey, Eicher, and Chancellor fired a 1712-42X. Frisbey did a great job in supporting his team with his F-TR rifle.

Saturday's Individual Matches - Consisted of a Palma format in addition to a 20 shot 1000yd match. Typically, the conditions in Missoula are incredibly favorable to the hard holders as the wind is fairly gentle there. However, the conditions were still unsettled and there was only one clean fired on Saturday; F-Open competitor Roger Hoppe fired it at 800yds. At the end of the day, Roger and Robert Hoppe, Jay Christopherson, and John Bruce were within a few points of each other in the F-Open Division.
F-TR shooters also had a close race with junior Andrew McLain, Mike Anderson and Monte Milanuk all within a few points of each other after 65 record rounds had gone down range. Close behind that pack were Mike Dodd and Praveen Kumar. At the 2013 F-Class Regional, the first day ended with Mclain ahead of Anderson by a seven points and the same story played out this year, with McLain on top again.

Sunday Individual Matches - Sunday brought a very calm morning and some of the scores showed it. AccurateShooter.com forum moderator, Jay Christopherson fired a clean with his 284 Shehane and McLain firing a probable F-TR NRA national record (again!).

After the two 20 shot strings were complete at 1000yds, the top 3 F-Open shooters were tied with only X's separating them. Jay Christopherson earned the Bronze regional award, John Bruce took the Silver, and Robert Hoppe was at the top and took the Gold.
The F-TR division shook out with Milanuk receiving the Bronze, Anderson the Silver and McLain the Gold - for the second year in a row!

L-R, Christopherson, Bruce, Hoppe, McLain, Anderson and Milanuk

Other tournament highlights:

• 44 shooters and 6 teams
• 10 new competitors (one match or no previous match experience)
• 5 juniors
• Junior Andrew McLain firing a 199-6X at 1000yds, likely breaking his previous national record he set last year.
• It was announced that one barrel award would automatically go to a junior if at least five were present. Micheal Self was the lucky young man. We have watched Micheal become a very good junior shooter over the last 4 years and he is an outstanding young man.
  

Match Sponsors - We had some incredible prizes to award and want to thank our match sponsors for their generous support.
NightForce
Cabela's - Missoula, MT
Sportsmans Warehouse - Missoula, MT
Lilja Barrels
Shilen Barrels
Sierra Bullets
Berger Bullets
Creedmoor Sports
Brownells-Sinclair
Western Powders
Wyoming Armory
Bartlein Barrels
Stiller Actions
BigBrass.com
Benchmark Barrels
McGowen Barrels
Stallings Machine
BAT Machine
Satern Barrels
Kreiger Barrels
Dillon Precision

Juniors

Hannah excited to tell her teacher she can shoot tiny groups at 1000yds with a .223

In two weekends, we will be hosting the second part of the long range regional with sling shooters coming from all across the US. If you want to shoot either sling or F-class, we still have a few spots open and if we have a few more juniors we will award another barrel to one of them.

Thanks to everyone for supporting the matches in Missoula!

JW

 

[Jay Christopherson]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

Deep Creek has a reputation for producing records and having easy conditions to shoot in - and to be fair, we got some of that on the 2nd day of individual matches. But I'll also say that there were at least a few occasions where the mirage was running exactly *opposite* to where rounds were impacting on paper. There were a few "WTF" moments during my first relay at 1000, in the Palma portion of the individuals. If you are solely a mirage reader, it makes for a difficult relay. It took me a few relays to figure out what I wanted to do and what I wanted to trust in terms of condition indicators.

It's well worth the trip out.

On another note, this was the first time I've shot F-TR. I shared a Savage with my friend David Oakes - the rifle shot very well as did the ammo he built. I'm still not on the Savage trigger bandwagon though - that red blade thing just messes me up... ;-)

 

[memilanuk]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

That wind vs. mirage thing had me scratching my head during the team match more than once. Had the shooters dialing their windage a bit to try and get it to where the calls I was giving were at least consistent with what I was seeing in the scope. Holding opposite the mirage is just plain un-natural...

That and I picked the day of the team match to suddenly become dyslexic when giving the shooter their holds...

It was a very good experience for me, personally because I normally struggle - a lot - with that kind of condition. I'm more used to conditions where changes between shots involves grabbing a fist-full of windage, sometimes revolutions - literally. Ranges with 'small' wind always seem to be the bane of my existence.

After the 1k stage of the Palma match I finally realized I was seriously over-valuing the changes I was seeing in the mirage. They required very subtle shifts in hold-off... which is not normally a term used to describe me or my shooting style by any rational person :

I don't think I've ever fired that many rounds @ long-range without touching my windage knob. I literally put a half-minute on for spin-drift and held between a half-ring right for the 'hard left' mirage and two rings left for the 'hard right' mirage. For 60+ rounds over all three 20rd 1k relays. Still lost a few to the 'hard right' condition, and more than a few to vertical (pretty sure that was mostly the shooter, all things considered) but by the last relay I was starting to get a handle on things. Too little too late, though.

Again, great match, great people, challenging conditions (very heavy mirage most of the time, had to dial down to 20-25x to be able to even see the edge of the 10 ring to be able to hold off at all) and a great time of year to be doing it.

 

[dmoran]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

Congratulations to Robert Hoppe and McLain on there Gold's..........
Also to our site administrator, Jay Christopherson, a good effort !.!.!

Questions:
- does any know what caliber Robert was shooting ?
- and Bruce ?
- and Jay ?

Donovan

 

[memilanuk]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

Donovan,

Minor correction... mine was a bronze. Andrew and Mike ran away from the rest of the F/TR pack by a fair margin.

As for the calibers... Jay was shooting a .284 Shehane

 

[dmoran]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

Minor correction... mine was a bronze. Andrew and Mike ran away from the rest of the F/TR pack by a fair margin.

Thanks Monte..... I edited/corrected my mistake above......
And good effort to you, taking home the Bronze !.!.!

Deep Creek is a great place to shoot...... I've been there for a couple 1000-BR matches and really like the place and a great group of "very talented" shooters (even you Tom... lol).

Donovan

 

[Jay Christopherson]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

Congratulations to Robert Hoppe and McLain on there Gold's..........
Also to our site administrator, Jay Christopherson, a good effort !.!.!

Questions:
- does any know what caliber Robert was shooting ?
- and Bruce ?
- and Jay ?

Donovan

I shot a .284 Shehane in the individual matches. I'm not sure what Bruce and Robert were shooting. I thought I heard that Robert was shooting something larger than the 6 Dasher he's shot so capably in BR, but I'm not 100% certain of that.

 

[Chuck Christopher]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

Thanks Jamey, the match at Deep Creek was fun, I got to score Jays perfect score sunday morning in the pits and work a lot with Hannah who was one of the junior competitors. This was a well run match with a lot of good competitors.
The only bad thing was the guy that brought a Wiliams Optics telescope..............thats gunna cost me .

 

[ronsatspokane]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

Thanks Jamey, the match at Deep Creek was fun, I got to score Jays perfect score sunday morning in the pits and work a lot with Hannah who was one of the junior competitors. This was a well run match with a lot of good competitors.
The only bad thing was the guy that brought a Wiliams Optics telescope..............thats gunna cost me .

Sorry about that scope.

I wish I would have known earlier that you liked it, I would have given you the full demo. The reason I got it is that it doubles as both an astro and a terrestrial scope in a size no larger than the average spotting scope with true ED glass. I had two other lenses with me that I would have shown you (besides the variable lens I had mounted) and the view through the 32mm Plossel using the erecting prism I had on it is nothing short of stunning. The views of the moon and planets using the non-erecting diagonal is stunning through any lens and with the non-erecting diagonal it can be pushed to a little over 100x before the image starts to decay. If you decide to go that route, remember that astro scopes are not sealed units but that does not stop a lot of birders from using something like this scope or even a TV85 for terrestrial viewing. Also, the head I had it mounted on was a fluid dampened Manfrotto video head. Well worth the money for both astro and terrestrial viewing.

As to the match, good job Jamey! That was very well run. It was a real hoot and very educational on many levels. This was only the second 1000 yard match for Praveen and myself. The first being at Rattlesnake in the tri-cities. The conditions could not have been any different with winds in excess of 25 mph on Friday at Rattlesnake to dead calm with no mirage on Sunday morning at Deep Creek. At the tri-cities we were praying to stay on paper and at Montana we were questioning the quality of our loads and our shooting technique. At both it was a privilege to watch and learn from those of you who really know what you’re doing in this sport. The ability many of you have to read the conditions approaches that of a supernatural power. Very fun to watch. Thanks for letting us be part of it.

 

[Jay Christopherson]

Re: Missoula, MT LR & F-Class Northern Rockies Tournament at Deep Creek Rifle Range

Ron was that the big, gray scope I saw setup at the firing line? If so, the view was pretty awesome - but I don't know if I'm adding that to the 100lbs of gear I already haul around...

Also, you and Praveen should consider the Wenatchee match coming up in a few weeks that Monte posted about. Sounds like a good match, I hope I'm able to make it myself.