This summer I got a great chance to go to an Appleseed Known Distance Shoot. These are offered few and far between around where I’m located mainly because 400 yard gun ranges are pretty rare. In fact the one I went was only offered to Appleseed instructors and Rifleman. It was also nearly 4 hours drive from my house.
What is an Appleseed Known Distance Shoot?
For those you not very familiar with Project Appleseed I’m sure you are wondering what is an Appleseed Known Distance shoot? It’s suppose to be a normal Appleseed Marksman clinic. With one simple difference. The targets aren’t scaled nor are they all at 25 meters.
For those who still don’t know this means you shot a rifle trying to hit a 20″ bell shaped target at 100 yards while standing. Then you move back to 200 yards sit down and shoot at the target. When you get back to 300 and 400 yards. Then you go to prone position. All of this done with nothing but sling to help steady your rifle.
This as a whole sounds like fun, and you don’t get to sight your rifle in every time you change distances. To make it more fun when you get to a a full AQT it becomes timed at each stage. So you get 10 rounds and 2 minutes at a 100 yards. At 200 yards you have a magazine of 2 and one of 8 with 55 seconds to go from standing to sitting, along with firing all 10 rounds. When you get out to 300 yards you still have 2 mags and a transition to prone. However they are nicer you get 65 seconds. Now of course the 400 yard stage is almost easy. 4 minutes start and stay in prone with 20 rounds. The kicker is you have to get 80% of your shots on target to qualify Rifleman.
The Beginning of my Trip
My Appleseed Known Distance weekend started with what should have been a 3-1/2 hour drive friday night after work. I had a hotel room booked and planned on staying 2 nights. When I was young I would have just gotten up really early on saturday morning and drove through. I’m not that young anymore.
My trip was going really good. I left earlier than planned. Had gas, pop, and great tunes. Plus my GPS was telling me how I was making good time. Right until I got into Iowa. Then it warned me of a delay ahead and wanted me to detour. I didn’t listen. First mistake.
Unlike Nebraska I soon realized that Iowa not only warns people 5-10 miles in advance of a lane closer. Everyone gets over when they are warned. This of course meant 7 to 8 miles of single lane traffic moving at best 25 MPH. Of course after 30 minutes at almost a dead stop, I finally got through the 100 feet of road construction and got on with my travels. I swear I won’t hold the stupidity of this road construction against all Iowans, just the roads department.
When I finally checked into my hotel I was pretty much done for the day. Of course that’s when I realized I forgot my phone charger and had to run to the smallest Walmart I’ve ever seen. Although I was thankful this small town had a Walmart. The rest of my night was relaxing and uneventful.
First Day of Shooting
When I woke up on Saturday morning I was excited and nervous about the day. I hadn’t really shot a rifle in months. Plus I wasn’t using my trusty Ruger 10/22. I was using my custom built AR-15 because It was the only center fire semi-auto I own with a scope. All though I’d never shot my AR past 100 yards. I figured it was the best I had for the job. In hindsight I may have been better off with my bolt action and figured out how to reload after 5 rounds.
When I got to the range I was in awe. It was huge. Extremely nice, and loads bigger than anything I’d seen before. With huge berms, and lots of parking. The only thing it lacked was bathrooms. Of course what else would you expect from a shooting range built by Brownells. I honestly had never seen a 500 yard range before. It was really cool.
Relaxing Start
Since everyone there was Appleseed Instructors we were all pretty informal about getting stuff set up and ready to shoot. Drag gear gear down to the 25 yard line, set up and get ready for a long day. After a few introductions and what not it was time to sight in our rifles. Everything was of course safe and all rifles were made safe at all times but the day started off very relaxed. Even the load command was “with however many rounds you think you need load”.
Of course my first 10-15 rounds down range made me realize very quickly that I was rusty. My groupings where sloppy and my sights where off a little bit. I definitely wasn’t shooting 4 MOA or better. However I got my rifle sighted in as best I could. Lucky enough for my ego I wasn’t the only one having problems with bad groups. This taught me a very important lesson. When you stop shooting to teach you can very quickly lose your skills.
My Shooting
Most of the day we spent running AQT’s staring at the 100 yard line and going back until we hit 400 yards. It was pretty laid back. As even though we all knew about the time monkey no one seemed to care. We were all instructor so not a whole lot of instructing was given. Which means I should have read up and researched a little more on adjusting my scope at known distances. Something we don’t deal with at a standard Appleseed Clinic.
Most of the day I spend trying to get comfortable with my gun. I’d only ever spent much time firing this gun from a bench so I wasn’t used to using the sling with it. Add into the fact that I had my sling mounted too far forward for me to rest my hand on the sling mount, and by the end of the day my buffer tube nut had come loose. I had a pretty rough day of shooting. I’m one that doesn’t normally blame the gun on misses so it was getting really hard for me to figure out what I was doing wrong with my shooting. Turns out some of it was the gun. Much of it was me and my scope adjustments.
The End of a Good Day of shooting?
I didn’t realize the problems I had with my gun until late in the day. However, as I was getting ready to pack up and head to the hotel someone mentioned that Brownells had a store just outside of Grinnell where I was staying. This gave me hope that I could get a few tools to fix my gun and do better on sunday.
As Brownells is on of my Affiliates and a company I’ve done a lot of business with in the past I couldn’t help but stop in, on my way back to the hotel. It didn’t matter that I was tired and very sore from shooting all day. The minute I walked into the store I was like a kid in a candy store. It amazing. They had some products out to see, and computers to look up parts and have them get out of there warehouse on site. Trust me when I say it took a lot of restraint for me not to buy $100’s of dollars of stuff. In the end I got the tools I needed to fix my rifle and a t-shirt that was on sale.
Sunday Morning
I woke up sunday morning with some very stiff muscles and a bruised shoulder. My back hurt, my legs hurt, and my spirit was iffy. I started the weekend hoping to learn a lot about how an Appleseed Known Distance shoot is run. I figured I’d go into with a teachable attitude. In hindsight I should have gone into it prepared to earn my rifleman patch again.
We started the day off a lot like the first day. Only with far less people. Seems a lot of people couldn’t make two days. Or like me, were too sore to shoot again. However, I got on the line. Sighted in my readjusted rifle and got ready for another AQT. I did far better on the 100, 200, and 300 yards. However bye the time I made it to 400 yards my body was starting to scream at me. Then it happened my gun didn’t want to fire. In 20 rounds I had 4 failure to fires. That was my last straw. I was planning on leaving early to get home before dark. However, I knew between my body and my gun. Sunday wasn’t going to be my day, so I packed up, thanked everyone and hit the road.
Conclusion
Over all lots of things went wrong over the weekend. Starting with me not being prepared at all. I had gun problems, lack of knowledge problems, and of course just plan getting old problems. However if I had to do it again, I wouldn’t change a single thing. A rifleman preservers. I will go back to practising at shorter ranges. Study the shooting fundamentals and hope that I get another chance to go to an Appleseed Known Distance Shoot. I will say without a doubt the Iowa Cadre of instructors are great people to hangout with. If I had more time I’d drive 3 hours just to help them with any of their normal Appleseed Clinics. Even if it means listening to all the “dumb Nebraskan” jokes.