Desert Midwinter 2013, Day 1 of 4

In the first of the four days of the Conventional portion of the 2013 Desert Midwinter Competition in Phoenix Arizona, there were two relays on Thursday morning, International Center Fire and then Conventional Service Pistol. The former marks the end of the International format competition, and the latter is the beginning of the Conventional.

The “line” with 40 firing points was completely full for Service Pistol.

I skipped the International events this year after wearing myself out last year trying to do everything.

But I did set up on point #15 for the Service Pistol 900. All I will say about my performance is that the 1911 with iron sights and ball ammo are … challenging. My score, which shall remain unmentioned, demonstrated I have “significant room for growth.”

My mind is now on the tasks at hand this (Thursday) evening. After blogging today’s report, there is dirty brass to be processed and a ball gun to be cleaned. The trigger reset today seemed a tad sluggish and there was a mysterious “trigger won’t break” on the first shot of the Rapid Fire match. I fired an alibi string and it worked fine thereafter so tonight I will break that firearm all the way down and carefully lube the internal parts. My suspicion is that the disconnector got hung up and didn’t fully re-connect. Hopefully that gun will then be ready for EIC on Saturday.

As you can see in the pictures above (click for bigger images), there were many goodies for sale. Not seen here are the bricks of CCI 22 paper box for $35 each – considering that the stores are completely devoid of this ammunition, finding it here for such a good price really was wonderful!

Individual 22 is tomorrow (Friday) morning with first shot at 8:30AM. It’s supposed to be completely sunny with temperature peaking in the low 60s with nothing more than a light breeze. Should be a gorgeous day.

Later this evening I’ll be getting my head into that event:

Focus on the dot, trigger pressure, pressure, pressure …

See you “on the line!”