2011 Texas Multi-Gun Championship

Stage 6, long range.

I had a great trip to Austin, TX for the 2011 TX State Multi-Gun Championship,  www.txmultigun.com , sponsoredby LaRue Tactical. Since I was near Georgetown, which just happens to be the home of STI, how could I not stop in for a visit? I made my way to STI on the Thursday morning before the match where Rabbit Boyett gave me the VIP tour. Talk about a kid in a candy store! The first thing Rabbit did was tell me we were going to go out and shoot a couple of pistols and that I needed to go to the safe and pick one of the 32 STI pistols in there. Wow, that was cool! I picked a SteelMaster and Tim Dillon, President/CEO, picked  the 5″ Tactical. It was a mistake for me to pick the SteelMaster, ever since I’ve been home I’ve been working to figure out what I can sell to get the gun funds together to buy one!

It's tougher than it looks to pick just one!

The boys in Texas really know how to put on a great match! The event was held at Best of the West Shooting Range in Liberty Hill, TX. The range has a ton of bays which are well suited for 3 gun, there are a number of 100 yard bays and some shorter ones, all are wide open. Stage 6 was the long distance stage, there were 4 MOA targets from 100 to 480 yards. They were a challenge with the full value 30 mphcross wind for some squads. The first day it was blowing from right to left, the second day it was left to right and Sunday morning it was calm. By blind luck, we shot it Sunday morning, just the luck of the draw.LaRue Tactical was the major match sponsor and pulled out all the stops. The prize table was stacked with LaRue guns and gear as well as certificates for Stealth uppers and optic mounts of the shooters choice. Many industry folks donated great gear to the prize table. One of the most popular perks of the match were the lunches provided every day by LaRue Tactical! Mark LaRue sent over his own personal Texas sized BBQ wagon. We had our fill of brisket and sausage wraps and sodas each day.

There's a first for everything, this time it's a bayonet.

I actually shot the match fairly well, with one major equipment malfunction. With penalties, I ended up with a 277 second run on stage 4. For comparison, shooters like Dianna Liedorff were burning it down in 42 seconds. Unfortunately, it put me at 37th in the tactical scope division when I was possibly shooting well enough to be in the top 15. It happens.

The Colt CR Pro 3 Gun rifle, wearing a Surefire Micro suppressor and Oasis thermal imager.

After the match a friend invited me along on a night time Texas hog hunt with he and some of the boys from Hornady. We spent that night hunting with suppressors, night vision, thermal imaging scopes. Any way I could describe the fun we had speeding around in the ATV in the middle of the night with no lights, hunting hogs would pale in comparison to the actual fun we had doing it! Neal Emery from Hornady had a cooler in his truck, so he was the lucky dog who got to take the meat home. I’ve longed to have a couple of the hams and pork loins for my smoker since I’ve been home.

This was my first shooting trip to Texas. I must say, I’m a fan. I could live there. How do I bring it up to my wife?