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Matches with Fieldcraft too?

rogers0311

Sergeant
Full Member
Minuteman
Oct 27, 2007
158
2
38
Camp Lejeune and elsewhere
Just wondering if anyone knows of any sniper competitions on the east coast that also involve field craft skill sets such as land navigation and stalking?

Most matches that I hear about are strictly shooting. Anyone know of any that incorporate other skill sets as well?
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

Most shooters that come to my match { READE RANGE SNIPER CHALLENGE } do not want to stalk, takes too much time, I did a spot the stalker drill last match, I low crawled on range with 32 shooters looking for me, NO ONE found me, I crawled over 50 yards in 30 min. time limit..........miker
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

The Oregon Sniper Challenge has field skills integrated into it.

A pet peeve of mine is a "Sniper" match with no field skills. A Sniper isn't a Sniper without field skills. Lots of "shooters" didn't graduate Sniper School because they couldn't hack the field skills.

Then again, field skills are a pain in the ass for the match director and the compeditors. They take time, energy and many of them are not interesting for the spectators.

I HATE stalking, but it is one skill that separates Snipers from Shooters.
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

the problem with most of what you want to do, is this. Not everyone wants to make a ghillie, break it in, put it on and crawl through the dirt. Also not everyone is in the physical condition to do that. Land nav yeah that would be easy to do. But youd better have alot of damn land and make sure everyone shooting is very profiecent at navigation, or youd be out looking for people at all hours of the night. The idea is a great one, but it would take some serious logistical work and alot of time to pull it off where everyone is safe and has fun
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

I have kicked around a couple of methods of doing a true sniper comp, but it is very labor intensive. I don't know that I will have the time or resources to run one for a year or two.
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

The earlier matches have done field skills and it was great and all but as everyone has said you usually only get 2 days at a match and to burn hours to do 1 stalk by the time you get to the area brief it conduct it and get into the next event you burn 4-6 hrs.

Plus people are spending big bucks flying to matches and to only shoot 20-30 rounds and such people would rather shoot more drills then do field skills plain and simple.

The field skills matches are fun and all but mean less shooting and people just tend to want to have more bang for their buck.
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

I definitely understand how logistically it would be hard to set one of these matches up. I would like to see a 2 day match, with the 1st day being pretty much all field skills, including stalking, maybe some observation exercises, shit like that. Then something where you would be up all night doing something, with the shooting portion on the 2nd day, after not sleeping and being worn out from the previous day and night. That would definitely be a challenge. I agree, its cool to be able to shoot tight groups with some custom gun and call it a sniper match, but I think that being able to do so after dragging that same gun through field skills and stalking would be interesting. Zero on the 1st day, drag your weapon through a few stalks, and see how you do the 2nd day.
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

I direct the Oregon Sniper Challenge and I have to admit that fieldcraft skills are hard to include in a match. With that being said I also believe that they are critical to "sniper" matches. This year we are doing a small concealment exercise so we don't burn up so much time but also make the contestants practice the basics of concealment. We will be running about 10 guys through this exercise at a time while the rest of the competitors are shooting various stages. This way we are killing two birds with one bullet so-to-speak. It is hard to find a range that is big enough and set up properly to do this (I'm lucky). Scoring is another nightmare when it comes to any sort of fieldcraft exercises. I have spent many hours devising this years scoring so that the concealment stage doesn't way too heavy on the event. With all this being said check us out at www.nwsurvivalskills.com. I know were on the wrong side of the country but you might want to make the trip on out here. Steve.
 
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Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

Stalking, Land Navigation, Night Operations, Endurance Techniques all sound so macho until you find yourself on the second subzero night in the field going on 48-hours without sleep. That's when you ask yourself; This is fun?
menfrank.jpg

After the fact however it was a hoot to have seen guys half my age L.O.M. out of a Gut Check while I kept going.

SAFETY TIP: If you team up with Frank, eat your Wheaties because there ain't an ounce of quit in that guy.
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: kmussack</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Stalking, Land Navigation, Night Operations, Endurance Techniques all sound so macho until you find yourself on the second subzero night in the field going on 48-hours without sleep. That's when you ask yourself; This is fun?
menfrank.jpg

After the fact however it was a hoot to have seen guys half my age L.O.M. out of a Gut Check while I kept going.

SAFETY TIP: If you team up with Frank, eat your Wheaties because there ain't an ounce of quit in that guy. </div></div>

What school/course was this? Sounds like some good training.
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

The match that Kmussack talks about was the inspiration for the original TAB GEAR product, the rifle cover....and a monster was born.
smile.gif
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

The picture was taken at:
<span style="font-weight: bold">Mission Badlands</span>
Bruce Robinson Memorial Sniper Match
April 1-3, 2005

There have been others, the last Sniper Rendezvous at Storm Mountain comes to mind (10-mile Forced March w/40-pound Ruck)

...not so much you say? Tell that to the dozen or so guys that fell out and ended up with IV's stuck in their arms.
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

Having organized a match or two and having attended both the Badlands AND Storm Mountain matches, I can tell you fieldcraft exercises sound really good on paper, but don't necessarily work in practice. The reason, for one the man power necessary to run the events and the time required for the events to be run correctly, and the fact that very few people will sign up. If as match directors you don't mind only having 20 people or less at an event, then you might get some joy in pulling one off, but you'll soon realize 20 competitors won't cover the cover the costs unless you do like Badlands did and charge 3X more and give 3X less back to the competitors.

People rarely want the physical gut checks and like Tony said above, it sucks to do a 48 continuous hour match and only fire 11 rifle shots. People want and expect the round count to be over 100 meaningful shots and not simply 5 events with two or 3 being barrel burners to get the numbers up.

I was at Thunder Ranch this week, and read the Oregon Sniper comp COF and it looks pretty good, ambitious for the number of shooters, I would be curious to see how they pull off field events with long times over 50 shooters. There was one I saw they give the shooters 5 minutes each to engage the targets, and it didn't appear to be a firing line type event, although I could be wrong. That is easily a 5 hour stage with that many people to shoot only a few rounds. Timing is very important and having a lot of down time can kill a competition. The Oregon event looks to be pretty good though I hope they have the timings worked out.

Interesting fact in regards to the Badlands match, during the actual match the rules were changed, the teams manipulated, and I asked Bobby Whittington about it recently, and how it appeared that the changes were designed to influence mine & Kevin's placing in the event and his answer was, and I quote, "things change in real life all the time". Sort of backed up my feelings about their operation, that they don't run a very fair event. As well it was determined the recent attack on here of my standing as a confirmed graduate of the USMC Scout Sniper school originated from their facility by their employees, where again, Bobby told me was "Not to my (his) knowledge" and what his instructors and range hands say about me when he is not around is none of his business even if it is said to his students, and are known lies. So I would recommend avoiding that place like the plague, but that is only my personal opinion on the subject having experienced these things first hand. However if you're not me, it might be fine for you, just be sure to ask them their opinion of me, as its sure to be quite entertaining from what I hear as any good piece of fiction often is.

The Storm Mountain event was pretty good, they had a 4 hour stalk, and the forced march was tough, I know I was on overdrive to finish it. They even weighed the rucks before and after to make sure you finished with 40 lbs. You got 1 round, walked a mile shot it, walked back and got another 10X... took a while and put a lot of teams down.
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?



I was at Thunder Ranch this week, and read the Oregon Sniper comp COF and it looks pretty good, ambitious for the number of shooters, I would be curious to see how they pull off field events with long times over 50 shooters. There was one I saw they give the shooters 5 minutes each to engage the targets, and it didn't appear to be a firing line type event, although I could be wrong. That is easily a 5 hour stage with that many people to shoot only a few rounds. Timing is very important and having a lot of down time can kill a competition. The Oregon event looks to be pretty good though I hope they have the timings worked out. [/quote]

Lowlight. The "long Distance" stage of which you speak will be a firing line setup with 20 people shooting at once. It should take approximately 1/2 hour(maybe 45 minutes) to get everyone through this stage. I agree that down time is a killer but it's almost impossible to eliminate. I try my hardest to minimize the downtime but there is always some. That's why I will have the NW rep. for GLOCK on hand to demo some pistols in our indoor pistol range(20 yards) for my longest stages, the "Helo Assault" and the "Sniper Mission". This will allow people to try out some new GLOCKS and take a little break before their next COF. I also realize that it takes a lot of helpers to work "the butts" and keep thing moving and once again I've very fortunate to belong to a club where so many people are willing to help out. Steve.
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

Sumpter,

One idea I like, and take it for what its worth ok.

IF you see a block of down time, and you have the ability, I like to run a IDPA / pistol / CQB rifle / CQB shotgun stage within 2 min's of walk time of the rifle event.

This "side" match is what I call filler. And this filler is included in the over all match score for the shooters.

I have found this works well if you have it about 1/2 the over all time of the rifle event.

So if you have a rifle event that is a bottle neck and it will take a person / group 10 min's to shoot; my side match is timed between 3.5 and 5 min's MAX.

This keeps the people rotating and down time on the low side.

Just a idea.

John
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

Like I said, I can understand that it is definitely a pain in the ass to get this type of match going, and I would imagine that it certainly is not for everyone. For someone like me it would be much more realistic and probably benificial which is why I brought it up. I think I would get alot more out of it then simply a long range shooting competition. I will definitely look into the ones mentioned!
 
Re: Matches with Fieldcraft too?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: J.Boyette</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Sumpter,

One idea I like, and take it for what its worth ok.

IF you see a block of down time, and you have the ability, I like to run a IDPA / pistol / CQB rifle / CQB shotgun stage within 2 min's of walk time of the rifle event.

This "side" match is what I call filler. And this filler is included in the over all match score for the shooters.

I have found this works well if you have it about 1/2 the over all time of the rifle event.

So if you have a rifle event that is a bottle neck and it will take a person / group 10 min's to shoot; my side match is timed between 3.5 and 5 min's MAX.

This keeps the people rotating and down time on the low side.

Just a idea.

John
</div></div>

Excellent idea. I'll put it to use. Thanks.
 
Quite some time has passed since the Badlands hosted Bruce Robinson Memorial match that Frank and Kevin teamed up to shoot and I shot in with a best friend...

The only prize was a T shirt . That's it. No prize table, a shirt. I still have mine

10 - 11 , 2 man teams started. Over half quit the first night. More the next day. I recall the rules maybe getting softened for all, for worry by the host that every team would quit, dunno - I was busy competing and having fun.

I recall too that Frank and Kevin came in first - they got a T shirt each. Guessing Frank didn't keep his
Lol

Now there's the PRS - long range games
And here we come full circle with a clamor for ' real world' shooting and Rifles Only steps up with Assassin's Way ,I love it!

Waiting to see how a $500k match goes down, there doesn't seem too be any monies for the RO to host?

If there's any courses of fire in Colorado, I'm here now and would happily volunteer to help score, range safety, etc

Peace to all
 
This isn't quite maybe what you're asking about, I was going to shoot this but ended up with conflicting with my calendar. I've heard great things about it and have a few buddies shooting it.