Three Days of Competition, Conversation, and Interesting People

This article is another installment about the Smith&Wesson U.S. National Steel Championships competition I attended that was hosted by the Titusville Pistol and Rifle Club in Titusville Florida, and some of the people that I met in my three days there. First, let me give you a thumbnail sketch of the facility. The Club is nestled out in deep woods off the beaten path on highway 46 which is technically Mims. It is a glimpse of old Florida the way it used to be before the developers rushed into the Sunshine State and started cutting down everything in sight. I enjoyed walking around the grounds, and there was one range that was bordered by a lake that was beautiful. As you walked around the property, you could see all the new work that was done recently on the property to improve the facilities including the addition of some recently built high berms. I met a lot of the staff during my three days there, and had many interesting discussions with them. They were not only funny and friendly people, but they were also good Americans who were concerned about the current anti gun sentiment that is threatening our firearms heritage as a nation, which is a real and present danger to every firearms owner in America today. I spoke with the wife of one range officer, and she told me she didn’t shoot, but she liked to come to the club just to be able to walk around the grounds. After being there for the three days, I fully understood her point. It was a little slice of old down home Florida heaven, that reminded Gun Shy of the good old days when you could go out into the woods and shoot, before everything was knocked down as much of Florida became the land of tee shirt shops and a parking lots.

Gun Shy has never been much of a spectator. I am the type that would much rather participate in competitive sports than watch someone else compete. As I stated in my earlier article, I never really followed IDPA competition very closely, but I always enjoy seeing a person that is at the top of their game, because I realize the dedication and discipline that it takes to achieve that level of performance. Gun Shy’s concept of winning a shooting “match” is having the ability to deliver effective shot placement and distribution of wound channels in a quick and accurate fashion that facilitates a situation where me as the defender is able to walk away unscathed from a potentially violent attack while incapacitating the combatant. Let it be noted for the record that Gun Shy respects his fellow man, but unfortunately there are some bad actors out there on the mean streets that never learned how to play well with others.

One of the great things about being at this competition was the people that I met there. Sure, I met some of the best competition shooters in the world, and even had the chance to interview a few (more on that later), but I also got to meet some interesting spectators from varied backgrounds. On the last day there, a young man walked up to me and asked me if I used to shoot down in the West Palm Beach area, because I looked like someone he recognized from the ranges down there. My first question was “Is the guy any good?”, and he assured me that he was. “Ok good” was my response. Anyhow, it wasn’t me but I started conversing with him. The young man was clean cut and in excellent physical condition, so I immediately assumed he was military, possibly an operator. He seemed very focused and knowledgeable. As we spoke more, I decided to ask him a little bit about his background. He went on to tell me that he was a member of West Palm Beach Police Department, as well as a member of the SWAT team confirming what I had suspected, that he was in fact an operator. It seemed like we covered a lot of topics in the time we spoke, and he was very knowledgeable in topics related to weapons and tactics. He had driven up from South Florida to watch the competition, and understood the value of how steel shooting competition had skills that could cross over into real life scenarios in relation to combat shooting. I must admit that I was impressed by this, because in a time where the fitness standards of some agencies have become lax in reference to physical conditioning, here was an officer who was not only highly conditioned, but also knowledgeable, and on his own time was looking to find new ways to raise his own skills and abilities to an even higher level. I think what many people in the general population do not fully realize, is that law enforcement is under much greater pressure in these current times than they ever have been. With all of the gang violence, and high risk drug warrants, our SWAT operators are not just merely high level law enforcement, they are soldiers that train hard and continuously throughout the year in order to be in a state of peak readiness for when the call out occurs. Whether the battle is happening in Afghanistan or Orlando, Iraq or West Palm Beach, the threat is the same to the operator trying to effectively manage a high risk and potentially volatile situation to achieve the specified objective effectively. The difference between law enforcement and military in my opinion is that law enforcement has more restricted rules of engagement, while the violent criminals have none. I know that many of the Domestic Urban Terrorists here in the greater Orlando area use many of the same weapons and tactics that terrorists use abroad to wreak havoc and strike fear into the hearts of innocent law abiding citizens. Gun Shy would like to at this time take the opportunity to give a shout out to West Palm Beach Police Department, and if this young operator is any indication of your team, then I believe you have a dynamic program in your agency. Gun Shy salutes all the heroes of Law Enforcement who risk their lives every day to serve and protect.

Here are some more SWAT related articles from the blog:

aroundotown.blogspot.com/2008/11/when-going-gets-tough-dial-s-w-t.html

aroundotown.blogspot.com/2008/12/orlando-swat-teams-rank-high-again-in.html

aroundotown.blogspot.com/2009/02/fairly-smooth-operation.html