Saturday March 6th was clear with light winds from the north. Shooting was into the wind. The Smallbore, Cowboy Rifle match started about 10am with 3 relays of 8 shooters. I started in the first relay on rams. My rifle was a model 39a Mountie and the ammo was the regular bulk Remington ammo that comes in a brick of 525 rounds from Cabalas. I am getting low on my regular ammo and so I am trying new stuff and this seemed to work pretty well.
I got 7 rams, 8 chickens, 10 pigs, and 8 turkeys for a total of 33. Not that good of a score and 2 other guys tied me for a three way shootoff for match winner. In the shootoff, Doug shot 0 turkeys, Joey got 3 turkeys and I got 5 for match winner.
The Pistol Cartridge match started off at 12pm with 3 relays of 8 shooters also, but with some different faces than was in the smallbore match. I was shooting my 1894 Marlin Cowboy in 357 mag. My load was a Lee custom mold 150gr RNFP bullet over 14gr of AA5744. This has been a real accurate load but all of the 5744 does not burn and it is somewhat messy.
I started on Turkeys in the 3rd relay and shot 8. My next time up I went to rams and shot the first one and then it happened, the famous Marlin Jam!!!!!. We took the bolt out and played with it and ended up getting 2 rounds under the carrier and gave up on it so we could finish the match. I borrowed a Rossi Puma in 44 mag from my spotter to finish the match. He had shot it very little and I had to figure out sight settings all the way through but I ended up with a 31 and my spotter, Gary Woods of Boise won with a 32.
Gary shot 10 rams and completed his Grand Slam in this match. He shot the first 5 rams dead center. The pressure got to him on the next 5 and he got 4 marginal hits that knocked them down really slow. Most were less than a ½ bullet. On his 5th ram he jerked it really bad. He hit on the top of the turkey berm and the bullet glanced off and hit the ram with less than a ¼ bullet right where the rear leg meets the belly. What a trick shot. Congratulations to Gary.
