Shotgunworld.com

I guess I don't see master class as being broken so therefore it doesn't need "fixed" Although I do know of a few shooters that have reached master Class and have reduced shooting or have been moved back to AA and are shooting a reduced amount. What is more troublesome is the lack of retention in the lower classes. Much of which has to do with the economics/time constraints of shooting.

I would suggest that punches don't expire you earned 'em/ paid for them/ they are yours. That may help the lower classes stay involved and not feel that the need to punch up within the next year to lose what they just achieved.

Shooting is expensive and if you go to larger shoots and big blasts the costs really stack up quickly. Not everyone is able and fortunate enough to go to a few of those a year.

I think we need an ammo sponsor on the national level, maybe a discount card that would be given with memberships. ie. get x% if you are a NSCA member and use the card or maybe an ammo point system, buy so much, get some at a discount or free.

I think that the lower classes that choose not to compete just see how much costs and time can really stack up.

I haven't introduced ANYONE to this sport that said

" this is the dumbest game ever, I would not want to do this again!!"

Most have thought it was alot of fun and would like to shoot more but the reality of it all is it is expensive not only in dollars but in time.

We really need to look into COST REDUCTION, whatever that may be, hotel deals, ammo, flyer miles, time off of work.

I shot the Open this year and had about as much in hotels as the cost of targets. maybe we need to raise the cost of targets to not make the cost of hotels look so bad

We also need a way to reduce "start up" costs, for a begining shooter, a bag, vest, shells glasses, gun, lessons, videos etc ... can be alot more than one is willing to invest.

Go to the range once and the cost of targets+ shells and the newcomer is like " I just blew 50 bucks on what?"

They can quickly see that in order to shoot in the 40's out of 50 it will take a MAJOR commitment.

Granted I don't have the answers just a few suggestions but I can see what the problem is. From up here in Erie anyway.

I would offer a suggestion that the NSCA/state orginization make available the level 1 instructor training available to a member or three of each club that would help newbies get started on the right track (at a majorly reduced cost) if they are seeking instruction.

who knows?

I have heard that NSCA changed the rule that all top 30 shooters shot on squads together on the same course at the same times ( to avoid weather issues) b/c one top shooter threatened to sue.

OOOOOhhhhhh. Did they not want to open the books ?

What's up?

Approximate participation by class at the Nationals:

M 384 35%
AA 194 17.7%
A 139 12.7%
B 126 11.5%
C 127 11.5%
D 81 7.4%
E 45 4.1%


1096 total


(does not include concurrent only shooters)

It doesn't appear as though Master Class Particapation is the issue. If I were to get the figures for the US Open I would suspect a similar percentage.

The long and the short of Scotties talk was we need to devise a handicap system like golf has so any shooter can compete against any other shooter.

Basically it would eventually do away with classes and just have the shooters and the courses handicapped so that everyone can compete against everyone else at the same time.

It s an idea that should be explored. It would allow a shooter who is now in say D class (or any other class) who has a great day to be able to beat Scotty or Kruger ect.

It would take some figuring out to get fair handicaps and fair course ratings to use, but it would stop that feeling I now have at every tournament that I am stuck in Master Class and I have NO chance to ever win anything again.

Look at a list of the Master class shooters in any big shoot of 2007 and you will be amazed at how many of those guys are no longer shooting at all. They quickly realized that in a tournament that has say 25 or 30 Master class shooters, you could pick the top 3 ahead of time, and one of those 3 will be the winner 90% of the time. Doesn't leave many scraps on the table for the rest of us 20 to 30 shooters (and no scraps for AA on down).

I can't rememeber the last time an A or B shooter or even a AA shooter won HOA in any big shoot. The vast majority of even the master class shooters have never won HOA in a big shoot.


We need to do something about that soon or we will become like the skeet shooters and have less and less competitors every year.

Que es esto?

Seriously?

I think Scotty is the most talented shoter in our country.....

However, handicaps play no major role in major golf tournaments............

You either have a PGA card or you do not....

and didn't someone earlier say there were almost 8,000 registered members? So at the biggest shoot, the nationals, barely 25% show up?....and no one sees an issue?

and 40% of that total are M and AA

There appears to be more to this than meets the eye

There are over 20,000 members and this is one of the highest attended Nationals ever held. I think 5% attendance is very good. And there are a million valid reasons why shooters do not go to the Nationals.

Yeah, but you can't just pay your $40 and go play on the tour either... You either need an invite (sponsor, etc. exemption) and then WIN - which would give you some future exemptions or you earn the privledge to go to Q-School and play well enough to earn your card for the next season... where you need to finish in the top 125 to keep it for another year or go back to Q school. couple other ways to get yer toe in the door, but it's all based on your ability and performance over time.....

It's comparing apples to avacados because we do have a class\handicap system and the PGA does not. The ONE GOLF tournament you can play W\O a tour card is the US Open and you still have multiple regional qualifiers that you need to win your way through to qualify for a handful of spots that are not preordained.

To use handicaps in clays, well you need a baseline to rate\compare the target sets and then you need a crew to come in to rate\certify the courses for the tournaments.... Your personal handicap would evolve just like a golf handicap and would vary based on the rating of the course...... Doesn't do anything to address the sandba..... ~er.... um~ .... handicap managers....

And just how would you rate a spoting clays course?

After much discussion about is Master Class broken?
One look at the bottom of Master class at the Nationals revels the problem. Too many Masters could not even place in D class. They have shot their way into Master without the skills to even be competetive in D class.

The class system and punches are not an indication of skill level.

I like the idea of using an adjusted average from the top 3 to 5 scores to rate percentile placement as a "class" score.

How about this idea? Make all Master class shooters attend 1 of the following shoots each year. The state, Zone, US Open or Nationals. If you place in the bottom 20% of the Master class at one of those shoots, it's a mandatory move back to AA. If you don't attend any of them, it's back to AA. This would reduce the amount of money in Master class, but make it much more competitive.

Hey wait a minute!!!!! I am in "AA Class"! Don't send them back!

John this is one of your great ideas as always! I say go one further and take the NSCA average and classify people that way. I look at my averages compared to the big boys to see how far behind them I am!
If we use and AVERAGE of what you shot for the year, it becomes simple. You make it or you don't!
If you don't shoot a minimum of targets you get out back to lower classes.

What's wrong with having a running average like a baseball player does for hitting average? Break it down however you want - like school - 90-100 is A, 8-89 is B, etc. or something similar. You could have state, zones, certain big blasts and the nationals count as more than one event to weigh on the average more. Depending on what your average is would determine what class you're in. No need to worry about punched or anything - your standing solely depends on how well you do. Maybe make it mandatory that no more than half of your registered targets for average can come from one place to avoid some folks getting the owner to set easy targets to get themselves into the higher class.

Just an idea

Clubs will be pressured to throw easy targets to get their shooters averages up and there would be no insentive to shoot on windy or messy weather days. A strict average will not work. Although I do look at my yearly averages to see how far I have come I don't think it would work as a class structure mechanism.

Back in the early 90's, avg is exactly what was used. If my memory serves me it took an 82+ average to make AA, but it could have been a bit higher.

The average system was dropped for the most part because it is virtually impossible to handicap a course. Some regions shot significantly more difficult targets than others and the folks that shot the easier targets had a hard time competing with the guys that worked on harder stuff. Therefore, "it wasn't fair".

I'm not sure what's "fair", but, I think in whatever system is used, you should have to earn your class. The argument that clubs will have to throw easier targets to please the clientel will always depend on that particular club's shooters. Personally, I have always thought that the more difficult targets you work on, the better you can get.

Hawk

Once again look to golf... Sporting has been called "golf with a shotgun" hasn't it? You would need to determine a base line for each type of target - base par if you will... then incrementally add "difficulty points" as the presentations get more difficult\technical - kinda how the USGA comes up with the slope rating on a golf course.... the par, length, width od fairway, general difficulty, hazards, green speed, etc. are all used to determine the course rating. That slope rating adjusts your handicap index up or down from your home course as needed to give you a better relation of your skills vs par on a given course. Heck, you could even post a "difficulty rating" for each presentation on the course.

The thing is, this could be a monumental undertaking as golf courses don't change much from year to year and sporting courses, well..... I suppose this could\should be part of being a "certified target setter"? Set the target, fill out the rating form for it, and post them so all can see them if the want to.... now you have a way to compare the Texas targets to the Colorado targets, to the Pennsylvania targets... Jinda solves a lot of the issues if it can be worked...

To continue with the golf analogy..... Oakmont is within 30 miles of me. It's on the regular rotation for the US Open and is probably the only course that the is kept US Open ready at all times (the members joke that they ave to soften the course up for the Open). One of the toughest tracks around.... If I were to get a chance to play Oakmont I have no illusions that I would probably shoot near tripple digits even though I was mid 80's on my home course... Just like golf, Sporting courses are gonna vary in difficulty. The key to being "fair" is quantifying the difference so you know what you're getting into. And yes, there will be bruised egos when they find out that their course is a powder puff and not a cast iron bitch....

Ok, I'm going to throw this out there for you all to consider and mash around. This comes from a barrel racing background. They changed their system from winner takes all to a divisional format. It's sort of like the shooting Lewis Class system. Say you have 100 contestants show up and a 17.00 second run is the fastest time of the day. Your 1-D or 1st division pays out off of that time. Then you add .5 seconds and your 2-D division pays out at any time past 17.50. For the 3rd division you at 1 second to the fastest time and the 3-D pays out at an 18.00. The fourth division would add 2 seconds and pay out starting with a 19.00 time.. see the pattern? When you add more contestants you can add more divisions. An arena pattern and ground conditions are what makes or breaks the times set, compare to difficulty of a sporting clays course set. It would not matter because everybody there would have to run (shoot) under the same conditions.

Instead of using the Lewis Class sytem which just divides by 4, you could use missed targets that add to the highest score for the day. It shouldn't be to hard to come up with an average difference of scores between classes. That way everybody is judged on their known ability for that particular day on that particular course.

Remember, it's just an idea from another sport that I thought I would throw out there. Have fun with it, maybe it makes some good points.

I still don't see master class as being broken. Shoot a bird get one point, he with the most points wins, simple.

Why are you worried about the bottom shooters of master class? If they were sent a notice of class reduction and didn't accept it, and if they are stuck in a class they can't compete in, who's fault is that?

IMHO we need less classes.

Less classes could be good, so is knowing how you truly stack up in your class.... I shoot NRA High Power rifle (Master) and Long Range rifle (Expert)... Your classifications are based on percentages and we've had the same arguements... Short range Master\High Master that got the card shooting reduced courses or in the case of Long Range had scores from 600 yard matches included in your LR average (NO LONGER USED - 600 yds is now considered mid-range). The thought was that the guys that used scores from less than the full distance course hadn't "earned" it because they didn't have to deal with reading wind which can make or break you at full distance but becomes much less of a factor the closer you get.

Kinda like achieving AA or M from easier targets (even if they seemed tough to you) and then showing up to shoot targets that truly are tougher and shoot against the guys that earned their cards shooting those tougher targets.... You are gonna get yer tail handed to ya... some accept and learn from it and some bitch and whine that the targets are "not fair" 'cuz they're harder than they're used to...

Best case is to accurately quantify the differences between the easy and hard targets so there is less "whine room"....

Maybe the option to refuse the downward reclass needs to be eliminated... You wanna fuel your ego be saying you "earned Master" ... well keep earning to maintain it...

Better yet, create a seperate division for sub-guages OR make it so that they have to go head to head w\ 12ga if the scores are to be counted towards your classification. If you think you can run shoulder to shoulder with the big bores with your sub gun, step up to the line and put up or shut up!