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USPSA - National Range Officers Institute

Kevin Imel

O Range Master, my Range Master…

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O Range Master! my Range Master! our fearful match is done,. The stage has weather’d every squad, the prize we sought is won… (With apologies to Walt Whitman.)

I suspect we all expect to see someone occupying the Range Master position at major matches because the rules require them and they are always there…right? But what about at your local matches? Is someone designated as the Range Master (RM) there? Do the rules require one? Do you take advantage of 7.3.1 and just have the MD be the RM? Or do you suddenly find yourself in need of an RM and go figure out who will do that task today?

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Plates: Just for Dinner?

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Metal Plates (see Appendix B3) and things that use plates like various stars, racks and so on can be popular with stage designers and shooters alike so why don’t we see more of them in major matches? It’s simple: Range Equipment Failure (REF) and then the shooter gets to reshoot the stage costing the match schedule time maybe worse. A fellow RMI once told me that “The only use for a plate at a major match is to put food on.” He’s likely right.

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Bootcamp? What’s That?

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Bootcamp? Well, if you have visions of running five miles with a full size popper on each shoulder or overhead pressing wall sections, …wrong type of bootcamp. A few years ago NROI started field testing a new concept for the Level 2, Chief Range Officer course called a Bootcamp. This was the brain child of Instructor Ray Hirst and it entirely changed the way we do the CRO class now. Years ago, the CRO course was more about stage design, mostly in the classroom or by correspondence, and less about running a stage efficiently. That left us with a problem finding people that actually knew how to run stages at major matches. The Bootcamp format of the class changed all that.

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The RO Seminar isn’t just for ROs

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So you have been enjoying the sport for a few weeks, months, or years and you say you have never taken the RO seminar because you don’t want to be an RO. Okay, but do you realize that the RO seminar will quite likely make you a better shooter? Yes, really. If you have been shooting for a while you probably have learned the rules, such as you know them, from fellow shooters and by watching others. But do you really KNOW the rules and are the rules you “know” really the rules? Maybe, maybe not.

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Joining the Range Master Program

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Let’s get this out of the way up front. The Range Master Program is not for everyone. If you just want the title, want the certificate to hang on your wall, and all the wealth and fame associated with being a Range Master; you are in the wrong place. The Range Master Program is intensive; not a “check the boxes and get the title” type situation.

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Majors and Form C

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Congratulations! Your club has decided to hold a major match and lucky you gets to be the Match Director. That will teach you to miss important meetings…right? In all seriousness, thank you for stepping up. Major matches don’t happen without a lot of good people and one of the first of those to be appointed is the Match Director or “MD”.

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But we’ve always done it that way!

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In my day job, when I sit down with a customer and talk about business processes one of the first questions I ask after they explain the process to me is “Why do you do it that way?” The answer all too often is “Because we have always done it that way.” And that is my cue to take them on the journey of reimagining that business process. What we often find is that as rules/laws/requirements/whatever have changed over time they have bolted on some other sub-process to maintain compliance instead of reworking the entire process to make sure it was efficient. In one notable case from several years ago, a physical piece of paper was hitting the same two desks in adjacent departments three separate times over the course of a few days instead of just taking care of everything necessary the first time it hit each desk. Needless to say, that got fixed.

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