USPSA/IPSC is a formally recognized sport that is about to celebrate it’s fiftieth birthday very soon (May 24, 1976). The earlier foundation sports from which it sprang go back well into the 60’s and perhaps beyond. As such, there have been a LOT of rules that have come and gone over that time. Some have helped to found a bit of the mythos around certain aspects of the rules and certainly had a hand in some of the legend surrounding the rules. Let’s cherry pick a few and talk about them and also discuss what you can do when things like this pop up…because they will.
My favorite of all, which is humorous and not really that horrible is “Default Target Height = 5 Feet at the Shoulder”. Yeah, this has never been a rule, as nearly as I can tell. Where did it come from? All the old classifiers used to state this with very few exceptions and so, that became tradition and became accepted as fact which, all too often becomes seen as “A Rule”. Nope.
The reality is that targets need to be set such that engaging them as set, from the full range of shooter heights, won’t lead to bullets going over the berm or violating safe angles of fire, among other restrictions. See Chapter 2 of the rules.
Another fun one, which actually WAS a rule for a few years, is “only the first two no-shoot hits count”. Okay, yes, this was a rule if you go back to the 2005 rulebook. We dumped it in 2008. Yet even today you hear this one pop up. The tradition continues, I guess.
A “fun” variant of that, which never was a rule and doesn’t even make sense if you think about it given the foundations of our sport is the “As long as you also got two good hits in the shoot target next to it, those no shoot hits don’t count.” What? How does this even start to make sense considering our “train for the real world” foundations? It doesn’t.
And then we get to perfs and scoring. “The bullet has to break the perf.” Okay, that isn’t a rule and never has been one as nearly as I can tell. And what does “break the perf” mean anyway? If you ask people, and I have, you get various answers. Some will tell you it has to go all the way through the perf and touch the higher scoring region of the target (hint: wrong answer). Others will claim that it needs to go “well into” the perf (you guessed it…also wrong answer). What the heck does “well into” mean anyway? Defining one nebulous term with more nebulous terms doesn’t help. The correct answer is found in 9.5.2 and 9.5.2.1. If the radius of the bullet hole is touching the perf (the rules call it the line between scoring zones) then you get the higher score. Use your overlays. Honestly folks, it isn’t that hard and doesn’t take that long. Spending a few seconds to ensure that you are awarding the correct score should be worth it…right? After all, when it is your turn I’d bet you expect the same courtesy.
“It’s a good hit so call it down”. This is in reference to falling steel targets. Again, not a rule, never has been. Falling steel poppers are present in our matches as a measure of “Power” which is why we calibrate poppers and the shooter can call for a calibration shot from the Range Master if they hit it and it does not fall. There is no leeway in the rules for anyone to just award the hit because they think it should have gone down.
Falling steel plates are not calibrated but also must fall to score. If they “got a good hit” and the plate did not fall, then it is Range Equipment Failure and a reshoot.
“Doubt goes to the shooter” and some variants on this. There is no rule that allows this sort of discretionary call. It either is a hit, or not, it is a penalty, or not, the time on the timer is correct, or it isn’t…and so on. I’ve even seen some of this stuff working Area and Nationals matches. It has zero place in our sport. While it is true that sometimes the Range Master has to interpolate between multiple rules to come to a ruling, they do so given their range of experience at matches and from discussions with other Range Masters, and their deeper understanding of the rulebook. These sorts of things are fairly rare. But they are the only ones allowed to do this.
And finally, the granddaddy of them all “It’s only a local match, those rules don’t apply.” Okay, yes, there are a few very limited exceptions for local matches (coaching, painting steel, and hiding activating targets). All of the rest of the rules are applicable at all levels. If your club doesn’t want to play by the rules or only wants to play by “some” of the rules, then don’t call it a USPSA match, don’t use any of our rules, and no you can’t turn in classifiers.
The fact of the matter is that when a USPSA shooter shows up at a match they have the reasonable expectation, even the right, to expect that a match billing itself as a USPSA match will use the USPSA rules, all the rules. I’ve done the hours long drive to shoot what I thought was a USPSA match only to find out the only stage that came close to complying was the classifier. People even stated “okay, this is the classifier so all the rules apply.” What the actual….! This was early on in my shooting career and that club didn’t last all that long. The classifier shot that day never showed on my record so they may not have been affiliated. But it was nonetheless very disappointing to spend several hours driving to not get what I was after.
And I could go on for pages and pages with other examples. But you get the idea, right?
So, what do you do when this sort of thing comes up at your local (or even higher level) match? Simple, ask them to show you that rule in the rulebook. Sometimes they themselves think it is in there and will go look. Sometimes others will chime in and join the discussion. The only correct action really is to look it up in the book so everyone gets it right in their heads and the match goes on.
As we have talked about on the podcast many times and have written here on the blog before; your local matches are used to prepare your shooters to shoot higher level matches. Not enforcing the rules can lead to them having a very bad experience at a higher level match! I cannot even count the number of times as an CRO or RM at a match someone has been DQ’d and their first words to me were “…but we do that all the time at my home club.” Yep, I’m sure you do. And now you get to pay the price.
Another term we talk about a lot is “Club Culture”. And a considerable amount of the myth and tradition rules are based solidly in the “Club Culture” issue. The sport is the sport and the rules are the rules.
One defense, arguably the best defense, against being overrun with the Club Culture problem is knowledge. How long has it been since your club members went to an RO class? How many are actually certified? You can find a list of all scheduled RO classes online at https://uspsa.org/seminars. Not one close enough to you? Schedule one for your club. It’s easy. Go to https://uspsa.org/nroi_seminar/information for more information and to schedule a seminar.
And if you want to know some more about our history, our December 2025 Podcast interview with the wonderful Michael Bane may be of interest. You can listen here December 2025 Podcast