(Be a Do Bee, Not a Don’t Bee)
As you may have noted, USPSA membership is growing and so is the number of affiliated clubs, both Steel Challenge and USPSA. With growth comes growing pains, naturally, but there are a few things you as an experienced club member, range officer, club contact, match director, section coordinator or Area Director can do to help alleviate some of the common issues. This will be especially necessary with the advent of “The USPSA Experience”, a web site dedicated to cleanly and simply introducing people to our sport.
Regardless of how they find a USPSA or Steel Challenge club, new shooters will not be familiar with the rules and regulations concerning divisions, safety, equipment, or penalties. Many times, these newcomers are taught the ropes of the game by older, more experienced club members or range officers. But, if your club isn’t following all the rules, even with the notable level one exemptions, then the new competitor often gets the wrong impression, one which will not serve them well when they go to a different club or higher-level match where the rules are being followed and enforced. This phenomenon is commonly called “club culture” and it can be good or bad. Good club culture emphasizes following USPSA or SCSA rules, uses NROI-trained range officers, and strives to maintain competitive equity for all through those endeavors. Bad club culture generally begins with the oft-stated philosophy of “it’s just a club match”, and division equipment rules are ignored, safety violations get waved off “because they’re new”, poppers aren’t properly calibrated and reshoots are granted for reasons that would not fly at a level II or higher match.
This is not a blanket indictment of anyone or any club where honest mistakes are made. They happen all the time and are a consequence of human officiating—we see the same thing in all sports. However, willfully ignoring the rules (it’s just a club match, remember), does a major disservice to all your members and competitors. New shooters go away thinking their Staccato single action 2011 style pistol is legal for Carry Optics because the range staff just let them slide, or worse yet, were not aware of the CO division requirements. This is one of the most common things seen at either higher or different matches than the local: a competitor with a gun that doesn’t fit division requirements in a division where nobody bothered to correct them because it was a club match. Another issue we often see is the gun being too low, or too far away from the belt. Whether you agree with these rules or not, they need to be enforced, regardless of match level. Requiring someone to adjust their holster to fit division requirements sometimes results in an argument or refusal because “I’ve been shooting this at home (or worse yet, THIS range) all year”. This speaks to a serious lack of attention to the rules at the club level.
Don’t get me wrong, I understand that club matches are about efficiently getting people in and out, and some of the finer points of the USPSA rules are sometimes ignored, usually not intentionally. In my last column in USPSA Magazine, I covered some of these issues. But that didn’t cover the entire problem of errant club culture. We, as the members and representatives of this organization, (and yes, as a member you are a representative, especially if you are a club contact or match director, SC or AD), have a responsibility to ensure that our matches are being run fairly, consistently, and within the rules to the best of our ability. Once, when asked why his matches ran so well and why he was insistent on running his matches like a Level II or Level III, a good friend answered, “Why are you surprised? It’s the same rulebook”. Keep that in mind, please. While the stakes may not be high at club level, it’s the same game, and we should be training our members in the rules as well as techniques of Practical Shooting. As a member, you should insist that clubs do things right—the benefits are great, but the harm done by ignoring the rules is greater. We can all strive to do better.
What resources are available to you to help you improve your club culture?
First are the USPSA Competition Rules, along with the SCSA rules, available in paperback from Amazon, or downloaded from the USPSA.org web page, or found on the USPSA App. If the rules change, we publish a new book and a change log as well, to help you discover the changes.
Second, if you are gaining new members, think about scheduling a Range Officer seminar. It’s a great way to build your knowledge base and gain certified Range Officers, and if you are already certified, NROI will allow you to audit for no charge. That helps to keep long-standing range officials up on the rules. Seminar information can be found here: NROI Seminar Information and a request form here: Seminar Request Form. It’s a great way to become a better competitor, too, and you may know when something isn’t right.
Third, listen to the NROI Podcast, produced every two weeks and available on your favorite podcast platform. We cover a variety of topics but always have some rules questions to answer.
Fourth, subscribe to the NROI Blog, a weekly blog post covering a huge list of topics, from rules to match organization to training and free advice. Written by the NROI Range Master Instructors, this is a good place to increase your rules knowledge or gain some insight into match operations or RO practices. There are a variety of resources available there, including Practiscore training videos, NROI Tips videos, forms, and the like. It’s also organized by tags, so you can search the blog for topics of interest.
Fifth, if you have rules questions, don’t guess! Send a question to: rules@uspsa.org and we’ll do our best to answer it quickly.
Sixth, take advantage of any RMI or RM in your area. Use them for advice, rules questions, and the like.
Last, but by no means least, contact your Section Coordinator and/or Area Director. They should be involved in ensuring matches run under the rules, should visit the clubs in their section or area at least once per year, and be available for help with USPSA issues in general.
Remember—competition requires:
- Rules—without rules, there is no competition, only anarchy. The founders of the sport understood that from the beginning.
- Enforcement—without enforcement, rules have no meaning, and the playing field isn’t level
- Officials—trained to enforce the rules equitably and consistently
We are all in this game together. Anybody who claims to be passionate about the sport, and yeah, I get it, should also be passionate about getting it right. That benefits everyone.