With 65 shooters plus staff, family, and friends, the 2016 “ASI Hand Sized Handgun Championship” broke records in Washington. “You guys are doing a great thing here,” said Russ Bates. “I had a great time, and I’ll be back.”
As a senior with physical limitations ASI’s relaxed, enjoyable style fits Bates perfectly. Others, like overall match winner Malcolm McIver and Match Director Rick Breneman got a chance to shoot their pocket pistols in a serious way.
Breneman designed the match with a 5-shot pistol in mind, and several people brought them. Brian Hallaq (who runs the ASI program at Norpoint Indoor Range) brought a modern 5-shot, .38 Special snubbie. “It’s rough shooting that double-action trigger, especially one-handed,” he laughed. His skills and the moon clips on his late-model S&W made quick work of required reloads.
Stage after stage showed Breneman’s ideas – ideas that often “just can’t be done” in other sports.
On one stage, shooters fired two rounds from a supplied AR-15 in 9mm before switching to their pistol. Later they shot stationary steel targets (Steel Challenge style). Props were common – everything from plastic guns, to poker tables, to shooting from inside a real car!
As we said earlier, Malcolm McIver won the overall title in the “Non-ASI” group. Washington’s Regional Coordinator Marcin Pawlina topped the ASI competitors, with Blake Gruger topping the group for Non-Conforming Handguns.
Amid smiles and laughter as shooters waited for their scores, a prize raffle gave away two $50 Taylor Freelance, LLC gift certificates, along with ASI memberships, T-shirts, and more.
Breneman tells us the ASI Hand Sized Handgun Championship will return to Renton Fish & Game club July 29, 2017.
Scores are available on the forum now.