ISSF Shooting taken over by the NRPAI?

Sparks

Was browsing through the new Olympic Council of Ireland website this evening and was rather surprised to discover that the NRPAI are now listed as the NGB for olympic target shooting in Ireland. Did we have another round of votes from the floor at the 2006 AGM or something? :rolleyes:

ogam

I hope this not another side or should I say snide swipe at the SSAI!! :rolleyes:

Sparks

So the body that's meant to recognise the NTSA suddenly lists the NRPAI as the Olympic NGB; but an NTSA shooter trying to get a response from the NTSA asking the question in public is a swipe at the NRPAI.
Bah, ogam. Bah, I say, and I shake my paw at you

DDLR

Sparks wrote:

Was browsing through the new Olympic Council of Ireland website this evening and was rather surprised to discover that the NRPAI are now listed as the NGB for olympic target shooting in Ireland. Did we have another round of votes from the floor at the 2006 AGM or something? :rolleyes:

Its about time if you ask me, With the NRPAI at the helm That sport is finally going on the right corse.

I wish them the best!

Sparks

DDLR wrote:

Its about time if you ask me, With the NRPAI at the helm That sport is finally going on the right corse.
I wish them the best!

I dunno DDLR, at least with the NTSA the AGM's not secret, even if it isn't quite as honest and above-board as I'd like my NGB to be.

stevenw

DDLR wrote:

Its about time if you ask me, With the NRPAI at the helm That sport is finally going on the right corse.

I wish them the best!

That depends on where you want it to go.

DDLR

Sparks wrote:

I dunno DDLR, at least with the NTSA the AGM's not secret, even if it isn't quite as honest and above-board as I'd like my NGB to be.

Yes Sparks i understand what youre saying, The AGM's are not as public as the NTSA but there not secret and yet saying that there is less !!!BS!!!! at the NRPAI's AGM's!


And stevenw

I feel the Sport will go the right way and bring more Gold home to our GREAT IRELAND!

Sparks

DDLR wrote:

Yes Sparks i understand what youre saying, The AGM's are not as public as the NTSA but there not secret

Could have fooled me. There's been no annoucement of the one from 2006 on the websites, no minutes released, and the only thing I've heard about it so far was from someone telling me their individual membership of the NRPAI has been cancelled!.

and yet saying that there is less !!!BS!!!! at the NRPAI's AGM's!

I don't know how you can think there's less BS at the NRPAI's AGMs, especially given the 2005 debacle!

And stevenw
I feel the Sport will go the right way and bring more Gold home to our GREAT IRELAND!

From whence? The only shooters in the country who have any hope of bringing home medals in international competitions have nothing to do with the NRPAI; which isn't to say that they're not avoiding the NTSA as well as much as they can, but at least they have a vote in the NTSA, even if this year's AGM made a joke of that as well.

Dvs

Sparks wrote:

From whence? The only shooters in the country who have any hope of bringing home medals in international competitions have nothing to do with the NRPAI; which isn't to say that they're not avoiding the NTSA as well as much as they can, but at least they have a vote in the NTSA, even if this year's AGM made a joke of that as well.

Hello Sparks,
I think both John and Michael Walls might dispute this claim,
and with good reason,they brought home quite a few medals last year.

Dvs.

Sparks

Dvs wrote:

Hello Sparks,
I think both John and Michael Walls might dispute this claim,
and with good reason,they brought home quite a few medals last year.
Dvs.

Not in ISSF internationals they didn't. Nothing against them (I've shot against Michael in smallbore and he's a damn good shooter), it's just that they weren't entered into any ISSF international matches and didn't win any medals there. We've got two, maybe three shooters in the republic capable of winning medals in an ISSF international, and maybe that again up north. And that's being very optimistic. The international standard is incredibly high because you're talking about going up against what are virtually paid professionals who have enormous support structures behind them - coaching teams rather than individual coaches, physio experts, biomechanics experts, dieticians, physical trainers, gunsmiths, the works - and all professional, paid, fulltime staff. Look at the USAMU or the residential athletic courses the Australian/Swiss/Italian/etc shooters come out of and whom we compete against. The fact that we have any shooters at that level at all is a bloody marvel. It's a whole other level out there - our problems are things like not having enough people show up for matches: theirs are things like too many people showing up at matches and shooting perfect scores.

Dvs

Sparks wrote:

Not in ISSF internationals they didn't. Nothing against them (I've shot against Michael in smallbore and he's a damn good shooter), it's just that they weren't entered into any ISSF international matches and didn't win any medals there.

With respect Sparks,
thats not what you said,

Sparks wrote:

From whence? The only shooters in the country who have any hope of bringing home medals in international competitions have nothing to do with the NRPAI; which isn't to say that they're not avoiding the NTSA as well as much as they can, but at least they have a vote in the NTSA, even if this year's AGM made a joke of that as well.

And now to try and demean their international medal winning achievements,
as something less than winning in an ISSF international match is a joke!

If a person can go and compete against their peers in an international competition, in any sport and win, they are entitled to respect for that !

if a person shooting air rifle/pistol or a bow, won an international medal,
would it be a fair comment to say, well they didnt enter any IPSC internationals did they....

Dvs.

Sparks

Dvs wrote:

With respect Sparks,
thats not what you said

Dvs, read the title of the thread and then reread what I said in context.

And now to try and demean their international medal winning achievements,
as something less than winning in an ISSF international match is a joke!

Dvs, the ISSF matches are harder. That's just how it is. There's no attempt to demean involved. And if you asked the Walls' about it, that's what they'd tell you. Look, the Irish Nationals this year were shot in good conditions, and Micheal put in 567 (beating me by a point), and making it into the finals. But to make the finals in an ISSF international, you're looking at 594 (Munich '05) to 595 (European Championship '05) and to win you're looking at 598 or higher. Out of 600. In air rifle, you're looking at needing to put in a 570 just to not embarress yourself and you'll need higher than a 585 to be in the top half of the field and 595 or higher to make it to the finals. Right now, we've got one air rifle shooter in the country who can do that on a good day, and maybe two more with the potential to do so if they got enough training. And in pistol it's even more pronounced - in the Irish Nationals, John put in a 466 and Micheal a 535, the overall winner put in a 565 after over a decade training in the army, and even he wouldn't make the top ten in the Europeans, he was five points short (they don't shoot standard pistol at any other event other than the World Championships and the scores will have gone up considerably since the last one so it's a bad comparison).

There's no bad reflection on Michael or John or me or any other Irish ISSF shooter over this, and to say there is, is to say you don't know much about ISSF shooting - you need support mechanisms that just aren't there in order to reach the level required. It is a bad reflection on the NTSA, not the shooters.

We don't have enough coaches, we don't have a proper carding grants system to support international-level shooters or shooters trying to reach that level, we don't have any national facilities for technical needs like equipment control or scoring targets (all the targets get scored on a Wilkinstown-owned scoring machine that we lend anyone running an air rifle match) or batch testing ammunition or chronographing ammunition or gunsmithing ISSF rifles or so on, our national coach doesn't get to see the squad for more than one weekend a month, and these days it seems that the ISSF NGB has far more non-ISSF and even non-shooting people voting at the AGM than it has actual shooters. Collegiate shooting has a long history of being ignored, Junior shooting has been even worse, only changing in the last four or five years, and you'll note more senior shooters walking away from the sport than new people coming in.

Thing is, even as bad as it is, getting taken over by the NRPAI would be worse by far - at least in the NTSA we have a vote at the AGM - we don't in the NRPAI and shouldn't since it's not meant to be an NGB but an umbrella body; and if the NTSA ever go too far, we have the Companies Act and the High Court to fall back on to make them follow their own rules and to treat their members fairly. Most ISSF shooters would resist doing that to the last, and frankly even I've had occasions in the past where that was an available option but I always thought it'd do more harm than good; but at least we have the option. In the NRPAI there are no such rules and no such outside arbitration and enforcement body, and there is a long history of ignoring their rules completely if it's convienent for those at the top table but citing them in triplicate if it stops something they don't want to happen. And frankly, if anyone in the shooting community is surprised to learn that, I'll be very surprised myself.

if a person shooting air rifle/pistol or a bow, won an international medal, would it be a fair comment to say, well they didnt enter any IPSC internationals did they....

Not if it was a thread about air rifle or air pistol or archery, no. If it was an IPSC thread however, it'd be fair comment.

Dvs

Sparks wrote:

Dvs, the ISSF matches are harder. That's just how it is. There's no attempt to demean involved. And if you asked the Walls' about it, that's what they'd tell you.

Sparks,
If you can go and take part in an international PP1+2 competition,
and you out shoot the best in the world in that discipline,
then you could make an informed judgement on which might be harder !

just because the best in the world in ISSF are only seperated by a few points in the top end of the scores does not mean it's harder than any other discipline.



Maybe they should place some targets a unknown distances, partial obscure some others, outlaw those tight shooting outfits and make unmodified rifles and pistols the rule,











That should open up the scores a little!:D:D


Dvs.

Sparks

Dvs wrote:

Sparks,
If you can go and take part in an international PP1+2 competition,
and you out shoot the best in the world in that discipline,
then you could make an informed judgement on which might be harder !

Or I could compare the firearms by MOA and the size of the targets and the range and the time allotted. Put it this way Dvs - if Michael and John beat the best in the world in PP1+2, why didn't either win even our domestic national championships in ISSF standard pistol?

just because the best in the world in ISSF are only seperated by a few points in the top end of the scores does not mean it's harder than any other discipline.

Indeed not. But look at the math. Take the precision needed in minutes of arc to hit the ten ring, and take away from that the size of the group the firearm will hold (again in minutes of arc) and you have a good measure of the difficulty of a particular shot, as you're looking at how accurate the shooter has to be, as opposed to the firearm. So compare ISSF air pistol and the B-27 stage of the PP1 match (I don't have dimensions for scoring rings for the other stages - find them and we can do a better comparison!)

10m Air Pistol
The ten ring is 11.5mm across at 10m. A world-class air pistol will hold a group between 4.8mm and 6.8mm at that range with a 4.5mm pellet. That means you have to be accurate enough to hold a 6.8mm group inside a 20.5mm ring, or in MOA, a 2.33 MOA group inside a 7.04 MOA ring; a margin of 4.71 MOA.

PP1
B-27 target at 7 yards, yes? And assuming you're shooting with les's new 2011 the math goes: ten ring is approx 4" @ 21' = 66.836MOA, group size is 50mm @ 50m = 3.43MOA, so the margin is around 63MOA. A bit higher than 4.71.

It's just the math of it Dvs, do you see what I mean?

Maybe they should place some targets a unknown distances, partial obscure some others, outlaw those tight shooting outfits and make unmodified rifles and pistols the rule,

Thing about unknown distances is that you can't really compare shooters from all over the world accurately if you use different courses of fire for each of them in each competition as you'll never be sure if one shooter had an easier match than another. Partial obscuring isn't really target shooting, it's more heading down another avenue. The shooting outfits are also strictly regulated and act like a weighlifter's belt not a tripod - those rifles are a lot heavier and we hold them for a lot longer, don't forget. And other disciplines are allowed far thicker jackets (which insulate the rifle more from the shooter's pulse). And while we may have modifiable firearms, there are strict regulations limiting those modifications and we're not allowed to modify the sights - no red-dot sights or telescopics allowed, except for running target.

That should open up the scores a little!:D:D

No rule change so far has managed to do that for more than a short while. We shrink the targets, scores drop, then they climb back.

You know, this has been bothering me all day. It's like we in Ireland don't actually get just how high the standards are elsewhere in the world. We see shooters like Derek Burnett going to the Olympics and David Malone winning world cups and there isn't as much celebration as there ought to be - it's like people dismiss these as if they'd won just another ordinary match. Winning a medal at that level is an unbelievably hard thing to do, and doing it with the support structures we have is simply out of this world. It really does bug me when I see people not bothering to note successes like those.

les45

Mark is spot on, Derek Burnett turned in a outstanding performance , he did not get one tenth of the publicty he deserved. We have lots of groups working away , trying to develop their sports. The Precision Pistol guys are puting in some great scores, our ISSF shooters are working and to a large degree funding their own expenses for their trips to Bisley, we had one of our ISSF Juniors take a medal at the British Junior Championships. The Practical Pistol boys and girls are starting to compete in various events around the world. The FClass are competing abroad,each and every person wants to compete to the very best of their ability, but to acheive anything we need support , both financial and moral. We need to start supporting each other. If we have a shooter that has the ability to win medals then lets get behind them, I for one would support a competition fund for shooting.The monies to be used to support shooters from all disciplines, and as a sport, shooting would be the winner ! Perhaps not the most orginal idea but it is worth thinking about !

Sparks

If we have a shooter that has the ability to win medals then lets get behind them, I for one would support a competition fund for shooting.The monies to be used to support shooters from all disciplines, and as a sport, shooting would be the winner ! Perhaps not the most orginal idea but it is worth thinking about !

The idea was put forward a few times les, but noone could agree on who should receive funding priority - and unless you have enough for everyone, you need to know what deserves more funding than what. And that is an argument that no sane, peace-loving person wants in on

les45

Why not !, I am sure if there was a commitment from the various groups to work together on this we could formulate a fair system. The problem may be the "Working Together"

Sparks

But how would you do the cost/benefit analysis between two shooters in different disciplines les? The importance of the competition? The liklihood of winning a medal? The effect it'd have on the shooting community here in Ireland? The possible positive PR outcome? The amount invested in training by the shooters? The relative skills of the shooters? (And that last one's especially nasty!).

The problem may be the "Working Together"

Darn right. Even if you had the criteria mentioned above, you've got to get over the obstacle of precedence. It's one thing to say that if we had a commitment to work together we could, and it's probably true; but getting that commitment in the face of people remembering their sport being damaged by other people, well that'd be a near-miracle at this point.

les45

The last few words are the crux of the matter, I shoot with a great bunch of guys in Newry, and with respect to all parties here in Southern Ireland if these guys can work together anyone can

Dvs

Sparks,
when you start trying to use maths to demonstrate that,
10m ISSF air pistol shooting is harder than PP1 +2,
because the maths show it to be so,
because of the size of the ten ring on the targets,
it only serves to illustrate how your opinion is based on incomplete facts.

I feel that I should point out that,
I do not feel that 10m ISSF air pistol is a lesser discipline than fullbore or rimfire pistol in other disciplines, however I do not accept that it is as Sparks claims, Harder!

The size of the ten rings on the targets is only one element in both disciplines, you are as Sparks says, shooting at a smaller ten ring in 10m ISSF air pistol, but you are doing so from a static shooting stance, no movement is required, the target is also static, not a turning target requiring you to shoot within limited short interval, ISSF air pistol gives you the chance to take unlimited sighting shots, with PP1+2 its straight in cold, no sighting shots, no time to adjust your pistol sights during the course of fire.

ISSF air pistol does not require you to shoot with your weak hand!
or to draw your pistol from a holster at the start signal, or to then shoot 12 shots in twenty seconds including a reload!
an 10m ISSF air pistol does not recoil like a full bore pistol.
10m ISSF air pistol is shot indoors.
PP1+2 require shooting from different ranges in the same course of fire.
10m ISSF air pistol, is just that!

Sparks,
it is apparent from your often stated opinions about the skill involved in ISSF air pistol/rifle shooting, that you seem to think that ISSF air pistol and rifle disciplines and those who take part in them are the elite in shooting sports and everything else is beneath it.

Sparks wrote:

But how would you do the cost/benefit analysis between two shooters in different disciplines les? The importance of the competition? The liklihood of winning a medal? The effect it'd have on the shooting community here in Ireland? The possible positive PR outcome? The amount invested in training by the shooters? The relative skills of the shooters? (And that last one's especially nasty!).

I'm pretty sure Sparks, that you would have no problem deciding who among the shooting sports in Ireland would best meet these criteria,
why those elite ISSF Olympic atheletes.:rolleyes:

My point is this ISSF pistol is not harder than any other pistol discipline,
just different.

I also agree that Derek Burnett and other Irish shooters do not get a lot of credit for their achievements on the international stage.

Thing about unknown distances is that you can't really compare shooters from all over the world accurately if you use different courses of fire for each of them in each competition as you'll never be sure if one shooter had an easier match than another.

Shooting at unknown distances does give an indication of a shooters ability to judge unknown ranges at the short to medium range and still put in a good score, this is a test of the individuals shooting ability.

Shooting at known ranges with modified equipment,unlimited sighting shots and time allowed to adjust sights and the setup of the pistol/rifle to perfection, it is often a test of the individuals ability to sight in the pistol/rifle once thats done, its a matter of repetition.

Dvs.

Sparks

Dvs wrote:

Sparks,
when you start trying to use maths to demonstrate that,
10m ISSF air pistol shooting is harder than PP1 +2,
because the maths show it to be so,
because of the size of the ten ring on the targets,
it only serves to illustrate how your opinion is based on incomplete facts.

I would have thought that it shows my opinion is based on facts, but we differ there I suppose.

The size of the ten rings on the targets is only one element in both disciplines

Agreed - but remember that 10m air pistol was just one ISSF event chosen for example; there are others...

you are as Sparks says, shooting at a smaller ten ring in 10m ISSF air pistol, but you are doing so from a static shooting stance, no movement is required

Contrast ISSF running target where neither of those is true.

, the target is also static, not a turning target requiring you to shoot within limited short interval

Except in ISSF rapid fire pistol, ISSF standard pistol, ISSF sport pistol, and ISSF 5-shot air pistol.

, ISSF air pistol gives you the chance to take unlimited sighting shots, with PP1+2 its straight in cold, no sighting shots, no time to adjust your pistol sights during the course of fire.

Which to me is daft - why have sights at all so? And while you have an unlimited number of sighters in 10m AP, you only have a limited amount of time for the sighters and the competition shots, which limits the number of sighters, practically speaking.

ISSF air pistol does not require you to shoot with your weak hand!

No, nor does any ISSF pistol event allow you to shoot two-handed or use red dot sights!

or to draw your pistol from a holster at the start signal, or to then shoot 12 shots in twenty seconds including a reload!

ISSF pistol events don't use a holster; however rapid fire is 5 shots in 8, 6 or 4 seconds (depends on what stage of the match) and is at 5 seperate targets 75cm apart with 10cm 10-rings at 25 metres, and is shot from the 45 degree hold position. Standard pistol is 5 shots in 10 seconds. Both are faster, though neither uses a reload in the middle of the course of fire (it's a shooting competition, not a reloading competition!).

an 10m ISSF air pistol does not recoil like a full bore pistol.

No, but an ISSF centerfire pistol does, since it is a fullbore pistol.

10m ISSF air pistol is shot indoors.

And all other ISSF pistol events are shot outdoors.

Sparks,
it is apparent from your often stated opinions about the skill involved in ISSF air pistol/rifle shooting, that you seem to think that ISSF air pistol and rifle disciplines and those who take part in them are the elite in shooting sports and everything else is beneath it.

I'm not sure I'd agree with your language Dvs, but I'd find the sentiment familiar (with the caveat that I'd be thinking of ISSF events as opposed to ISSF airgun events). To me, it's the best thing out there. Which, when you pause for a moment, makes sense - if I didn't think it was the best thing out there, why would I be doing it?
And for the record, I do think that in terms of demands on accuracy, there's precious little that competes with ISSF events - Palma shooting would, and there are one or two other events, but precious little. Other events get their challanges from different sources - movement, speed, reloading, random target ranges or courses of fire, antique equipment, and so on. Nothing wrong with that, it's just that it's the accuracy that drew me into this sport, and it's always going to be the accuracy that I value most in it. And ISSF events give other events a good run for their money in some of those other areas.

I'm pretty sure Sparks, that you would have no problem deciding who among the shooting sports in Ireland would best meet these criteria,
why those elite ISSF Olympic atheletes.:rolleyes:

Actually, you'd be wrong - I'd never get the chance. No NTSA person would. Don't forget, the NTSA is a limited company - its directors are charged, by law, with putting the NTSA first. Which is one of the reasons I've been saying the NTSA shouldn't be a part of the NRPAI - there's an inherent conflict of interest that we can't overcome for legal reasons.

But that aside, damn right I'd put some of our shooters first. Not all of them, you understand - but there are a few, a very precious few, who are truly outstanding. They train every day, one or maybe two of them have the potential to beat the best in the world, and they put enormous amounts of time, effort and resources into their training. They work at it like Mary O'Rourke campaign workers. They deserve any support they get, and frankly, when the NRPAI blocked reform of the carding grant which would have given them better support, it was about the almost the most galling, demoralising, incensing thing I've ever seen in the sport.

My point is this ISSF pistol is not harder than any other pistol discipline,
just different.

Ah, but define what makes a discipline hard! And justify the metric you're going to use!
(Also, look at the past records of shooters who've tried to make the switch to ISSF disciplines and found their skills lacking. That, more than anything else, shaped my opinion on this comparison in the beginning).

Shooting at unknown distances does give an indication of a shooters ability to judge unknown ranges at the short to medium range and still put in a good score, this is a test of the individuals shooting ability.

I would have said that it's a test of the individual's ability to gauge distance. And to me, to gauge distance, we have rulers, rangefinders, reticules and other such devices.

Shooting at known ranges with modified equipment,unlimited sighting shots and time allowed to adjust sights and the setup of the pistol/rifle to perfection, it is often a test of the individuals ability to sight in the pistol/rifle once thats done, its a matter of repetition.

Yes, that's all it is! :rolleyes:
(I laugh, but you sound like my coach )

By the way, I don't know of any discipline that bans modification of equipment or sighting in of firearms. Maybe it's not quite so easy to adjust the height of a cheekpiece in a light hunting rifle than it is in an ISSF free rifle, but it's still doable and is done; and you buy the pistol that best suits your hand which is a form of modification - and with good reason as everyone's hand is different and if only one rake angle and size of grip was permitted, it'd be unfair advantage to those whom that rake and size suited. And maybe you're not sighting in on the day in PP1, but at 21 yards with a margin of 63MOA for aiming for the ten ring, that doesn't seem like such a big deal!

les45

Does this mean we are going to see a team from the PP1 boys and girls enter our June Bank Holiday Competition DVS, lets settle this once and for all !!! my money is on the Practical Pistol Team.

Dvs

les45 wrote:

Does this mean we are going to see a team from the PP1 boys and girls enter our June Bank Holiday Competition DVS, lets settle this once and for all !!! my money is on the Practical Pistol Team.

Les,
I'll see what I can do.

Dvs.

Sparks

Checked the OCI's webpage again today, and it seems that normality has returned