FAQ: I'd Like To Start Target Shooting - Where Do I Begin?

IRLConor

I've started work on a wiki page to help answer the frequently asked question of "How do I get into target shooting?". Hopefully it and the club/range list should help more people (or at least boards.ie members ) to join our sport.

Please have a look and do one or more of the following:

• Edit the page and add more detail.
• Edit the page and fix my mistakes.
• Send me suggestions for more detail.
• Send me corrections showing where I've screwed up.
• Flame me unmercifully for "doing it wrong" (Strictly by PM only please ).

Please also have a look at the page for your club in the club/range list. If it's missing details please either fix it yourself or PM me the details and I'll add them in. If your club isn't mentioned, please let me know and it can be fixed.

Sikamick

Conor, are you a student and if you are, are you belong to the students Union.

If you read the posting I put up (Target shooting Clubs give newbies a chance) there seems to be no one interested in taking up the offer.

Idea! if you through contacts in the students Union could get them to run the competition, then as we at DTSC have suggested, will put up the prize.

There will be no cost to enter this competition, you will just have to be a newbie to the sport.

See posting below.

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PS.

I see there has been 92 hits and no postings on the previous thread, if any of the viewers(Club Members) don't want to contact me, would you please put this idea to your Committees, for them to take it on.



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Dublin Target Sports Club

(Fee's)
200 Membership - Join up 100 Euro - Insurance if you don’t have it ( 55 Euro )

We are interested in taken on new members, but what we don't want is people joining the club just to get their license. Maybe this is why a lot of the club’s fee's are high, if the fee is expensive you more likely to attend and get the value for your money.

We have an idea! and we would like comments from boards.ie shooting forum members, ( to run a competition/draw through Boards.ie ) and to try to get other clubs to do the same to bring new blood into the sport.


We would give the winner one years free membership, pay the first years insurance and pay for their first Rifle or Pistol, but the winner would have to be a newbie, willing to be dedicated to the sport of Target Shooting and attend the range on a regular basis and get involved in club/ inter club competitions.

We do have a format in mind as to how this could be done that would include
Boards Target shooting forum and Clubs.

If any of the groups mentioned above are interested in this idea please PM me.

Michael O'Connor
Secretary to Dublin Target Sports Club
Activities, Pistol Shooting, Bench rest Rifle, Compound and Recurve Bow.

IRLConor

Sikamick wrote: »

Conor, are you a student and if you are,

I haven't been since 2004. I still shoot with DURC as the club allows alumni to be members.

Sikamick wrote: »

are you belong to the students Union.

Nope, I steered well clear of them. (Well technically I was a member as they made it difficult to not pay the sub, but I had nothing to do with them.)



Your offer is very generous. Hopefully someone will take it up.

Both myself and Chopperdog tried this last year and no one contributed anything...

That said - I was given out to by the mods at the time for trying to put a list of clubs with contact details on boards, so thing may have changed since then.

IRLConor

Deleted User wrote: »

Both myself and Chopperdog tried this last year and no one contributed anything...

The FAQ entry or the list of clubs and ranges? If you still have material for either please send it on.

I don't mind if no-one else contributes, it would be nice though. Obviously for the clubs/ranges list the clubs which have plenty of details will get a bit more attention from readers so I believe it's in the best interest of clubs to put plenty in. At the end of the day though, it's their own choice and if a club wants to keep a low profile for some reason then that's fair enough.

Deleted User wrote: »

That said - I was given out to by the mods at the time for trying to put a list of clubs with contact details on boards, so thing may have changed since then.

There are many views on leaving contact details visible on the web. Clubs can decide for themselves whether they want the details published, I don't mind if they don't want them there.

Just a point - its NTSA rules rather then NSRA for 25yrd and 50m prone (at least according to the emails that are sent out)

I'll have a look and see if I can dig up anything.

IRLConor

Deleted User wrote: »

Just a point - its NTSA rules rather then NSRA for 25yrd and 50m prone (at least according to the emails that are sent out)

As far as I can tell, NTSA rules are a hodgepodge of NSRA (mostly) and ISSF (some bits). From what I've seen, 25yd competitions are held roughly to NSRA rules (because there are no ISSF 25yd/m prone rifle rules) and 50m ones are held to either NSRA or ISSF rules depending on the club.

Deleted User wrote: »

I'll have a look and see if I can dig up anything.

That'd be great, I've never seen them written down anywhere.

Sparks

IRLConor wrote: »

As far as I can tell, NTSA rules are a hodgepodge of NSRA (mostly) and ISSF (some bits).

There is actually a book of NTSA rules, though I didn't see it for a decade or so. It's basicly the same as the NSRA rules but ties are broken on countback rather than with graduated gauges for 25yd shooting. And they're only ever used in the 25yd nationals, every other 25yd match I've ever shot in used the NSRA rules instead. (Oh, and there are time differences for details in 50m as well).

To be honest, I don't know why we didn't just use NSRA rules from the beginning for what is an NSRA discipline. There was a bit of a disagreement and debate about that point at a previous NTSA AGM a few years ago - the motion was to use NSRA rules on NSRA targets and ISSF rules on ISSF targets because the NSRA 3-card system for 50m is not ISSF-legal and the rules the NSRA uses for 50m are not compatible with those the ISSF use (for example, in the NSRA rules you can go back to sighters in the middle of scoring shots, you can't in ISSF rules). We've already seen at least one national championship result disallowed because of ruleset confusion when an NI shooter followed NSRA rules on an NSRA 50m card during the NTSA nationals only to be disqualified because we were working off ISSF rules; and a lot of NI shooters tend to get muddled on that one because of being so used to shooting NSRA rules on NSRA cards. The problem lay in the lack of target changers for ISSF cards and the cost of the fanfold targets for those changers; hopefully the increasing number of electronic targets in use now will change the situation.

Recently a MQS was disallowed on that point - however at the last 50m match I was it most of the shooters were veryh quick to get the NSRA / ISSF thing established at the start.

AFAIK, NTSA rules don't include preptime at 50m, I don't know if thats the same for NSRA but its one reason why I dislike them.

Sparks

I thought it was the other way round - no preptime with NSRA rules (20min) but you can go back to sighters during the card; preptime with NTSA rules (25min) but no going back to sighters?

At any rate the 'no going back to sighters' is a very difficult thing to enforce, unless you happen to have as many spare ROs as firing points, and have them all watch what the shooters are shooting.

IRLConor - better add 'DRC rules' to that list as well then!

IRLConor

Well, the rules I was mentioning in that table was to give some info to prospective shooters to roughly how the competition was organised, not the precise definition of the rules or the variation in use in Ireland.

DeVore

I have no problem with a wiki page which lists contact addresses for reputable clubs.

DeV.

rrpc

IRLConor wrote: »

Well, the rules I was mentioning in that table was to give some info to prospective shooters to roughly how the competition was organised, not the precise definition of the rules or the variation in use in Ireland.

We've had some discussion at NTSA committee level regarding rules, and it's pretty much as Sparks put it. When using NSRA targets, we run with NSRA rules, and ISSF otherwise. NTSA rules are a bit like re-inventing the wheel, so basically it's ISSF rules diluted by such characteristics as the range, club or targets dictate.

Rathdrum used to be NSRA rules because of the whole 10 bull target thing, but since we've switched to electronic we're moving more towards ISSF.

There's always a thin line between what you can achieve with the equipment present and what you aspire to as well as trying not to discourage people from competing.

Repeating Henry

Lad's sorry for butting in but the object of this thread has been lost
How do we get newby's to get involved? Firstly by making it as simple as possible quoting the ins and outs from a technical point of view might be
a bit daunting making the sport seem elitist.

As I see it, the start of this thread was about someone offering to get the
ball rolling by offering all the basics to get started to newby's by means of a first competition and the winner takes a prize. After they become established in the sport then perhaps they can select what disiplin suits them best and
with that what rules apply.

I don't think the fear of backdoor promotion should let genuine attempts
to at least try something new. The idea behind Boards proves this point.
Lets see using Boards and its members combined intellect can something
come out of this involving all clubs.

To start: Can a discussion take place here to see if "Clubs" provoiding this sort of prize would be benefiting in any way greater that the actual offer itself or could it be a novel way just like the concept of boards of attracting
new members, the age profile for this sport seems to be getting older by the day, time is ticking. Ideas don't have to from the Top to bottom direction
only, left of field ones often are best.

I see we have the likes of John Griffin above us in the hunting department
John Greene is launching Midway Eire soon ("hear he is brining in Norma")
Ammunition that is. John's what do you think, you know the sport well from a shop front prospect. How would you both judge the sports health to be
from your prospective.

Sparks

Henry, you're addressing the wrong problem. You're tackling the question of how we get people started in competitive shooting. While it's completely valid and important as a question, it isn't the same as asking how we get people started in the sport...

Henry, just a point

IRLConor and Myself both captained a club that in my year 450+ members with over 300 active members, and in his year had over 500 members (i don't know how many active members, i wasn't around then).

We both train, teach and coach beginners on a regular basis, many of whom go on to do quite well in target shooting. For the past two years I spent at least 10 hours a week coaching.

HOWEVER - when they leave college they are lost. This is a point that sparks has been on about to death, but each year we loose betweeo 50-150 people who like shooting and know the basics as NO CLUB SEEMS INTERESTED IN TAKING THEM!

While bringing new people into the sport is great and needs to be done, we also need to make sure that we don't loose people already in the sport.

rrpc

Deleted User wrote: »

HOWEVER - when they leave college they are lost. This is a point that sparks has been on about to death, but each year we loose betweeo 50-150 people who like shooting and know the basics as NO CLUB SEEMS INTERESTED IN TAKING THEM!

A bit unfair that Zaraba, seeing as Rathdrum has made swingeing cuts to membership fees in order to attract students.

Have they not been enough?

Thats true - I was talking in general, and over the last while.

(and I will be sending you that cheque pretty soon!)

However, DURC / UCDRC should be getting info about this shoved down our throats - I tell people about RRPC's offer, but we can easily plug in the range if we are sent stuff.

I only found about those discounts when I asked - clubs should be a more proactive in chasing ex students.

Just to fill people in - it costs €4 per year to join DURC, and we provide all gear.

I know that other clubs can't match that, but thats the environment that our members are coming from and if you want them when they leave, you are going to have to cut fees like RRPC (which is in the range of €250 per year)

Sparks

To make matters worse, they're going from 4 euro a year in a fairly social environment where the range is right there on campus, to hundreds of euro a year, not all the kit available, the range often quite a trip away, everyone a stranger, and right at the point where most companies are expecting 50-60 hour weeks or more, and they're suddenly coming to grips with "the real world".

Clubs don't just have to cut rates, clubs need to learn marketing. There's 50-150 trained potential members generated every year, usually in a demographic that goes on to become fairly high earners, but that intial transition is very difficult. It's not so much that the club's doing them a favour by cutting rates as it is that there's serious competition for them and clubs are not doing enough to beat out other sports and other clubs and other pursuits, and are losing potential members as a result. Despite all that RRPC have done, I still don't think that there are any clubs out there that actually fully understand the nature of the situation.

rrpc

Deleted User wrote: »

Just to fill people in - it costs €4 per year to join DURC, and we provide all gear.

I know that other clubs can't match that, but thats the environment that our members are coming from and if you want them when they leave, you are going to have to cut fees like RRPC (which is in the range of €250 per year)

Only €250 the first year and €50 of that is Insurance. As long as you're a student it's €100 a year plus Insurance after that.

As for the marketing, we're working on that. For the present, all our offers are in the FAQ section of our website, more targeted stuff will follow when it's ready.

It's a bit chicken and egg in that you have to have funds to really attract people and you need the people to have funds.

rrpc - the point is for people who have just graduated.

They are not going to have huge cash flow; you would need to extend your offer for a year or two after people have graduated.

rrpc

With all due respect Zaraba (meaning none of course ), If they've graduated and are working, a fiver a week isn't asking too much. Especially if they're getting gear provided and somewhere dry* to shoot .

However if they're not working, then the status quo ante remains.




*note I didn't say warm

Sparks

In fact, charging them a membership fee at all for the first year or two might not be a great idea. Let them pay what it costs for them to be on the range (ie, ammo and electricity and targets, keep it down to less than what would be in your wallet). I know that the argument for high capitation fees is the amount that previous members have put into the club, but if you get no new members, the club dies and with it the amount that previous members have put into the club! Consider the initial no-fees-period an investment in future years of membership; after all, if they get familiar with your club, then it becomes very likely that they're going to stay with your club, because now there's a higher barrier to leaving the club and going elsewhere (in that they know your club and don't know elsewhere).

Sparks

rrpc wrote: »

If they've graduated and are working, a fiver a week isn't asking too much

But is is a fiver a week? Or is it an amount which, when amortised, becomes a fiver a week? Bit of a difference for someone with cash flow problems!

rrpc

You can do that anyway in Rathdrum. Small charge for range use and ammo and that's it.

And I defend the small charge to the hilt because if a member is going to give up their time to supervise shooters on a freezing night, the least they can expect is the club gets something for it, even if it's only a few quid.

rrpc

Sparks wrote: »

But is is a fiver a week? Or is it an amount which, when amortised, becomes a fiver a week? Bit of a difference for someone with cash flow problems!

We're flexible.

Sparks

And I defend the small charge to the hilt

See, this is what I meant above by saying that noone quite gets the problem yet.
The facts are that the average age of a shooter in Ireland is 42; club sizes are small; and activity levels are low. If you want to change that, it becomes a fairly standard business marketing problem.

Look at Bank of Ireland - they have operating costs like every other business (or shooting club); but in college they charge no fees and make a loss on students. This works because in years to come, those students will be earning loads - and if BoI can get them signed up in college with a few cheap gimmicks like not charging fees for a few years, they benefit enormously because most people won't change service providers until that service becomes truly abysmal, and often not even then (hence people offering to give people great deals and incentives to switch phone carriers and the like). It's not altruism, it's a profitable way to run a business. And if you run your club that way, then in the long run, it becomes more healthy, because the effect snowballs. The more who join your club, the better known it becomes, and the better known it becomes, the lower the barriers to entry are. And as their cash flow improves, their club fees rise (always lagging so there's never a decision point for them to consider whether or not they can afford membership this year - the moment they stop being a member, you're in trouble).
This is marketing 101, and it continually perplexes me that no club in the country seems to get it. You'd imagine they all had too many members or something...

Sparks

rrpc wrote: »

We're flexible.

Then you need to advertise that.
I mean, I've known Rathdrum for a decade, and you for nearly as long, and I never knew before now that you could pay your RRPC membership fee by installments! And if I don't know, how's a graduate who's been to RRPC maybe once or twice supposed to guess?

Sparks

Sparks wrote: »

The facts are that the average age of a shooter in Ireland is 42;

Whoops, my bad. From an official parlimentary question two years ago:

797. Mr. J. O’Keeffe asked the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform the average age profile of licensed firearms holders here. [2056/05]

Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform (Mr. McDowell): ...
The Garda authorities inform me that the average age of a licensed firearm holder is 49 years.

So a reasonably optimistic guess would be that that figure should now be 50...

rrpc

Sparks wrote: »

Then you need to advertise that.
I mean, I've known Rathdrum for a decade, and you for nearly as long, and I never knew before now that you could pay your RRPC membership fee by installments! And if I don't know, how's a graduate who's been to RRPC maybe once or twice supposed to guess?

It's in our rules and is explained to all prospective members. if you don't express an interest in joining you won't need to know will you?

Sparks

But I won't express an interest in joining if I don't think I can afford it, because it would be humiliating to draw attention to myself only to admit that I couldn't afford what every other member was able to afford.

rrpc

Sparks wrote: »

So a reasonably optimistic guess would be that that figure should now be 50...

That's *all* firearms owners Sparks, not club members.

The average age in Rathdrum is 45, but that's been dropping for the last year.

rrpc

Sparks wrote: »

But I won't express an interest in joining if I don't think I can afford it, because it would be humiliating to draw attention to myself only to admit that I couldn't afford what every other member was able to afford.

In my experience people have had no problem saying it's a bit much in one payment if they're joining for the first time, existing members have often asked to spread the payment over time as well.

We don't advertise it because quite frankly some people have abused it in the past and ended up using the clubs facilities and not paying anything at all or only a small proportion of the sub. That's not right either. We're a club, not a debt collection agency.

fourtycoats

Deleted User wrote: »

as NO CLUB SEEMS INTERESTED IN TAKING THEM!

.

Not strictly accurate Zaraba. ECSC Roundwood when it was known as The Fassaroe Sporting Club, always had a good relationship with the TCD and UCD clubs. We facilitated their 50/100 metre competitions on our range in Enniskerry and we have always had concessions for students. This relationship fell by the way side when we lost our range . However, now that we have developed our new range in Roundwood we fully intend to revive the relationships. During the course of this year, we will be upgrading our rifle firing point to enable us shoot the target disciplines and competitions again for up to 8 shooters simultaneously, In the meantime we can handle a limited amount of ISSF rifle shooting and are well set up for up to 10 pistol shooters at a time .We still make concessions for students.

rrpc

Sparks wrote: »

Look at Bank of Ireland - they have operating costs like every other business (or shooting club); but in college they charge no fees and make a loss on students.

Yes, lets look at Bank of Ireland. They have assets measured in billions, they have hundreds of thousands of customers of which students make up a tiny minority and who typically take up a an even tinier proportion of staff time and resources.

btw, the banks make a loss on most personal customers whether they pay fees or not. The only money is made on loans and mortgages. In reality, the bigger corporate and commercial clients subsidise the personal customer who has a credit current account or ATM card.

In fact, if you use your ATM card in another banks machine, your bank pays that bank more than they charge you for the transaction.

Not really a good analogy.

In fact it's worse because a club has *very* finite resources in terms of equipment and firing points available at any one time, so giving one person free use over another person who has paid starts getting unfair once a queue develops.

Sparks

Hey RRPC, if you don't have a problem, then you don't have a problem.

All I'm telling you is what I've seen since 1993, having lived through the process myself and then seeing it from the other side of the admin line.

WTSC has taken the line for the past decade of minimal entry barriers. Club firearms, kit found, begged, borrowed or bought for members, usually with nothing asked for in return, and the full cost of membership was about 20 euro if you had your own insurance for the last few years. We did an enormous amount of work for our members. We're in the middle of nowhere, we're not on a train line, haven't got a regular bus route, and started as a hayshed with a platform to stand on and targets halfway up the wall on the far side of the barn. Given those limitations, I think the results have shown that the approach works for bringing in new shooters (in this case from the pony club, but we've gotten a few from the colleges as well).

Whether or not you want to take the same line is entirely your choice.

(and fourty, I remember seeing FSC's student fees pinned up on the wall of the firing line shelter back when I was a student - they were set at over a hundred pounds at a time when five pounds was my weekly food budget. FSC was very good to the club in allowing the use of its range for matches (once a year), but it wasn't a real choice for a new graduate at the time).

IRLConor

Sparks wrote: »

FSC was very good to the club in allowing the use of its range for matches (once a year), but it wasn't a real choice for a new graduate at the time).

And for training, I know I was out there for a training session at least once.

Sikamick

Surely what IRLConor is trying to do here is to give basic information for new people to the sport, to know How , when, where, are clubs. Not the high tech stuff lads. Formula 4 before Formula 1. Think (Newbies)

No disrespect meant in the above
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IRLConor wrote: »

I've started work on a wiki page to help answer the frequently asked question of "How do I get into target shooting?". Hopefully it and the club/range list should help more people (or at least boards.ie members ) to join our sport.

Please have a look and do one or more of the following:

• Edit the page and add more detail.
• Edit the page and fix my mistakes.
• Send me suggestions for more detail.
• Send me corrections showing where I've screwed up.
• Flame me unmercifully for "doing it wrong" (Strictly by PM only please ).

Please also have a look at the page for your club in the club/range list. If it's missing details please either fix it yourself or PM me the details and I'll add them in. If your club isn't mentioned, please let me know and it can be fixed.

rrpc

Sparks wrote: »

Hey RRPC, if you don't have a problem, then you don't have a problem.

All I'm telling you is what I've seen since 1993, having lived through the process myself and then seeing it from the other side of the admin line.

WTSC has taken the line for the past decade of minimal entry barriers. Club firearms, kit found, begged, borrowed or bought for members, usually with nothing asked for in return, and the full cost of membership was about 20 euro if you had your own insurance for the last few years. We did an enormous amount of work for our members. We're in the middle of nowhere, we're not on a train line, haven't got a regular bus route, and started as a hayshed with a platform to stand on and targets halfway up the wall on the far side of the barn. Given those limitations, I think the results have shown that the approach works for bringing in new shooters (in this case from the pony club, but we've gotten a few from the colleges as well).

Whether or not you want to take the same line is entirely your choice.

I agree with you Sparks. The only proviso I'd enter to all of the above, is does it work for the long term? And from what Geoff is saying at the moment, the jury's still out on that.