We got back from Perry yesterday afternoon. I would have written last night, but we were pretty tired. I think the Army Marksmanship Unit's, Small Arms Firing School (SAFS) had just over 600 students, and 518 of them returned the next day to shoot the M16 EIC match (Excellence in Competition). Friday after we checked in, we went shopping on Commercial Row. We bought a few small things, like shirts, pins, and cups. Saturday we reported to the Camp Perry Theater for the safety briefing.
We got out of the safety briefing at about 10:30, and didn't need to report to the range until 1:00. So we took our Bushmaster AR15 over to Bushmaster for a little work. National match sights, butt stock weight, and a trigger job, to make the gun a little easer to shoot.
We reported to the firing line at 1:00 for coached practice, but with just over 600 shooters, it took awhile. We didn't get out until 5:30 or 6:00. It was so damn hot (high 90&'s), with no shade. After I shot, I wasn't feeling so good, and couldn't work the pits. I even at one point was given ice by a medic. I wasn't deathly sick or anything, but it was bad. A person could go from sick to being carted away by an ambulance pretty easily. One guy was even given an IV.
The next day (Sunday) we had to report back to the range at 6:30 AM for the M16 EIC. Since I was relay 2, I was sent to the pits, with relay 1 of course. It was better working in the morning, because it was slightly cooler.
The M16 EIC was a 400 point, five sighter match. Meaning five sighting shots, with 40 shots for record. The first string was slow fire prone, followed by rapid fire prone. The third string was 10 shots rapid fire sitting/kneeling, followed by 10 shots slow fire standing.
I ended up with two misses in the standing, and that hurt me a little. I finished with a 301-1X, and my Dad finished with a 328-1X, beating me out this year. While we didn't win any EIC points, we had a great time none the less. Also they really did issue us real M16's, same gun as our troop shoot. I an sure some of them saw action in Vietnam. Our's was made my FN FWIW. While they had a selector block on the safety, they still had the burst cam in them, and were capable of auto fire.
If the gun grabbing weenie bags knew the US Army, with the help of other Military branches were teaching civilians to shoot machine guns, they would probably have a heart attacks!