Old Bakersfield PD qual

[Gun Nerd]

Two more runs tonight - PX4CC, AIWB under a polo shirt, indoor range.

The first run included a horrifically fouled draw at 20’ and an incompletely seated magazine at 60’ that required a tap-rack to fix. On the upside, I was really happy with my performance on the other strings. Final score - 72 by the original par times, 77 if you add Wayne’s 0.3.



The second run was pretty good, except for an even more fouled reload and an unintentional headshot at 60’. Technically it’s on the silhouette but really it should be a -10. Final score accepting it as an on-target hit would be 76 by the original par times and a squeaker pass at 80 if you allow the extra 0.3.



Overall, what I continue to see here is that if I can manage to avoid disaster, I’m a mid-80s shooter with the original par times. In the future, I don’t think I’ll worry about the extra 0.3 - to quote Barbie, math is hard and I’m only worried about tracking improvement. I can always just add 4 points to approximate a stopwatch-and-whistle score.

[JCN]

Are you using the as described 7” circle for 10 points or are you using 8”?

[Gun Nerd]

Are you using the as described 7” circle for 10 points or are you using 8”?

I’m scoring 10 points for shots completely inside the 8-ring, and 9 points elsewhere on or touching the repair center.

[That Guy]

Told you all it might take a while...

I shot this qualification with my PX4. Now, the last time I actually fired this pistol was in July, however I do dry practice with this pistol fairly often. I did manage to get to the range during early August, but as I was on my holiday I took a holiday from serious business guns too, only shooting revolvers and my lever action rifle. After my holiday it has been difficult to get to the range, as either it's booked solid, the weather isn't co-operating, or both, so it has been over a month since my last range trip. In fact the pistol bays were booked full today as well, but since we've been getting more rain I suspected the people who booked the bays won't actually stay there shooting until closing time, and I was right. Got a bay for about an hour - and what's more it hardly rained at all during that time! Prior to shooting this, the only gun manipulation I did was to load and holster my pistol - so I would say I shot this pretty cold.

Since this is a PD qualification, I thought my 6005 would be a suitable holster. I did use a Blue Force Gear elastic magazine pouch for my reload though, I realize that's pretty much cheating but that's the first reload pouch I have on my kit.

As I said, I shot this cold after an extended break from shooting. I must say I was quite surprised by the results - I fully expected to fail. However, I don't think I did too poorly, at least for me:

String 1: 1.62s
String 2: 1.91s
String 3: 5.28s
String 4: 3.32s

Of course looking at the target one can't help but notice I was too lazy to bother converting inches to centimeters, messing with a ruler and string, and so forth, opting instead to just put an IDPA target up and get on with the shooting. So I guess I suck and my results are meaningless. Still though, I found this a fairly interesting exercise and like I said, I was quite surprised by my results.



By my count, I believe I dropped two points on my marksmanship and lost one more point for going over the time limit on the first string, giving me a final score of 97. I'll take it!

[AMC]

Shot this yesterday. Tried printing out SCCY Marshals solution, but it wouldn't open on my desktop. Went to grab a legal sized paper from the printer.....out. Ended up using one of our Qualification targets. The 'bottle' type silhouette is about 20% larger than a USPSA Metric "C" zone. The score zones are a 5" circle in the center surrounded by a 9" circle. Used those as my 10 and 9 score zones. Yes.....not exactly an apples to apples comparison, but at least the score zones were tighter, not looser. Didn't feel like I was "cheating".

Shot it with a P320 Pro Fullsize 9mm with Streamlight TLR-1HL out of a Blackhawk T Series L3D holster. Used the listed par times. Ammo was Federal AE 124 grain.

First two strings went over time (1.61 and 2.22) because of slightly fumbled draws in the morning. And threw 4 outside of the 5" 10 ring I was using. I could do better....but I'm no GM level shooter.

Interesting little test. Very efficient. It's given me some ideas on how to do something similar with our folks, within our current resources and abilities.

[John Hearne]

Shot it the other day as my cold test. Used an IDPA cardboard target and the legal paper with 7" circle. My first run was 97 points. I was late (1.69 seconds) at 10 feet and then dropped two rounds out of the 7" circle but on the paper. I shot it again and still ended at 97 points. I ended up with too much time left over on the other stages and had the time to make hits in the 7" circle. For 10 rounds, its a decent test.

[Wayne Dobbs]

The more I look this over and think on it, the more I question some of the target dimensions. To my knowledge (and I was a serving cop and competitive shooter then), there were no 7" circle targets in LE use in the 1970s. The old Colt silhouette had an 8" X-ring inside a huge bottle zone and the Gunsite/API target of the day had a 10" (!) circle for the full count zone. Of course the major use LE target of the day was the barn-door sized B27 with a huge full count zone for qualification scoring and an elliptical 4" x 6" 10 ring for PPC scoring, surrounded by progressively larger 9, 8 and 7 rings.

Waidelich's recollections that the circle was about 7" and the outer zone was about 9" x 13" don't match up with any target in common use at that time. Which brings me to an easy and convenient comfort zone of using a B-8 repair center's 8 ring (also 8" in diameter) for 10 point scoring and the rest of the target paper for 9 points. The repair center is 10.5" x 10.5", which is 110.25 square inches and is smaller than the previously stated 9 x 13 zone, which gives us 117 square inches of total area. I think that gives us a usable target that matches up well and is likely a bit more difficult overall.

Also, for you guys out there working this course from concealment, the goal of the BPD qualification was to test street officers in uniform wearing high ride thumb break holsters with mostly 1911 pistols. So, if you duplicate that with an open carry ALS type holster or war belt holster the times and accuracy standards should gel nicely. I've shot it several times with the above conditions and have a couple of 100s and several 99s. I think it's a great course for today with appropriate memories of some great old time cops killin' LA bad guys.

[AMC]

I think there are several attractive things about this type of test. One is that it has both marksmanship and weapon manipulation standards that are somewhat demanding. It is also short, in both ammo use and time used. That makes it very efficient. The rest of your alloted range time and ammo, even if limited, could be spent on training.

The downside for larger agencies is that you can't really run multiple shooters simultaneously. It's a one-shooter at a time deal. Now, that let's you use the "Hit-Factor-Like" scoring that Bakersfield used...but if you're trying to qualify 20 cops at a time, suddenly the efficiency in time used drops away.

I still think this type of test has merit. Anybody who's been in the business have ideas about how to adapt this type of thing to larger agencies? Looking at you, Wayne....

And Jason says Hi.

[AMC]

Shot it the other day as my cold test. Used an IDPA cardboard target and the legal paper with 7" circle. My first run was 97 points. I was late (1.69 seconds) at 10 feet and then dropped two rounds out of the 7" circle but on the paper. I shot it again and still ended at 97 points. I ended up with too much time left over on the other stages and had the time to make hits in the 7" circle. For 10 rounds, its a decent test.

John, how do you feel about the accuracy/par time standards for an in service qual? I still have concerns about time efficiency when running large groups of people, but also about realistic standards with patrol officers today using modern guns and holsters.

For example, I'd be wildly ecstatic if we could get everyone to qual on this course with a full 50% added to the par times....

[JCN]

The downside for larger agencies is that you can't really run multiple shooters simultaneously. It's a one-shooter at a time deal. Now, that let's you use the "Hit-Factor-Like" scoring that Bakersfield used...but if you're trying to qualify 20 cops at a time, suddenly the efficiency in time used drops away.

I still think this type of test has merit. Anybody who's been in the business have ideas about how to adapt this type of thing to larger agencies? Looking at you, Wayne....

And Jason says Hi.

If you don’t mind my trying to help:

Could you do it with turning targets that only present within a certain amount of time in order to have multiple people at the line?

Is there a requirement to run everyone completely through a qual before moving onto the next person or could you run 50 people through the 10 foot string, then move everyone to the next distance, etc?

If no turning targets could set an over time par buzzer and remediate anyone not making that time with an individual time scored HF. Might motivate them to not get called out (but could get you in trouble in this HR world for making them feel badly about themselves).