I’ve heard it said that there are two classes of competitive shooters – those who have been disqualified, and those who will be disqualified at some point in there shooting career.

I am somewhat embarrassed to report that on Saturday, I moved from the latter group to the former, and joined the DQ Club.

The good news – no one was hurt and I was not in danger of hurting anyone. As a matter of record, as I was moving from point 4 to point 5, I “broke the 180” while moving laterally, and no one was in the area where I pointed my gun.

As God’s sense of humor would have it, it was on my last stage of the day, as I was moving to shoot the last 3 targets. And I was the next to last shooter in my group, so rather than pack up, as is the tradition, I helped break down and all, before going home.

Now, in retrospect, I see what happened. In my planning, I was going to shoot from spot 4, some feet back from there the number is, where I actually shot. Had I gone east-west from 3, shot the two targets and moved to 5, all would be good. But I moved up to make the shots on the other targets closer, and then I didn’t keep my gun pointed down range as I moved to 5.

All in all I am pleased to report my fellow competitors were very consoling, and shared their first DQs with me. One shooter, who I have been competing with since 2002 when I moved back to the Atlanta area, did a ND after falling. He said he’s had 5 more DQs since, no one hurt, and no two the same.

Lesson learned. Now, let’s keep this the only one.

Note, if you want to share your DQ stories with me, you can comment, or email me at FillYerHands at Gmail, and I will sterilize them if you wish, and share at some time in the future.