IDPA 2018 Equipment Survey

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alfsauve

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I love reading the Equipment Survey from their Nationals.

I realize that just because a pro uses xxxx brand or yyyy model doesn't make it best. Nor will it necessarily be good for me. However, I've beat myself up trying to blaze my own path that I at least pay attention to what the better, seasoned shooters are doing. I also realize the survey isn't scientific or even complete, and that it encompasses shooters in a very specific style of shooting. But still I find it instructive. Here are my major takeaways.

The majority use reloads. Given how many rounds they practice a week, no surprise.

TiteGroup by far and away the preferred powder (remember most are shooting 9mm, 10mm or .45ACP).

Five brands dominate (50%) the bullet manufacturers.

Most used Molly Coated bullets, followed by Jacketed, followed by Plated. Wonder if that's a cost thing?

Competition guns are dominated (top 50%) by three brands. Might have to do with sponsor money.

Preferred Concealed Carry gun brands do not include some well known names, at least not in the top 90%.

The majority reload. Given how many rounds they practice a week, no surprise.
BUT
Their preferred Conceal Carry ammo is Federal and Hornady. Very few rely on handloads for Conceal Carry.
 
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Most used Molly Coated bullets, followed by Jacketed, followed by Plated.

There is no way most people in a service-caliber handgun game are shooting moly-coated. I will bet all of the money in my wallet right now that they are talking about the plastic/powder coated bullets that are super common in all practical shooting pistol games over the last 2-3 years, not the moly stuff that was popular (but no longer really is) in high-powered rifle games.

On the other stuff... got a link to the survey? Or is it an IDPA member-only thing. I'm a USPSA guy, but I'm always interested in taking a peek at seeing what's popular in IDPA... both for similarities and for differences.
 
I agree with ATLDave not many are using molly coated anymore that survey result is referring to the new polymer coating that are being used on bullets.

There is also not may guys shooting IDPA with 10mm, 40 S&W to some small degree but only a few running 10mm, it is not needed by the rules and just increases costs over other calibers.

Despite that being the National Match I would bet that 75% or more of those shooters are not sponsored "professionals" but just regular competitors with "real" jobs.

The guns/brands they use are being used because they win with them. That may or may not mean they are good self-defense weapons but it means they run and run reliability. If there is one thing about practical pistol sports like IDPA is that if you don't show up with equipment that runs the scoring system will brutalize you.

Titegroup hits two things competitive shooter want. First its dirt cheap and it only take a little bit to make power factor saving even more money. Second since it uses less weight of powder to make power factor it recoils less*.

-rambling

*See several recent thread on recoil for more arguments on that point. :D
 
I agree with ATLDave not many are using molly coated anymore that survey result is referring to the new polymer coating that are being used on bullets.

In 5+ years of shooting USPSA matches every single week, I have never seen a single shooter using moly-coated bullets. It's just not a thing!

Agree with the rest, except I would be shocked if the percentage of non-sponsored shooters were anything close to as low as 75%. Of course, then that gets into a whole discussion about what being a "sponsored" shooter means.
 
In 5+ years of shooting USPSA matches every single week, I have never seen a single shooter using moly-coated bullets. It's just not a thing!

Agree with the rest, except I would be shocked if the percentage of non-sponsored shooters were anything close to as low as 75%. Of course, then that gets into a whole discussion about what being a "sponsored" shooter means.

I tried Sierra moly-coated 158gr RN lead in my Model 10 for IDPA. I got a killer deal on them but I would have been better off skipping them it was a mess. After a typical ~80 rd IDPA club match me and the Lewis lead remove would have to go to work. I never did get that bullet to not lead the barrel. I was over crimping the first batch and after 80rd I had no rifling for the first 1.5 inch of the barrel. It was bad. Less crimp reduced but never eliminated the leading issues. I have since started using the same bullet (IBEJIHeads 160gr RN) I use for USPSA for IDPA though my local club quit hosting IPDA this year unfortunately. The most recent rule change had made is almost fun and then they stopped...

I was being conservative on my "sponsered" shooter number to not offend... ;)
 
One issue that I always had with competitive shooting of any kind is the "sponsored" shooters."

Even in Bullseye, which I shot for years it was an issue.

One guy might be an insurance salesman. Let's say he earns $125,000 per year. He pays his house note, car note and supports his wife and kids on that BEFORE buying guns, ammo, components etc.

The guy beside him is "sponsored" by Smith & Wesson and Hornady. He gets paid the same $125,000 per year just to shoot, and all ammo, guns, registration fees, etc are paid by the sponsor.

That seems like quite an advantage to me.
 
That's not really much of an issue these days. The "sponsorships" aren't anything like that with the exception of just a handful of guys... and even they usually have "day jobs" at the sponsoring companies. People being paid a salary to go compete... there's just not that much of it. There are other levels of support than a $125k/year shoot-for-pay deal, but if that's what you're worried about... quit worrying.

Note: The winners of each of the divisions at the USPSA nationals does not have the kind of deal you described, unless maybe Max Michelle (who won in Carry Optics) could be considered to have that deal with Sig. Most of the "professional shooters" these days are really professional trainers/teachers. Their competition success sells class slots at high prices, but the classes are what pay the bills for most of what are "professional shooters."
 
It's the way all hobby-sports are in the US.

I could see banning pro's from SSP and Production pistol classes though. If pro's are mandated to use a stock pistol sometimes, do it in ESP or Limited.
 
One issue that I always had with competitive shooting of any kind is the "sponsored" shooters."

Even in Bullseye, which I shot for years it was an issue.

One guy might be an insurance salesman. Let's say he earns $125,000 per year. He pays his house note, car note and supports his wife and kids on that BEFORE buying guns, ammo, components etc.

The guy beside him is "sponsored" by Smith & Wesson and Hornady. He gets paid the same $125,000 per year just to shoot, and all ammo, guns, registration fees, etc are paid by the sponsor.

That seems like quite an advantage to me.

I guess I never let that bother me. I was there to have fun and had fun. Seeing the "professional" shooters was almost as entertaining as shooting myself and I tried to learn what I could from watching and if opportunity allowed talking to them. I RO'ed a couple big USPSA Area matches in the past and that was always a learning experience watching the huge variety of shooters (good to bad) and how they solved the stage.
 
I could see banning pro's from SSP and Production pistol classes though. If pro's are mandated to use a stock pistol sometimes, do it in ESP or Limited.

I can't speak to IDPA, but that would make zero sense in USPSA. Production =/= stock.

And the sponsors would hate it. Production is the most "competitive" division for a lot of the more common retail brands and gun types... the makers do want "famous" shooters to be shooting their stuff. There is some perceived marketing value in it. Most makers don't make anything that is truly well-suited to open or even limited - not anything they sell a lot of, anyway. Your proposal would be like banning pros from stock car racing in the 1970's, when there was at least some superficial resemblance between the race cars and retail cars.

Production is not a "beginner" division in USPSA. It's harder than most of the other divisions.
 
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On the other stuff... got a link to the survey? Or is it an IDPA member-only thing.

It's in their Winter 2018 Tactical Journal. I checked on their new website and don't see even past issues on-line.

Couple of points.

> "Molly" was their spelling. Maybe I should have indicated "(sp)".

> I referred to those competitors as "pro" which in my mind meant serious not casual, like myself. Regardless of the #s, my point is these are people, most of which have more experience, knowledge and guidance then myself. (>50% were Expert or higher) Their choices bear consideration. NOT BLIND COPY, but consideration.

> The survey had two questions about make/model of the gun. What make/models they used for competition and what make/model they used for concealed carry. It was the absence of Ruger and Taurus in the Concealed Carry list that I found interesting. (The list only contained the top 90% of responses.)
 
> "Molly" was their spelling. Maybe I should have indicated "(sp)".

No, it's not a spelling issue. There's no way that a plurality of shooters in a practical pistol shooting game are shooting molybdenum-coated bullets. If someone read the survey results and thought that's what they said, they were wrong or the survey was poorly worded. Moly/molly coating is coating with a powdered mineral. Nobody is using that stuff in pistol rounds in games in 2018. Lots of people are, however, using plastic-coated bullets from places like The Blue Bullets or SNS Casting. In fact, that stuff has gotten so popular that now Federal is loading complete ammo with it. It is totally different than moly coating. I'll eat my hat if half the IDPA competitors are using moly-coated bullets. There's just absolutely no way. Just like if someone wrote up the survey results and claimed that Minie balls or tracer rounds were really popular among the competitors - just no way that's correct.

I'm sure you are correct that the majority of people who show up for a national championship in anything, including IDPA, are probably people who are pretty serious about it. And I agree that makes survey results interesting. I'm with you 100% on that.

On the concealed carry front, if someone is going to spend hundreds of hours a year pulling the trigger on a gun of some general format, it absolutely makes sense for them to use a pretty similar format for CC if they can.
 
Personally, I'd rather see where I stand with the pro shooters. I don't think it's a problem yet. You can get all the gear they use. Same ammo. Heck they'll even let you borrow their own pistol.

They just have more time to train. The silly spandex sponsor jerseys, and yoga pants, are a bit hilarious though. Kinda glad that I don't have to wear those.
 
People generally have as much time to train as they make. If you're willing to make less money and neglect your family, you, too, can spend 20-40 hours on the range every week. A lot of people who go far in the hobby-sports make facially-unreasonable sacrifices in terms of time (and money) in order to get good and pursue their passion. They give up a lot to do what they do.

Don't underestimate the cost of greatness. Greatness often comes at a terrible personal cost. That's part of why so few are truly great at anything.

To be perfectly clear, I don't make those kinds of sacrifices, because they aren't consistent with the kind of professional and personal life that are important to me. Shooting is important to me, but not more important than my profession or family. So I practice some, but not anything approaching what the really, really serious people do. I'm not willing to pay the cost of greatness in any of my chosen hobbies, and so I am not great at any of them. I'm proficient enough to have fun and to be better than average. That's about what my level of effort buys. I don't begrudge those who choose to "pay" more effort and get more result.
 
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To be perfectly clear, I don't make those kinds of sacrifices, because they aren't consistent with the kind of professional and personal life that are important to me. Shooting is important to me, but not more important than my profession or family. So I practice some, but not anything approaching what the really, really serious people do. I'm not willing to pay the cost of greatness in any of my chosen hobbies, and so I am not great at any of them. I'm proficient enough to have fun and to be better than average. That's about what my level of effort buys. I don't begrudge those who choose to "pay" more effort and get more result.

In a way I have to admire those at the top. They are consistent year after year in their practice, in particular dry fire. Most of us have other priorities in life as you mention. We can still do well but we must put in the time. Personally I find dry fire to be boring but try to do it often. Now that my kids are grown, my mortgage is paid and my wife is happy to get rid of me for the day I do have time to practice but I will never be as fast as the kids these days.

I'm at the point now in my chosen cof that I'm doing respectable, not killing it, not winning major matches, but having fun. I hope I haven't peeked yet but from watching others progress over the last few years I've noticed once you start resting on your laurels you start getting beat by guys you dismissed not too long ago. I think 30 minutes a day doing proper dry fire and once a week live fire with drills and stages under match conditions will in many cases get the budding shooter moving in the right direction. Like you Dave having fun for me means doing well, respectable, better than average.
 
I can admire the accomplishments of those at the top (of the shooting sports) while also feeling that I would not trade lives with most (or any, probably) of them. Not because I wouldn't want to shoot as much as they do, but because I wouldn't want to forgo as much as they do/did in order to shoot that much.
 
Absolutely. As I am tonight.

But that's not the same as the level of time that Ben Stoeger or JJ Racaza or Bob Vogel are putting in. Nor equal to what they were putting in long before they got "famous."
 
Well, back to the Survey...

I'm out of 9mm bullets so I'm going to give The Blue Bullet a try.
 
There's no way that a plurality of shooters in a practical pistol shooting game are shooting molybdenum-coated bullets.
You're correct. The survey didn't have an option for poly/powder coated bullets

...not the same as the level of time that Ben Stoeger or JJ Racaza or Bob Vogel are putting in.
Ben is always running around holding training classes. JJ and Vogel had real full time jobs...but they might be training more now

The only real sponsored shooters that I know are the ones who shoot for USAMU and Glock
 
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I wouldn’t put much into the survey, I made stuff up at times on them. Besides they don’t put placement on them.

Who cares if 90% shoot coated bullets pushed by titegroup, if none of them finish in the top 10%.

It would be much more interesting to have the survey information beside everyone in finishing order.
 
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