Thoughts about the Future of IDPA
By
Gary W. Burris

It was my honor to work the 2004 IDPA National Championship match again this year as a safety officer. And it struck me that the IDPA is becoming top heavy. The chart below shows the classification distribution within the different divisions of this year’s National competition:

There were 33 Industry, 4 Press, 20 Ladies, 38 Law Enforcement, 82 Senior, 10 Veterans, 7 Junior, 7 Military and 14 International shooters.

Several things come to mind after reviewing this data.

One of every five shooters is a Master. One half of all shooters are an Expert of above. Shooters continue to improve and move up in classification. In my opinion, this is why we have so many top-level shooters with nowhere to go. Many have changed divisions in order to work their way up again. Eventually they will all become four gun masters. Where do they go from there? Will those shooters who have attained Master look for another shooting venue to challenge their skills? Do we create a classification above Master to keep them involved in IDPA?

10% of the shooters were representatives from Industry. It seems to me that Industry and Sponsored shooters usually dominate at our National Championship. I’m not saying this is a bad thing. But it is something we need to think about and decide if changes need to be made in order to give the professional shooter room to advance.

The IDPA needs to continue to grow. I’m wondering if adding more divisions would offer opportunities to new shooters? Say we add a new SSR division that is speed loader only and change the existing SSR to moon clip only. Or, consider a Safe Action division. Another might be a high capacity magazine division. What about pumping life into the Back Up Gun division?

My intention is to provoke some thought about where the IDPA is heading and what we might do to help grow the sport. It may be that we don’t need to do anything and just keep the status quo.

My Opinion
by
Gary W. Burris

I think and most would agree that the IDPA is starting to smell pretty gamey and we need to do something to reign this in before it gets completely out of hand.

Here are some of the things I noticed at this year’s IDPA National Championship match that really bug me.

Most courses of fire require that the shooter start standing with his hands naturally at his side. From what I have observed, many shooters have some gorilla in their ancestry. I’ve seen shooters with their shoulders hunched forward and their hands in front like a gorilla. Some curl their fingers under the hem of their concealment. Many assume a fighting stance with feet spaced greater than shoulder width apart. None of this seems “natural” to me and I’d like to see a lot less of it in our sport. Perhaps a few Failure-to-do-Right penalties would help to curtail this activity.

I saw a lot of “gun slingers” at this match. Their gun was in a low-slung holster or their pants were low on the hips. The grip was canted outward and I wonder if they carried their gun in this configuration on the street. I doubt that it could be considered concealed and would be a violation of concealed carry laws in states that have such laws.

I know there are plans to adopt new holster and magazine carrier rules that will be something that is measurable vs. a list of approved designs. Perhaps this will eliminate the “gun slinger” from competition.

I listened to the questions that a lot of shooters asked and wondered to myself if they had ever read the rulebook. It seemed to my mind that they were seeking ways to circumnavigate the rules to gain a tactical advantage. I encourage shooters to ask for clarification of the course of fire description. But what part of reload behind cover if cover is available don’t they understand? Is tactical order that difficult a concept to comprehend?

I don’t expect to see any major changes to the 27 rules we currently have when the new rulebook is published. You’ll probably see some clarification to these rules. I do expect that we will be required to enforce the rules a little more stringently. I’m only guessing because I don’t have any insider information.

Weapons and Airline Travel
by
John Igoe

I travel almost weekly on a commercial airliner in the United States for my job as a regional sales manager. I carry the standard equipment that all who sell in the world carry such as; laptop computer, cellular phone and charger for all, etc. This is never a problem if you follow the standard procedure of taking the computer out and putting it in the plastic tub, taking your keys and cell phone out of your pockets and taking your shoes off (now a requirement).

During September 2004 I traveled to Atlanta from Houston and returned four days later but this time it was different. It was the first time that I traveled with my hand gun. I was going to have some time to go to a range with my son-in-law and wanted him to shoot my favorite hand gun.

I had read all of the chat room posts, read numerous airline regulation pages about hand gun rules and regulations but I was still nervous. I shoot frequently with my Smith & Wesson 1911 and enjoy shooting the gun very much. The gun did cost me a few coins and I did not want it confiscated for any reason and made it a point to try to have every rule covered.

The airline’s regulations all stated similar although not identical rules. Some said hard sided, lockable cases, others said metal lockable cases, yet others did not say hard sided at all, you get the picture.

I tried to cover all of the regulations by purchasing a $30 (Wal-Mart) hard sided, metal, lockable “fire proof” case. This I felt covered all the bases and then some. The only draw back was that it was somewhat heavy and did not have a means to fasten the lid shut without “locking” it. For a period of weeks before my trip I agonized over using the lockable case or should I come up with a better idea? I envisioned using Velcro to close the lid without locking it; this would not work on this type box. My final solution, I though was ingenious, was to fasten the key onto the handle of the box which provided the solution to all regulations.

I had received some “expert” advice from customers at one gun shop that you were not to “lock” the case which must be located inside your checked luggage. To satisfy this concern on my out bound leg I fastened the lockable, hard sided, metal case locking key to the handle with a stout rubber band. This seemed to be the proper solution until I got to the airport.

I arrived at the check in counter and stated that I “had a firearm to declare in my checked luggage”. These words were like magic. I was asked to complete the automated check in procedure and than for the first time I heard a request that I had never heard before, “Please step down to the end of the counter with your luggage.” The airline agent, as is procedure, required me to remove the box from my luggage to be checked. I had to open the box, with the key fastened to the handle, and it was inspected. She asked, “Is it unloaded?” I replied “yes”. She asked me to sign an airline Firearm Declaration which states in part, “I understand that the carriage of a loaded weapon is a violation of federal regulations. I therefore declare that the firearm contained in my luggage is not loaded and my luggage contains no more that eleven pounds of ammunition per firearm transported. Furthermore, the luggage containing the declared firearm(s) is locked and I alone am in possession of the key or combination.” I signed the Firearm Declaration. Of course this was the first time that I had seen this declaration and did not fully read the entire paragraph; I know that this was a mistake.

You will note that the key that I used to open the box was attached to the handle of the box and the airline agent did not say anything about this. After I signed the Firearm Declaration, the document was placed inside of the box and the box was locked with the key attached to the handle. Nothing was said about the key. I was than directed to follow the agent with the checked luggage, which contained the locked box to the security officer at the checked luggage X-ray machine. The bag was X-rayed and the agent asked me if the box was locked. I stated that it was and he stated OK. I did tell him that the key was fastened to the handle of the box. He did not say anything. I took the flight to Atlanta, we arrived, my luggage arrived and my locked box was inside. All was good.

On the return trip I was to follow the same procedure or so I thought. All was fine until I submitted my bag on the return trip to the X-ray agent. After airline check in, I placed my bag with all of the others to be X-rayed and stated to the agent that I had a “Declared Firearm” inside the luggage. He placed my luggage ahead of a dozen pieces of people’s waiting luggage to be X-rayed. Then when my bag came up on the X-ray monitor all of the agents crowded around the monitor to see what it looked like. All of the passengers including myself could see the monitor although I was the only one that knew what to look for.

I then did something that I will not repeat. In answer to a question by one of the waiting passengers I replied that there was a hand gun in my luggage. I couldn’t believe her reaction. Her mouth opened so wide I thought that she was going to scream. Luckily she didn’t. She hustled her kids away from the area so quickly I couldn’t believe it. If she had screamed I may still have been at the airport.

The agent, who was unaware of this exchange, calmly asked me for the key to the locked box to do a hand inspection after the X-ray. No, I did not have the key fastened to the handle this time. He unlocked the box, inspected the empty magazines, looked at the disassembled weapon and looked under the padding that I had at the bottom of the box. He relocked the box and handed me back the key. His only comment to me was that, “it was a good box for this purpose.”

I arrived back in Houston, my luggage also arrived and it contained my locked fire arm box. The learning experience of this exercise is to follow the rules and keep your mouth shut.

John Igoe

IDPA member number A16200
Certified Range Safety Officer
Classified SSP sharpshooter
Classified CDP sharpshooter