Stillwaters Run n Gun Recap
Stillwaters Ranch Llano, Tx
9/25-26/2021
The Stillwaters Run n Gun was the 3rd of 4 events in our 2021 series. Both 5k and 10k events sold out, making it the largest event we have held to date.
The Stillwaters Ranch, located in Llano, Tx, offered some great topography for us to use for the event. Open to an off-road club once a month, there were plenty of jeep trails and natural terrain to send competitors over. We look forward to future events here where we can further expand the use of these trails and step up the difficulty of both the shooting and trekking portion of the events.
The weather was beautiful over the weekend, clear skies all day, low winds, and cool mornings. After about noon the temperatures did spike to +90 degrees which added an extra level of difficulty to those competitors who registered for later blocks.
10K Course Profile
5K Course Profile
For the first time, we re-used 3 of the 5 stages from the 10k on the 5k course. We normally try to separate them, but we enjoyed those stages so much we decided to keep them for both days. The 5k course of fire had 36 rifle hits and 35 pistol hits across 3.7-ish miles. The 10k course had 48 rifle hits and 47 pistol hits across 6.2-ish miles. Note that we map the distance on a computer with a terrain mapping program and not directly mapping it on foot using GPS. It is quite entertaining hearing the varying distances that competitors come back with on their personal devices.
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Per our normal operating procedure, competitors were forced to shoot stages blind, giving no competitor an advantage from watching other shooters complete the stage. We incorporated a new aspect into our matches that we called open stages. In an open stage, competitors were allowed to choose their preferred weapon platform to engage the targets (targets within 50 yards were counted toward the pistol count and targets past 50 yards were counted toward the rifle count). It was very interesting to see how competitors approached this as it pertained to their skill sets. Some competitors benefitted from the open stages while others struggled. If you haven’t noticed, our intention is to offer a unique and exciting experience, while also giving competitors an opportunity to learn areas of personal improvement.
We owe a huge thank you to our Range Officers who spent the weekend working both courses. They spent a lot of time running back and forth keeping competitors safe and managing their stages with great success. None of these events could happen without their assistance. If you are interested in becoming a Range Officer reach out to us at contact@oedefense.com or through our website so we can provide you with all the details and perks of volunteering!
We also want to thank our sponsors, and hope you will to, who provide us support and offer our competitors some great gear for our prize tables. We have enjoyed working with each of these companies and look forward to partnering with them throughout this series and beyond.
Series Sponsors
Event Sponsors
Additional Sponsors
Congratulations to our winners Jonathan Foo, Sterling Blocker, Will Vansant, Meghan Hayden, and Stephanie Marshall!
UPCOMING SERIES EVENTS
Details and tickets for our next 2021 series event happening December 11th-12th, the Ranch Run n Gun, are available here. We hope to see you there!