Saraspa Appleseed - April 2010
The April 2010 Appleseed Event at SaraSpa was a special one for a number of reasons. The main reason was that the event dates of April 17th and 18th were the weekend before Patriots' Day. Patriots' Day commemorates the Battles of Lexington and Concord - the first battles of the American Revolution. Another special aspect of the April 2010 Appleseed event was that your humble web-correspondent was an active participant. Therefore, I can assure you the events recounted below, no matter how fantastic, actually happened. I was there - I lived it.
Getting Started
The Appleseed shoot is held on the 50 yard range at SaraSpa - which, by itself is no big deal. Unfortunately, the 50 yard range is under construction AND we had some significant rainfall in the days prior to the event. Bottom-line, the planned firing line was under water! Luckily our builder Mark Pepper had his tractor on site and SaraSpa member Bob Rutland hopped in that baby, cleaned up the firing line, and saved the weekend! Great job Bob and Mark!
The Instructor Team
We had four instructors at the event. They were (from left-to-right) Shoot Boss Alan Tremblay, Ryan Kramer, Mark Dupper, and Mark Rosenzweig. They were all very competent instructors and we were lucky to have them. Since we had two instructors named Mark - we need to distinguish between them for narrative purposes. Lets call Mark Dupper "Mark" and Mark Rosenzweig "Crazy Mark". As you read on I think the reasons behind this naming convention will become obvious.
Acknowledgements
- I would like to thank Appleseed participant Michele for providing access to the many photos she took at the event. You can tell which photos are Michele's - they are in focus and well composed. Many of the photos below are repeats of those shown in the Appleseed Forum After Action Reports - but hey, a good picture is worth showing twice.
- SaraSpa's own Dave McBurnie also provided pictures - thanks Dave!
- A special thank you to Mark Rosenzweig's daughter Valerie. She ran the kitchen on both days and provided some great food under tough conditions. We had chili on Day 1 and kielbasa on Day 2.
The Basics
If I had to pick one word to sum up the Appleseed event, it would be SAFETY. Safety was the first topic we discussed and it was stressed constantly during all of our activities. There was a wide range of experience level between the participants - and the whole event went off without a hitch.
| Two participants pose with the welcome banner. | Shoot Boss Alan started things off by making sure everyone understood the safety rules |
| Crazy Mark takes us through the 6 steps of "Firing the Shot" | Crazy Mark highlights key points on Mark's "hasty" sling pose |
Getting Down to Business
| It may appear to be simply a table under a tent, but this is the control center for the whole operation. | The legendary M1 Garand... |
| Waiting for the order to fire... | Inspecting our handiwork - everyone made sure they were sighted-in |
| Firing an Army Qualification Test (AQT). Shooters transition between prone, sitting/kneeling, and standing. | View from the other end of the line |
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