Go Fund Me page to help with cost of a Benchrest Promotional video

Mike Bryant

Active member
A good friend of mine, Sheldon Charron, has established a Go Fund Me page to help raise the funds necessary to make a professional video promoting the sport of Benchrest competition. Right now he's trying to raise the funds to be able to make it to the NBRSA Nationals in Phoenix, not as a shooter, but to interview some of the great shooters of the sport who will be there for his documentary. A lot of these shooters are getting up in age and who knows whether they or any one of us will be around in the future. As most of you know who shoot competitively that benchrest competition has always been a very small sport, number wise, as it is a very detail oriented sport and draws people who are pretty meticulous and very competitive. A lot of us got started in benchrest competition as a natural growth into the sport from trying to improve the accuracy of our prairie dog or groundhog varmint rifles and found the accuracy we strove for in benchrest competition. Unfortunately, we have been losing competitors over the years mainly from the affects of an aging benchrest population with few new shooters coming it to take the place of those who have quit shooting because of age or who have passed away. This documentary will be a good way to promote the sport and help get new shooters into the sport.

https://www.gofundme.com/f/benchrest-documentary
 
Mike, I know Sheldon as well and can support this go fund me request.

Here is what I wrote on our forum:

Shooters,

We all know BR is perhaps one of the greatest shooting sports ever created, and that everyone thinks they know about, but few understand the game outside of the current competitors. Sheldon has been active in the shooting sports for years and is also active in the film making world. Sheldon wants to get the word out about our game, having recently participated in a few shoots, he sees that there is a great story to be told, but it is not getting out to the world.

He has asked for our support in this project, in whatever amount you can spare to get this project off the ground. Check out the go fund me link:

https://www.gofundme.com/f/benchrest-documentary

I will be contributing, and I encourage everyone to contribute in a corporate, club or sanctioning body capacity. The future of the sport could use some assistance and this is but one way to get the word out.

Thanks for considering this.

Rick

A good friend of mine, Sheldon Charron, has established a Go Fund Me page to help raise the funds necessary to make a professional video promoting the sport of Benchrest competition. Right now he's trying to raise the funds to be able to make it to the NBRSA Nationals in Phoenix, not as a shooter, but to interview some of the great shooters of the sport who will be there for his documentary. A lot of these shooters are getting up in age and who knows whether they or any one of us will be around in the future. As most of you know who shoot competitively that benchrest competition has always been a very small sport, number wise, as it is a very detail oriented sport and draws people who are pretty meticulous and very competitive. A lot of us got started in benchrest competition as a natural growth into the sport from trying to improve the accuracy of our prairie dog or groundhog varmint rifles and found the accuracy we strove for in benchrest competition. Unfortunately, we have been losing competitors over the years mainly from the affects of an aging benchrest population with few new shooters coming it to take the place of those who have quit shooting because of age or who have passed away. This documentary will be a good way to promote the sport and help get new shooters into the sport.

https://www.gofundme.com/f/benchrest-documentary
 
I sometimes think we are our own worst enemy.

This past Sunday, I was at Tomball trying different combo’s, getting ready for the Nationals. The local 4H club was shooting their Rim Fires, and several came over to watch me shoot my Rail Gun and LV.

I showed the young men how I loaded the 6PPC, even let one young man shoot a 5 shot group with the Rail, showing him how to concentrate on the flags. He was amazed.

But then, they looked at all of the loading equipment, the flags, the bench equipment, and truck full of “stuff” I hauled around, and you could sense the air of “good Lord, all of that just to shoot”.

It’s a far cry from taking your 22 out of the closet, stopping at Academy for some shells, and head to the range.

I should have encouraged them by saying “it’s not as difficult as it looks”......but it is.
 
I try to promote BR

every chance I get. This sounds great!! I added a little to the pot and hope others will to!

I really enjoy spending one on one time with new shooters and showing them what it takes to compete in this sport.

Richard Brensing
 
I agree with Jackie's

First sentence. Then it carried on with more of what he wrote.

BR is very intimidating to the novice. I have been doing this game for 11 years and I still feel like a novice.

I remember being at the range loading off of the back of my tailgate and hearing someone say to me, "you guys are way to anal". I think this is why the other shooting sports are taking off. F-Class, 3 gun, PRS....those are growing in leaps and bounds. You even see regional matches that have great prizes. The support is there from the businesses for these events.

A documentary may help in educating the uneducated.

Calvin
 
Very UNFORTUNATE

I just received notice of refund for my donation.

Sheldon, if things turn around I will ne there to support.

Calvin
 
It was too last moment to raise the money to allow Sheldon to go to the Nationals to do the video. The Go Fund Me pages are pretty specific in that the money has to go to exactly what was spelled out in the fund raiser. He had to refund the money by a certain date before the money was transferred to his account or he would have had to paid Go Fund Me something like 3% if he had gone past that date. He chose to refund it when donations seemed to stall rather than go past their refund date. I think it was a really good idea and I hope he is able to pursue it at the Cactus next year and have more time to raise the money to do it. He may be moving to Vancouver as it is prohibitively expensive to live in Los Angeles where he is now.

Jackie, you forget that when you started shooting benchrest, that you didn't have that truck load of equipment with you when you first got into the sport. We all started out with a lot less stuff. Joe Archer and my father in law would load up in whatever vehicle I had at the time and all three of us had our equipment and guns in it. Pared down to the minimum needed to shoot the match. I'm sure all of us bring way too much stuff to matches now days. I have yet, to see a Southbend lathe in the back of a trailer, but it wouldn't surprise me one of these days to see one set up in a loading trailer. I remember a match at Luther years ago where Ron Prachyl showed up in a Corvette with his girl friend to shoot the Okie Shooters match. It doesn't take much equipment to shoot a one day match. I carry a two pound jug of 133 to most matches instead of carrying a 8 pound jug. I had just a little bit of 133 left out of that 2 pound jug when the Nationals was over. It lasted through all of the varmint classes. I shot LT31 in the UL and switched to 133 for the last group in the UL 200. I think I could have been shooting Retumbo in the 200 and it probably wouldn't have made any difference. Definitely the worst conditions I had ever seen for any UL 200 yard Nationals and my agg showed it as well as most others except for Paul Mitchell.
 
He may be moving to Vancouver.....


You tell the boy.... "no poop on the streets in Vancouver!"

And if he DOES choose to roost in The 'Couve, you tell him to contact me, I might just invite him up to Redneck Heaven where he can shoot and record stuff to his heart's content 24/7 in total privacy. No traffic noise, nothing but the hoot owls and coyote's to pollute the video

peep peep
 
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