The Fun Fac­tor in Cow­boy Action Shoot­ing Events

A Short Intro­duc­tion to Cow­boy Action Shoot­ing Matches

Cow­boy Action Shoot­ing com­pe­ti­tions are divided into dif­fer­ent shoot­ing areas or stages with var­i­ous west­ern action sce­nar­ios that range from sim­ple scripts to com­pli­cated shoot­ing rou­tines. Some local CAS clubs that are just start­ing out have tar­gets but not too many bells and whis­tles. How­ever, shoots have been excit­ing and has elicited a lot of interest.

Well-established cow­boy shoot­ing groups that spon­sor an event spend much time, money and imag­i­na­tion to put all the props and sets in place. These include facades of saloons, banks, and sta­bles, stage­coaches, and even mock-up horses that “move.” Orga­niz­ing these type of events keep things enter­tain­ing for spec­ta­tors as well as the participants.

The Main Match Guns in Cow­boy Action Shoot­ing Competitions

The firearms used in CAS matches are restricted to orig­i­nals or their repli­cas, of the type that were around before 1900. Revolvers must be single-action mod­els. Rifles can be either of the lever-action or the slide-action type, but both should be in pis­tol cal­ibers and have exposed hammers.

Shot­guns can either be dou­ble bar­reled with exter­nal ham­mers or slide action with a ham­mer of the kinds man­u­fac­tured dur­ing the 19th cen­tury. Shot­guns should be 10-gauge or smaller, with bar­rels not shorter than 18 inches. Hand­gun and rifle ammo are restricted to lead bul­lets with medium veloc­i­ties. Only low brass lead shots loaded with #4 buck­shot or smaller are allowed.

Expe­ri­ence the Spirit of the Game

The main match gen­er­ally con­sists of four to eight stages, depend­ing on the num­ber of par­tic­i­pants, in which they will shoot at steel tar­gets. Their speed and accu­racy will deter­mine their final score. Con­tes­tants are timed on each sce­nario and misses are counted against them. Each miss is equiv­a­lent to a five-second penalty.

As a begin­ner, don’t feel bad if you’ve gar­nered a lot of misses. Even the pros can actu­ally miss even close tar­gets at times. Just bear in mind that it’s alright for you to miss a tar­get, so long as you don’t look bad while you do it.

The fun part of the event is that par­tic­i­pants are required to adopt a cow­boy name or alias and to dress up in Old West-style apparel. Some asso­ci­a­tions are more exact in this aspect than oth­ers, par­tic­u­larly on the National level. Local groups gen­er­ally encour­age their mem­bers to dress in west­ern cloth­ing, but if you’re just start­ing in the sport, jeans, boots and a cow­boy hat will do for a while.

Many peo­ple find Cow­boy Action Shoot­ing as the type of shoot­ing sport that allows you to have fun, min­gle with folks that share your inter­est, and really enjoy your­self. The sport is not lim­ited to adult males, but is family-friendly, which means ladies and chil­dren can join as well.

Get­ting Involved in the Sport

This type of sport has a lot of women shoot­ers com­pet­ing in matches. Women who pre­vi­ously were uncom­fort­able with firearms end up seri­ously immersed in the cow­boy shoot­ing arena. Much of the womenfolk’s involve­ment in the sport has to be cred­ited to the con­ge­nial atti­tude of most of the shoot­ers in the event. Add to that the fun fac­tor of  “play­ing” cow­boy or cowgirl.

There are cer­tain shoot­ing cat­e­gories where women and kids can par­tic­i­pate. Most CAS groups have cat­e­gories in mod­ern, tra­di­tional, duelist, gun­fighter, black pow­der, ladies, seniors, boys, and girls. CAS clubs can be found in every state all over the coun­try. There’s a cat­e­gory for nearly every­one to join. No mat­ter what state you live in, you’ll cer­tainly find a CAS orga­ni­za­tion in your local­ity that will be more than happy to wel­come you.

Bring the equip­ment you have, even if you don’t have all the guns and gears. If you’re just there to look around, come on out and do some shoot­ing any­way. You’ll be pro­vided with guns and ammo. Some groups will even walk you through a shoot­ing sce­nario or two so you’ll dis­cover what the sport is all about and learn how it’s done.

A word of warn­ing though, Cow­boy Action Shoot­ing can be a fun and addic­tive sport.