...I've seen videos from the old days. "Practical" shooting was never "practical". And any attempts at making it more relevant (IDPA) just get more ridiculous�..
"Practical" was a word that was debated intensely at the beginning as most clubs previously called it "combat" shooting (SWCPL, OCPL, etc.) and the word "combat" was considered too provocative in the post Viet Nam era. If you consider "practical" as a black and white absolute (measurable) standard, you're probably correct. If however you consider that in 1976 the ONLY other forms of organized pistol shooting were PPC, Bulleye and Metalic Silhouette shooting, IPSC was extremely "practical." Cooper sent out regular letters to the section coordinators urging us to design courses around actual shooting events; however, at the major events, they had to increase the round count and add more athletic elements simply to extend the standard deviation and better identify the best performer. In the early days, on a local basis, we frequently ran "The Saint Valentine Days Massacre," "The Sgt. York shoot," etc. A lot of them were based on actual events. "Practical"???? Maybe not, but certainly more so than any other event available at the time.
Competitive shooting is a sport, nothing more or less. As soon as you test skills against a timer and publish a ranking after the match, all practicality goes out the window because people want to win. It's the nature of the beast. If it's gonna be practical, there needs to be no timers and no rankings and no divisions�.
Maybe we're splitting vernacular hairs here, but I couldn't disagree with you more. In fact, IMO the MOST practical element to "practical" shooting is the timer (aside from man-on-man events). The timer adds artificial stress to shooting; in fact, a number of combat vets have mentioned that they felt more stress when the timer "beeped" than they did in actual combat. Obviously not all, but enough to be statistically significant. Granted, since the targets don't shoot back, the entire experience is artificial to some degree; however, man-on-man events bring an element of "practicality" that even supersedes simunition training at creating stress. Cooper was a huge fan of man-on-man. Obviously starting with the Big Bear Leatherslaps--the early events always ended with the top shooters competing in the man-on-man. In fact, Coopers idea was that all of the courses in the match were designed for the sole purpose of determining the top shooters that would enter the shoot off and then the Champion would be determined SOLEY by the shoot off. If you've ever gone to Gunsite, EVERY class has a man-on-man shoot off---some have one every day---purpose: to add an element of stress (practicality) to shooting.
Sorry for the bloviation
-- end of soapbox.
JMO---of course, I could be wrong.
