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Comment by is_true | Hacker News Reader

I feel that they have too much extra gear

Have you participated in this sport, or one closely related to it in order to form a basis for such an opinion?

I do shooting competitions from time to time, and I agree that Olympic target shooting has too much strange equipment. Most great shooters don't even bother with it because it's so boring and equipment-specific. Instead they do stuff like USPSA, IPSC, and IDPA. All of those competitions depend more on movement and speed, not slow fire accuracy and special equipment. (Though USPSA does tend to have ridiculous looking guns in its unlimited division.)

With any of the practical shooting competitions, a skilled shooter can be competitive with an unmodified handgun. Also, the skills required have a lot of overlap with real world defensive handgun use. Oh, and it's way more fun.

I did smallbore 3-position (Olympic-style rifle) in high school, and I've shot a handful of USPSA/IPSC matches. I think they're both fun to do, but only the latter is fun to watch. IPSC would be a better Olympic sport than the current precision shooting sports.

I've been pretty deep into competitive fencing (B rating?), which is a pretty gear heavy sport (but mostly around the whole "not dying / going blind" angle). I also have a master classification in bullseye rifle.

Rifle competition has a staggering amount of kit. It's bonkers. Special jacket, pants, underclothes, shoes, blinders, gloves, slings, a rifle that is like a space gun with adjustable weights and pieces all over. Most serious 30 rifle competitors will have three separate stocks to reconfigure the rifle on the fly between positions. Special kneel rolls, special mats, $1000 training cameras. You have this special tripod for holding the rifle between shots, and all your pellets (or cartridges if it's smallbore or high power). If you're not shooting electronic targets, you have a whole separate tripod and sighting scope to see shots & scores.

When I go to the range I'm lugging no joke like 50 pounds of crap.

Bullseye pistol... actually not that much. Special eyewear if your eyes need it. Earplugs. And that's kinda it.

Olympic rifle is some insane gear race bullshit.

But then again, so is internationally competitive bicycle racing. Anything that doesn't have literal $$ caps on gear will end up that way.

Yep. That's why I think it would be better to do it with less equipment.

I'm probably wrong, but I would like to see humans competing not cyborgs.

The only specialized equipment I'm seeing in Olympic pistol shooting is a very fancy pistol, and shooting glasses which may optionally have a blinder and an aperture. Since people are winning Olympic medals with and without specialty glasses, I think it's fair to conclude they're optional.

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