Recently I had the opportunity to compete in the Pennsylvania Governor’s Twenty shooting match up at Fort Indiantown Gap, near Harrisburg, PA. Open to currently serving Army National Guard and Air Guard personnel within the state, units send their best shooters to the competition in order to determine the best twenty shooters in the state. The top twenty shooters in the competition are awarded a Governor’s Twenty tab that they can wear on both duty and dress uniforms. In addition to the tab, shooters also have the opportunity to score leg points towards their respective Expert In Competition (EIC) badge totals. Overall, it was a fun, albeit long, day and I definitely learned a lot. In this article, I’ll break down how the match went and some lessons learned that may help any future first time competitors.
Zero Day
The match events officially started on Friday with a 30 round, 25-yard rifle zero. No help was offered as match officials expect you to know what you’re doing at this stage. I zeroed my 4×32 ACOG using the tip of the red line for 25-yards. Normally, this would be perfectly adequate for a regular rifle qualification, but in my opinion it wasn’t precise enough for 400-yard shooting on points-based targets. In the future, I recommend getting a solid 100-yard zero on the ACOG prior to competing. This will probably have to be done at a range with your unit, but it will be well worth it.
Match Day
Saturday was match day and started with a 0630 weapons draw followed by a basic marksmanship instruction class. Then we moved to the range and split into groups, half going to shoot pistol first and the other shooting rifle. I was in the rifle group which was further broken down into those shooting first and those who would be working the pits (who knew the Army had pits?). I got pits first.
The rifle course of fire was broken down into a 5 round zero confirmation at 400 yards followed by the rifle EIC event, as follows:
Some lessons learned: You’ll definitely want to use either a 4×32 ACOG or 1x/4x Elcan Specter. The match is limited to equipment issued to your unit, and the ACOG or Specter offers the best capability to make hits at range. I was sorely lacking in experience shooting “unsupported” with my magazine on the ground. While a cardinal sin in the Marines, the range NCOIC made it clear that this was the best technique for making hits out to 400. I guess there’s a first time for everything. Unfortunately, being unaccustomed to shooting that close to the ground coupled with trying to get proper eye relief on the ACOG resulted in me getting a pretty good scope bite (a day of firsts!). In the future, I plan to mitigate this by limiting gear worn on the chest, thus allowing you to get closer to the ground. Wind calls were also key. The wind was blowing approximately 12mph NW to SE with stronger gusts west to east. While working the pits, it was very obvious who was making wind calls and who wasn’t. I was able to use the grass down range as well as the trees swaying on either side of the target to adequately make wind calls.
Overall, I scored 111 out of 250 possible points on rifle; not great, not horrible. I made some very small, very basic mistakes that ended up biting me later.
Moving over to the pistol range, we split into new groups and began shooting. Like on rifle, we shot a five round zero confirmation before getting into the pistol EIC event, as follows:
I’ve never received professional pistol instruction and was worried about being able to perform adequately. As such, I picked up a Sig M17 and put 500 rounds through it in preparation for the match.
Some lessons learned: First of all, if you disassemble and reassemble a Sig M17, it won’t seat a magazine until you lock the slide in the rearward position. This led to a bit of an awkward moment on the firing line where I couldn’t get the mag in and was like wtf! They were ready to give me another pistol but thankfully that wasn’t necessary. The prone position was tough for some people, particularly those with a bit more fluff around the midsection. I had never practiced prone shooting with a pistol but ended up having no issues. The alternate prone position demonstrated was one where you kind of lay on your side and rest your head on your arm. Your mileage may vary, but that one looked awful. If you think this might be an issue, I’d recommend doing some practice at home. I was primarily worried about making hits out to 30-yards; my local range only goes out to 20-yards. Turns out, this was no big deal. If you can make good hits at 20, you can do it at 30. Finally, I had trained mostly for slow fire and this was where I excelled. Getting closer may seem easier, but you have less time. Particularly with magazine changes included, I rushed some shots and my score reflected.
Turns out, practice makes perfect, and my results were much better versus rifle. I scored 133 points on pistol out of a possible 200.
Some more general recommendations: Issued pistol pouches suck. You can “cheat” and have the mags only half seated in the pouch for easier retrieval, but the pouches were so tight I was still getting mags stuck and had to be careful not to strip a round off as I drew them. In the future, I’ll invest in some good kydex pistol mag pouches so this hopefully won’t be an issue. Practice not just for accuracy, but for time. On both rifle and pistol, the closer you get, the less time you have. I was fine on pistol, but had two saved rounds on rifle that really hurt me later. Time goes by fast! Finally, as with any range day, don’t forget your pogey-bait and sunscreen!
Results
My final score was 244 points overall (111 on rifle, 133 on pistol). I had heard talk throughout the day that 250 points was generally considered competitive, and I was just shy of that. In the end, I tied for 20th place (and a tab) at 244. The tie breaker was based on who had more X-zone hits. I had two, the other shooter had five. Had I put at least one more point on the board with one of those two saved rounds, I would have pulled ahead. As it was, I came in 21st place out of 110 shooters, a tough end to a long day.
Overall, practice makes perfect. I’ve always been confident with a rifle, and less so on pistol. Where I focused my pre-match training showed clearly in my results on match day. Food for thought: If I’d shot a rifle score similar to my pistol score, I would have been near the top 10. Nevertheless, it was still a great experience! I learned a lot and I’ll definitely be coming back in the future. Congrats to the 2025 Pennsylvania Governor’s Twenty and especially to the eight new tab winners!
Gearset | Skillset 