10-8 Performance

A very challenging 9 stage local @theuspsa match at @Volusiagunclub this weekend, with 110 degree heat index. The match design and weather conspired to make it an exceedingly difficult day for everyone. I was pleased to have made excellent progress on personal goals of collecting over 90% of points per stage and improving execution of complex stage plans. Resale value on this car definitely went down. @kimberamerica 2K11 @trijicon SRO @oakleystandardissue Meta Vanguard @supervel 124gr  @eric.howitzerclothing @howitzerclothing Delta sun hoodie @limcatcustom ambi

I'll be picking up my new @staccato2011 P4X today at @shootgtr (if you're need a Staccato near Gainesville FL hit them up). If you like the original steel frame HD P4, this combines the full length grip and steel frame of the P4 with the compensated top end from the C4X to yield the same overall 4" barrel length. Updates will be on my Patreon, link in bio.

#fortyfivefriday brings us a little fun side project I threw together a few years ago, a loose tribute to the feature pistol from one of my very favorite movies of all time. Who remembers this build and the movie inspiration?

I think I'll be shooting my next club match from AIWB with this @TXCHolsters CVRT GO, but haven't quite decided what will be riding in it. This @kimberamerica 2K11 Comp (not comped...ported) with @trijicon SRO absolutely crushes, but we'll need to see which test gun needs the range time the most.

Well this isn't the new @staccato2011 P4X, but this is my C4X from earlier this year. It is due to get some more range time next week. My initial review of it is up on my Patreon. Link in BIO.

This pair of @staccato2011 HD P4's served me very well for the 2025 USPSA season, with the training gun on left having logged 19801 rounds, and the match gun at 5049 rounds. While the HD is designed as a service pistol, it obviously functions extremely well for any performance shooting. Both have been exceptionally reliable and durable, setting a high bar. The training gun got a new recoil spring assembly at 10k, and that's about all that either have had done for maintenance other than cleaning.

Hope everyone made it through America's glorious 250th birthday with all digits, hair and eyebrows intact! Time to caffeinate and attack the week!

Happy 250th Birthday America! I hope that everyone has a fantastic day celebrating our amazing country! For your patriotic enjoyment, here's America's pistol!

This flashback seemed appropriate as we head into the weekend to celebrate America’s 250th birthday. The office will be closed today in observance of the holiday. Have a great weekend everyone!

Let's discuss taping or rubber banding the grip safety. In the era before people got all smug about doing ignorant things on the internet, the usual reasoning for the tape/band was if a shooter had an issue consistently disengaging the grip safety while using their 1911 style pistol. No amount of "grip it harder like a man" will fix that, and certain hand shapes/sizes in conjunction with gloves will aggravate the interface. Ideally, the grip safety should free the trigger after no more than 50% into its range of travel, but many guns require the safety to be fully depressed. The better solution for this is to have a 1911 specialist refit the grip safety to accelerate the timing of the release of the trigger bow. Relying on a piece of tape or rubber band or even mechanically pinning the grip safety on a duty gun is less than ideal. You neither want the function of your gun to rely on a piece of tape or rubber band, nor do you want to go into a post OIS investigation with something which will clearly invite a question to which you know you do not have the best answer.

These are Browning High Powers that I got in 1985 (bottom) and 1992 (top) respectively. The two tone is a Belgian that was likely done at Cylinder & Slide, as there weren't that many shops doing BHPs in this style in 1985. The top one is a Belgium/Portugal model that Bruce Gray @brucegrayggi and Art Leckie built for me. At the time of the release of the Springfield Armory SA-35 in 2021, there was quite a fervor from people who apparently didn't realize that the design was from 1935 and not the new "2011 killer" or "Glock killer." The BHP in any format is a cool piece of retro historical fun, but not really poised to dethrone anything else. It had its chance.

This is what peak performance looked like for about 1 season of USPSA, circa 1990. After Jerry Barnhart won the USPSA Nationals in 1990 with his single stack comped .38 Super with a Tasco PDP2 red dot on it, we were off to the races. Everyone with an iron sighted comp gun quickly got a red dot bolted onto it. This @springfieldarmory Custom Shop comp gun (sadly not mine) is a perfect snapshot of the time: .45 comp gun that was already on the very end of its evolutionary run, BoMar sights, Tasco PDP3 optic on a frame mount. This stop gap setup quickly gave way as double stack designs like the Springfield Armory P9 in 9x21 Major and .38 Super Para Ordnance, CMC and Caspian frame kits changed the game. 📸@akscott60

Thank you to all who have supported my @springfieldarmoryinc / @lipseysguns 10-8 Performance Master Class pistol project! If you have not seen it already, there is a resource page on the 10-8 site which rounds up some of the media, including a holster fit video and a disassembly video. Check it out! 10-8performance.com/sa-10-8-master…

#fortyfivefriday This early 80's Clark "Bowling Pin Model" aka Pin Gun, was the first of what we now know as a sight block style 1911. Custom pistolsmith and bullseye legend Jim Clark popularized the Pin Gun - a barrel weight and tapered conical sleeve that was threaded onto a standard 1911 barrel - as a way of taming the recoil of the powerful .45 loads favored in Second Chance Bowling Pin shooting. This particular specimen is one of the later ported models, and led into the rise of the chambered compensator. It is a perfect snapshot in time back to when I first started shooting IPSC (before USPSA became the US governing body), and everyone on the cutting edge was shooting a ported pin gun. Four decades later, and we are effectively rediscovering barrel weights and ported barrel weights.

When the gun starts entering the eyeline and moving towards the target. This applies from any holster or from ready. The reverse is true for engaging safety. For LE and defensive applications this optimizes both mechanical safety and speed, since it cannot be assumed that every draw is unopposed on a range and ending with firing. I have personally witnessed many ND's with early safety/trigger involvement.

@108Performance Where in the draw are you disengaging your safety?

Here's a PSA for any "1911/2011 curious" shooters who came up in the polymer pistol world - the correct manual of arms for the platform is with the thumb on TOP of the safety both during and in preparation for firing. Forming a grip which physically bypasses or ignores the safety is to invite presenting to the target to fire with the safety left in the SAFE position or returning to ready or holstering with the safety OFF. The manipulation of the safety is part and parcel of using a 1911/2011. No matter how many social media followers you have, how great your cinematic camera is, or how many beards you have, that is an incontrovertible aspect of the gun.

@atl_flaneur @kimberamerica The Atlas safeties are angled upward, unlike any other 1911 safety, so I have avoided them

My limited experience with Limcat parts is that they’re far off dimensionally from Staccato that you have your work cut out for you fitting them to pistols that follow Staccato’s numbers. I like the Atlas shielded safties—they take a couple strokes of a file to fit the safety/sear interface and whatever deepening of the detent notch you want to do.

Digging this Limcat shielded ambi on my @kimberamerica 2K11. Took a LOT of fitting to the frame, as well as a ton of sculpting so that the levers weren't quite so ridiculous. All that said, does anyone have a spare unused one? I need another one for a new project and they're not available anywhere. Thanks!

My @staccato2011 C4X has 1745 rounds on it, and it’s due to get another range session to round out its testing. If your niche is performance shooting with a requirement for EDC/concealment, this is a purpose built gun for you. Based on the social media teasers from Staccato, their pending July 4th drop is something else wearing the same comp as this model.

One of the stages from this weekend’s @theuspsa match with @sapsa_fl. I had a very difficult day managing my mental game, but somehow managed to finish 10th out of 73 shooters and 5th in Limited Optics. The best part of the day wasn't the running around and shooting, but the truly awesome, funny, and supportive crew with whom I get to shoot each match. Find your crew and get out and shoot!
@kimberamerica 2K11 @trijicon SRO @oakleystandardissue Meta Vanguard @supervel 124gr FMJ @eric.howitzerclothing @howitzerclothing Performance sun hoodie