Bianchi Cup

Julie and I just got back from the 2025 Bianchi Cup and we are very happy to be home. Not that Bianchi wasn’t enjoyable, but a week away from home is still a long time for this retired guy, lol. Julie came in 2nd lady but shot her best ever barricade event with a 480/48 X. That is, she hit the 10 ring for all 48 shots fired, and all of those 48 shots were in the X ring. Very few shooters ever accomplish that, and it earned her a spot in the shootout, her first ever for the barricade.

I did not shoot Bianchi this year, as regular readers of this blog will likely remember that I was burned out on competition last season. Accordingly, I have not shot any action pistol training or matches since last year. This year at Bianchi though, they held a side match after the main event, and Julie signed me up for it. The match was the same course of fire as the regular Bianchi Cup, but limited to 24 shooters, shooting production optics only. In addition, all shots would be fired from standing. Since I preach and teach the concept of on demand performance, I figured this would be a good test to see how well I did with no recent relevant practice, and from the hardest position, standing only.

Well, it was certainly hard. I dropped 2 shots on the mover, 1 plate, a whopping 7 shots on the practical, but I had a nice finish with a perfect 480 score on the barricade. That was my best barricade score in competition, and with the highest X count I have had at 38. Total score was an 1876, one of the lowest I have ever shot.

While I didn’t win, or even podium, I think coming in 4th, against some of the best shooters in the country, with no practice, speaks well of the idea of on demand performance. You can’t expect to win a specialized event without specific practice, but with the right training and focus, you should be able to do pretty well at anything.

Of course, the gun I used helped quite a bit. My usual LTT P30L got a rest, and this year I shot my current carry gun, an LTT P30L. In this case though, the gun has a light LEM trigger, where my usual competition gun has a DA/SA trigger. The LEM proved to be quite capable, but a part of me definitely missed my nicely broken in DA trigger. Maybe I’ll have the competition bug again in time to train for next year’s Bianchi Cup, but then again, maybe not.