Hi from the "Wet" Coast, oh I meant the West Coast. We've been running informal BR matches in Campbell River for the last 3 yrs. Started from nothing, like you are now, and we now have an average of 11 shooters/shoot showing up 10 times/yr. We shoot out to 500yds when there isn't too much snow and the sou'easters aren't blowing too bad. Some things we do:
-we use shipping pallets for target holders at 200, 300, 400 500. Cheap and easy to setup & replace. Put 'em all in a row with legs on the back to stand them up, staple your cardboard across and staple your targets on. It's not fancy but it works. We have regular target holders at 100 and 600
-make it fun. make it fair. Guys/gals won't come back if it's no fun and they think it wasn't fair. Shooting a factory Remington against a full custom BAT is not fair. Have some refilled 500ml water bottles & at the end of the shoot put them out at varying distances. Let guys have at'er. Free & Cheap reactive targets always brings a smile to a shooters face.
-we don't use moving backers at 100 & 200. It's a trust thing. I'm pretty sure we're all there for the fun, evan though we're shooting for money. I've thought of placing backers 3-5' behind the group targets in order to get a slightly different angle on the holes, but so far have seen no need.
-start at 100 yds with sighters and whatever. Get everybody zeroed. Have a ballistics table out of a reloading book available for reference.
-we jump out to 500yds right away. We've found that shooting 500 yds at 3:00pm makes for a sumb_tch for seeing your shots. At 10:30am you can see your bullets holes. My eyes aren't the best, but I can see .22 cal holes at 500 with a 24x Leupold. Most people can see their holes with 36x Weavers, etc.
-we use a 28'x22" flourescent yellow/green sighter sheet with an aiming point drawn on, near the top. It is poster board bought at a dollar store. I'll post a pic of our 500 yd sighters. You can see how they walked their shots in. I'm pretty sure this will work at 600yds if there's not any mirage.
-we shoot a marmot/groundhog target for score and group at 500, 300 and 200. You can see your holes in the white at 500 on the marmot target, but not in the black. Sometimes we shoot eggs at 300 or 400. We shoot flies at 500 & 100. There are a bunch of other targets we shoot at 100, 200, 300 and 400 as well. I can send you copies if you send me your address
- we run 3 classes of guns, Factory-bedded and trigger adjusted, Custom Factory-factory action with everything else modded, and Custom-full blown custom guns. No restrictions on scopes or weights. We had one gun in Custom Factory that weighed 18 lbs and was cleaning up for a couple of shoots, so I asked him if he would mind shooting in the custom class, he did and competes favorably with those guns.
-we shoot 10 relays/class. $2 entry fee/relay. Winner of relay gets 1/2 the entry fee for that relay class. I run a 50/50 draw with 1,2 & 3rd prizes. Some relay winners give their winnings back to the club to fund improvements. I went to the cash prizes 'cause most people like to win something and I didn't feel like getting trophies. The cash prize also makes it easy hand out and to be fair. If there's only 2 people in a class, then the winner gets $2. If there is 5 people in a class, then the winner gets $5
I don't know if we're doing the right things, but people keep coming back and seem to have a smile when they leave. We're always looking for improvements and new targets. If you have questions, ask away. I might have some ideas.
Cheers
Greg