US Open Sporting Clays: My final thoughts and pictures (Chicago: closing, club)

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Full disclosure, I've never been to a US Open (or the US Nationals) prior to this one. However I've been to a few state shoots and a few zone shoots (and a few different clubs), but The US Open at Northbrook Sport Club was BY FAR the biggest and best event I've ever shot.

Where to begin? Well, Northbrook (45 minutes north of Chicago O'Hare airport) always does a good job, but this week they out did themselves.

Rather than single out individuals (Brett & Tom) for praise, let me just say that the hundreds of club volunteers that put in THOUSANDS of hours of work, paid off in spades (speaking of spades, when I ask you to pick a card, don't pick the ace of spades. everybody does, and I can find it with my eyes closed).

At any given time I would guess there were 50 or 60 stations all running at the same time. The hundred or so teenagers that were pulling, trapping, and scoring were all pleasant and knew what they were doing. Plus if you were a teenage boy, Northbrook was the place to be this week

I didn't shoot the main event, but I did shoot the Super (Duper) Sporting, FITASC (new style), 20ga FITASC (old style), and the Prelim.

All of them ran smoothly, and I thought they all had well thought-out targets. A lot of people told me they thought the Super Sporting targets were the best of the event.

The food was good every night, and the free beer was flowing. I did want to thank UBS for the Lou Malnoti's pizza on Thursday night. No trip to Chicago is complete without a slice "Lou's".

There was an F3 Blazer (with grade six wood) on vender row for $8500 that fit me like a glove, however when I shot a round of 5-stand with their demo gun, it beat the crap out of me. Hey, I just saved $8500.

I also shot a round of 5-stand with a Zoli Q-sport demo gun, and it's one of the softest guns I've shot. At $5500 it's a bargain. The lovely lady at Alamo Arms was going to let me shoot the Krieghoff Parcours demo gun, but someone checked it out to shoot the main event. That's right, you can use a demo gun to shoot one of the events.

In fact one of the people I shot 20ga FITASC with didn't even bring a 20ga gun. They just demo'd one for the event. There were a ton more venders there that offered anything you needed. Guns, vests, chokes, supplies, they were all there. Qmaxx was there with their Blu lube/cleaner. They had a complimentary gun cleaning station, featuring their supplies. It was a nice setup.

Kid & Clays was there too, and I won a gun slip in the silent action. However since the weather cleared up nicely, I didn't even use it.

Saturday night Northbrook had a steak cook-out, and guess where they got the steak? They bought the farm next door, and (how can I say this sensitively) they turned one head of cattle into a bunch of steaks.

Speaking of food, when I brought it to the clubs attention that the food vendor was closing too early, they asked them to stay open later, and they did. I was going up to get a brat, and one of my So Cal buddies asked me, to ask them, if they had veggie burgers.

Since I didn't want to get my ass kicked, I didn't. This is America son, we didn't claw our way to the top of the food chain, to eat veggie burgers

I finished up my trip to Chi-town with a visit my buddy Bob's boat. That's some view off the back, huh?

Don't worry, if you missed this year's US Open at Northbrook, I'm sure it will be back (it was that good). For a complete list of upcoming events at NSC, visit

Me, I think I may have to come back in October to umm, ahh, "visit my dad".

Let the pictures begin...

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