The United States Steel Championship This is the fastest action in the handgun sports. Steel shooting… draw and shoot five steel plates as fast as you can for the National Championship in Titusville, Florida. It’s the most spectator friendly of all of the pistol sports. You can actually tell what’s happening as the match is underway. But until this year, if you wanted to see top flight competition in steel, you would have to travel to the high desert of California. Not now, with the creation of the National Steel Championship, the East Coast now has access and even though this is the first Steel Championship, the big names are in attendance and the action is world class. The scoring is simple. It’s the time it takes to shoot four target plates and the designated stop plate on each string of fire. Competitors fire five strings on a stage and score their best four strings for an overall total. The electronic timers are gun shot activated and are accurate to a hundredth of a second. If you need an extra shot to pick up a missed target, you’re not winning. There are four titles in contention: First is The Rimfire Steel competition with the shooters beginning each stage of fire gripping their pistols in the low ready position, pointed down at a 45 degree angle, facing downrange. Day two is competition in the Limited Division in centerfire calibers, using iron sights, and drawing from holsters to begin each stage. Day three is the Open Competition with purpose built “race guns” featuring compensators, red-dot optics and lightened slides for faster lock time from target to target. The fourth championship title is the quickest time over all for shooting all the stages with all three guns, Rimfire, Limited and Open. Related Links National Steel Shooting Championship  Stage Diagrams to build your own Steel Match (PDF) Pro Tips:  K.C. Eusebio is now a member of the Army Marksmanship Unit’s Action Pistol Team, but he has been a force in steel shooting since he was twelve years old with no shortage of titles won in competition. And he’s ready to share his technique in this Pro Tip lesson on shooting really fast! Steel Challenge