For the first time since I've been here (and according to one senior NCO, for the first time in the three years that he's been here), our unit held a marksmanship range specifically for cadre. Usually, we'll only get to fire if there are rounds left over at a student range and the cadre range safeties feel like shooting a rifle. I haven't even been to the range here before.
We were there for quite awhile (1430-1900), the first half hour of which was standing out in the rain waiting to get issued weapons. "If it ain't raining, we ain't training!" The kicker was that it's an indoor range.
I was on the second (of two) firing orders, so there were a bunch of E6 and E7 enlisted sitting around in a classroom attempting to amuse themselves while they waited for the first firing order to finish. A mind-numbing two hours later, we were set to move into the indoor range.
It went okay. We zeroed our weapons (mine was probably still a click or two off to the left) and then got familiarization rounds. Since we zeroed in the prone supported, we got 10 rounds in each of the prone unsupported and the kneeling positions. I had never fired kneeling before and was distraught at my performance at this point. Every one of my 10 rounds (and some of my rounds from prone unsupported) were to the left of my target.
But it was too late to do anything about it besides focus and observe the fundamentals of firing. 20 rounds in the prone supported showed me missing once (at the 300 meter target). 10 rounds prone unsupported had me miss once (at the 300 meter as well). And then kneeling was only one miss (on the 150). I was blown away by my performance on the kneeling since I thought I'd miss every one after how I did in familiarlization... pretty sweet, though.
Overall, a 37 out of 40 is just one shy of "Expert" qualification on 25 meter paper target (the target is at 25 meters and the sillhouettes on it simulate ranges of 50 meters up to 300 meters). I'm a little disappointed that I didn't get the 38, but having not touched an M16 in almost two years (not counting the AR15 I messed with a bit on Xmas leave) I did pretty well.
I still don't look forward to switching out my qualification badge for Friday, though.