International Practical Shooting Confederation (IPSC)

The sport of practical shooting originated from competitions in California in the 1950s with the goal of developing handgun skills for defensive use, but quickly evolved into a pure sport with little grounding in the original purpose. The sport soon expanded to Europe, Australia, South America, and Africa. IPSC was founded in May 1976 when practical shooting enthusiasts from around the world participated at a conference held in Columbia, Missouri, creating a constitution and establishing the rules governing the sport. Today there are over 100 active IPSC regions, making practical shooting a major international sport which emphasizes firearms safety highly. Through international rules concerning firearms, equipment and organizing of matches one tries to unite the three elements precision, power and speed, which is also the motto of IPSC that is Diligentia, Vis, Celeritous (DVC), Latin for “precision, power, speed”. Only full calibre firearms are used, i.e. for handguns 9×19 mm is the smallest calibre, and the competitors try to achieve most points in the shortest time possible.

IPSC shooting is dynamic, challenging, and one of the fastest growing shooting sports in the world today. Courses of fire utilize many aspects not found in the more traditional shooting disciplines such as movement by the shooter, moving targets, multiple targets, and the freedom for the shooter to solve the shooting challenges presented in the courses of fire.

The International Practical Shooting Confederation (IPSC) is the world’s second largest shooting sport association and the largest and oldest within practical shooting. Competitions are held with pistol, revolver, rifle and shotgun, and competitors are divided into different divisions based on firearm and equipment features. While everyone in a division competes in the Overall category, there are also own separate awards for the categories Lady (female competitors), Super Junior (under 16 years), Junior (under 21 years), Senior (over 50 years) and Super Senior (over 60 years).

IPSC’s activities include international regulation of the sport by approving firearms and equipment for various divisions, administering competition rules and education of range officials (referees) through the International Range Officers Association who are responsible for conducting matches safely, fair and according to the rules. IPSC organizes the World Championships called the Handgun World Shoot, Rifle World Shoot and Shotgun World Shoot with three year intervals for each discipline.

IPSC created the International Range Officers Association (IROA) to establish a structure for the accreditation, recognition and maintenance of match officials.

IROA certifies that IPSC Range Officers are the best trained, the best qualified and best prepared to ensure a uniform worldwide standard for all competitions.