5 to Go is the stage most people picture when they picture Steel Challenge: four white plates walking away from you in a staggered line, and a stop plate off to the right, close. It is the stage that teaches you the sport’s central lesson, which is that the plates are not the problem. The distance between them is.
Four 10-inch plates and one 12-inch stop plate. One 3′×3′ shooting box. Five strings, best four counted.
Our own scale plan of SC-101 · 5 to Go, drawn from the dimensions published in Appendix B of the SCSA Competition Rules, edition 2026-03. Seen from above, shooting box at the left. Distances are measured from the box; offsets are from the center line; heights are to the top of the target.
| Target | Size | Distance from the box | Offset from center | Height to top |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10″ plate | 10 inches | 30 ft | 10 ft 3 in left | 5 ft |
| 10″ plate | 10 inches | 36 ft | 3 ft 5 in left | 5 ft |
| 10″ plate | 10 inches | 45 ft | 3 ft 5 in right | 5 ft |
| 10″ plate | 10 inches | 54 ft | 10 ft 3 in right | 5 ft |
| 12″ stop plate | 12 inches | 21 ft | 17 ft 1 in right | 5 ft |
The stage peak is the aggregate of your 4 counted strings. Divide it by 4 and you get a par time you can set on a shot timer today.
| Division | Stage peak | Per string |
|---|---|---|
| Rimfire Rifle Optics | 9.5 s | 2.38 s |
| Rimfire Pistol Optics | 8.75 s | 2.19 s |
| PCC Optics | 9.5 s | 2.38 s |
| Open | 11.25 s | 2.81 s |
| Carry Optics | 12.5 s | 3.12 s |
| Production | 13 s | 3.25 s |
| Single Stack | 13.25 s | 3.31 s |
| Iron Sight Revolver | 13.5 s | 3.38 s |
Peak times verified against SCSA’s live classification system on September 8, 2026. The full 16-division table is on our peak times page.
The four plates climb from 30 feet out to 54 feet while stepping across the center line. That combination is the trap: the plate that is farther away is also the one that is further off to the side, so the sight movement and the aiming difficulty go up together. Most shooters lose 5 to Go on the last plate before the stop plate, not the first.
The stop plate is the other half of the problem. It sits at 21 feet — closer than every standard plate — but 17 feet 1 inch to the right of the box. If you finish the array on the far left, you are asking for the single widest transition on the stage as your last move, under time, with the run on the line.
Same five targets, eight different problems. The full set, plus the data behind them:
Sources
SCSA Competition Rules, edition 2026-03, effective March 1, 2026 — Appendix B (stage diagrams), rule 2.1 (target height) and the chapters cited inline. Peak times from SCSA’s live classification system, retrieved September 8, 2026. The diagram above is our own drawing made from the published dimensions. If a measurement here does not match the stage as your club sets it, the rulebook and your match director are the authority — and we would like to know about it.
The date under the headline is the last time we checked this page against its sources — not the day it was first written. Rulebooks get amended, regulations change and season dates move, so we review these guides on a regular cycle and re-stamp the date whenever we revise one. If you find something here that has changed before we caught it, email [email protected] or tell us at the counter; we will verify it against the source and correct it.
We write these because people ask us at the counter. Everything in them we either sell, service, or shoot ourselves — and if you'd rather talk it through than read about it, come in.
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