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 Well, it is the time of year where my thoughts start to return to shooting in the warm sunshine. Well… not really, I have been fully involved in getting ready for Shot Show and shooting is just a small glimmer in the back of my mind. In years past, I spent this time getting ready for the “season”, attending gun shows, gun shops and anything else I could find to get folks interested in shooting. Cold weather, and sometimes snow, keeps all but the most dedicated off the ranges. I find it a good time to go to a few gun shows to look for the new cool blaster, visit with the others there that are searching for their new blaster, and catch up on my reading about my favorite topics, guns and shooting.
So how do I get more folks interested in shooting? For me it’s simple, I love to shoot so I just spend my time talking to all who will listen about our sport. In most cases, we had good success from just sharing with others our experiences. A good video of your club matches will also help drive home the point of how fun it really is to take part in range events. This is the perfect time to fit in some boy scouts and maybe a ladies group, give demonstrations if weather permits, talk about gun safety or self-defense if it is cold or snowy. Not too many years ago I spent some time with a church group talking about gun safety and finally teaching a concealed carry course. Being an NRA instructor helps, so if you are not, find one to work with and see everyone that you can.
Years ago, we started hosting NRA’s Woman on Target events with great success in gaining both interest in our club and in shooing IDPA. I have to add that it was a great deal of fun. At the 2008 IDPA National Championship, I took part in a First Shots Program. It is a new program that I am a great believer in. Get one of these going and see what it will do for your club and it will make you smile as well. These sorts of events are great ways to not only get more involved in shooting but to protect our favorite past-time. Win their hearts and minds!!
This time of year is also a good time to work on courses of fire for upcoming matches. I can’t tell you how many times I have been asked how to come up with good CoFs. No real secret, just watch TV and read the newspaper for all that you need to make the basis for good courses. When they are based on real life encounters, you just can’t get more realistic than that. Over the years, I have seen some real good stuff come from “holdup” or “I can’t believe I survived” stories that are available everywhere. After you do this for a while, you will see everyday experiences that give you ideas for future matches. Several years ago I owned and operated a boot and shoe store. I can’t tell you how many times I based CoFs on what I had worked out for steps to defend myself and others in the store in the event of something bad happening. How many home invasion based scenarios have we used over the years?
This time of year is not a bad time to build new and more realistic props for this year’s matches. Nothing makes a match more realistic and attracts more folks than to have cool props. I couldn’t even begin to tell you how many cars and trucks that we have used up over the years to make the action even more realistic. Not sure what the statistics are, but I’ll bet that more encounters involve an automobile than you would believe. Other than the home, I’ll bet the average American spends more of their life in their car than any other place. Moving targets are also lots of fun. Over the years I have been involved in developing a few. From simple gravity driven, to complex electronic moving targets, they are all tons of fun and as realistic as it gets. My last project (at CASA) had the option to activate off most anything you could come up with. I would give Glen Fairbanks an idea and he would figure out how to make it work. Not sure which was more fun, challenging him or shooting the CoF after he worked it all out.
If you are not lucky enough to live in Arizona with such great weather year round, one could go the indoor route. I have attended some great indoor matches. Last year I journeyed through the snow to shoot the Smith & Wesson Indoor IDPA Nationals. It was a great match, and I am not sure of another way to shoot in Springfield, MA in the winter. It was pretty cool on the indoor ranges during that match but still bearable. There are new indoor ranges going up all over the country, go in and have a look around. I made a trip last year to a new indoor range in Texas, and the boys at Red River have it going on. They have a great IDPA program and a great place for novice and experienced alike to go and shoot. If you get the chance to stop in, tell Jason and Keith I said hello. Find a good indoor range in your area and talk to them. If they have not yet got an IDPA Program started, help them get it going. I have never met a business that would not let you help them grow; serious shooters should be just the customers they are looking for.
If you have nothing else you can find to do, how about a little dry fire practice? I, like I imagine most of you, am not the most studious at my dry fire practice. You all know the rules; make sure the firearm is unloaded, no loaded ammo in the area, choose a safe area to place your target, and use it. In my experience, dry fire practice works, but only if done properly. Bad practice develops bad habits. Lots of ways to go about this, but here is one that I have used in the past. I like to use “dummy” rounds and “dummy” magazines, or magazines loaded with “dummy” rounds. If done properly, you can get a fair amount of practice during a dry fire session. Start from ready and work on sight acquisition, just raise the firearm while picking up the sights to help develop that skill. It’s not necessary to press the trigger every time, better if you don’t. Mix in full presentation drills keeping the draw smooth and deliberate sometimes pressing the trigger, sometime not. Whenever you feel yourself getting sloppy, start over and work back up to where you want to go. Make sure you follow all the correct steps in whatever you are working on. I like to work in reload drills and failure drills with mine. All sorts of ways you can add or subtract based on time and what your focus is on at the time. Make sure you work from a plan, practice with no goals will not help you achieve the full potential of the time you are investing. Some have said that to be great you should dry fire practice twice as much as you live fire practice. Not sure if that is a scientific fact, but I know that a good planned regimen will make you a better shooter.
Now that all that fun stuff is out of the way, this time of year with the holidays that come along, remind us how important the ones around us truly are. I look forward to the day when my kids are ready to go shooting with old dad. Some of you have met my son Eoin at past Nationals; that little man has been to four nationals and he is only six. Dad keeps buying him guns, but he is just not quite old enough to really get into it. I see little Patty (not even two) watching brother playing with toy guns and she appears to like the idea of being interested in them as well. I really think that will be a load of fun when they both arrive at the age when they are ready to really go shooting with dad. I guess by now you can tell that I truly enjoy our sport, I hope that I have infected some of you to go out and get others involved, if not, I hope at least I got a smile or two out of you.
Till next time: Stay safe, shoot straight, and always watch six!
Texas Concealed Handgun - Class III Dealer - IDPA - T.C.L.O.E.S.E Instructors - Armorers
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