Gun Nuts: Camp Perry!

We had an excellent show last on Camp Perry, featuring Lars from NRABlog.com, Texas State Highpower Rifle champion Robert from Blackfork, and friend of the show Heath - who had the range facilities set up to let Breda shoot an M1 Carbine for the first time. You can check out all of last night's show here, or click here to download an .mp3 file of the Camp Perry show.

Next week's show is going to be great - we're continuing the $5 New Caller drive - for each new caller that's never called in before, I'm going to donate $5 to NRA-ILA to help our fight for our right to keep and bear arms. Next week's show is going to feature special guest Larry Correia, author of Monster Hunter International - which is currently screaming up the charts at Amazon.com.

As usual, the show is available on iTunes - you can subscribe going to the iTunes store and searching for "Gun Nuts Radio", or by following this link to subscribe to our raw RSS feed. Join us next week at 9pm Eastern time for a live review of the new Daniel Defense DDXV carbine, and to talk to Larry Correia, author of Monster Hunter International!

Training when you're ill

Yesterday I was cruising the web looking for information on whether or not you should exercise when you're sick - because I happen to have an awesome head cold right now. I actually did find an article in the NY Times about exercise when you're not well, which suggests that as long as it's not an illness that inhibits lung capacity or respiratory function that it's safe and beneficial to work out when you have a cold.

That got me thinking about practical shooting and training - it's no secret that I approach practical shooting from an athlete's point of view - so what are the benefits to shooting when you're running a head cold?

Unlike pure physical exercise, practical shooting such as IDPA or USPSA requires you to "think" with a gun in your hand. You're required to solve a shooting problem within the confines of the rules of the sport, which is added to the already significant challenge of having the mental focus to run your gun well. That's the problem with practicing when you're sick - a head cold can be a mental distraction and interfere with your ability to focus on the front sight, pull the trigger properly, etc; personally I wouldn't recommend live fire practice if you're got a raging cold.

But that doesn't mean you can't practice! This is where dry fire comes into the equation. Just because you're sick doesn't mean you can't practice other things, like dry firing, presentations from the holster, or magazine changes. Since you're probably stuck in the house anyway, a cold (unless you're really knocked out by it) can give you an opportunity to work on some of the mechanical skills involved in being a successful practical shooter. Just make sure that you're not reinforcing bad habits. If your practice starts to get sloppy, slow down and make sure you're nailing the fundamentals. Just don't let a head cold be the thing that takes you out of your game.

Bowling Pin Match Photos

From the Pin Match at Marion County Fish and Game on April 25th, 2009. Click any of the photos to make them larger!

This is my favorite photo of the bunch - the pin on the left was just hit with a .44 bullet traveling with some speed, and you can see bits and pieces flying out the back of the pin. In the next picture I snapped, the pin is off the table and falling.

From April Pins

Here is the author of that pin's demise.

From April Pins

The pin matches always draw some of the area IDPA/USPSA guys to sharpen their skills on the pins.

From April Pins

From April Pins

Of course, the shots that are the most interesting are ones of bowling pins flying, or having chunks taken out of them.

From April Pins

From April Pins

This last photo is my favorite, because of the gun in the picture. At first, you think it's just an MP5 clone, but look closely at the fire control switch on the gun.

From April Pins

That's right...it has all three positions. I cannot tell you how much I wanted him to load up a 30 round magazine and just go "buzzgun" on those pins.

IDPA Divisions: Stock Service Revolver

Probably one of the least participated in divisions is Stock Service Revolver. Unlike USPSA, IDPA has two separate iron-sight revolver divisions, one for revolvers that load from moon clips, and one for revolvers that load from "traditional" speed loaders. The division for your classic speedloader wheelguns is called Stock Service Revolver, and here is what the IDPA Rule Book has to say about it:

A. Any revolver of .38 Caliber (.357” or larger) or larger that
utilizes ammunition with a rimmed case and is not reloaded with a full moon clip.
B. Barrel length of 4.2” or less (as measured from the front of the cylinder).
C. Have a maximum unloaded weight of 42 oz.
D. Be loaded to the division capacity of six (6) rounds in the cylinder. Seven (7) and eight (8) shot revolvers are permitted, but may only load six (6) rounds.

Additionally, revolvers in SSR have a relatively extensive list of permitted modifications that you can make to them.

1. Sights to another conventional notch and post type (see “sights” in glossary for further information).
2. Action work to enhance trigger pull as long as safety is maintained (smoothing the trigger face, removing the hammer spur, use of over travel stop, conversion to DA only and addition of ball detent are considered action work and are permitted).
3. Grips to another style or material that is similar to factory
configuration (no weighted grips).
4. Chamfer the rear of the chambers.
5. Shortening of factory barrels.
6. Custom finishes.

So if you're looking for a gun to shoot in Stock Service Revolver, if you have a Ruger GP100, or a Smith & Wesson ModelXWhatever chambered in .357, you are good to go. Your ammo needs to make a power factor of 125 (bullet weight x velocity / 1000). Here are the muzzle velocities and bullet weights necessary to hit the power floor with a .38 Special (note - I set the power factor to 127 to give you wiggle room):

158 grains - 803 fps
148 grains - 858 fps
130 grains - 976 fps
125 grains - 1016 fps

As you can see, it's pretty easy to find ammo that meets that power factor right off the shelf. Just about any .38 Special +P load is going to meet that power factor, and then you'll be off to the races.

Steel Challenge Match Photos

This last weekend we had a Steel Challenge match at my home range at Atlanta Conservation Club. The match consisted of four stages, two official Steel Challenge stages (Smoke & Hope and Roundabout) as well as two stages that the match director thought up. But this is supposed to be a picture thread, so let's get to it.

This is one of my favorite pictures from the match - if you look on the ground in front of the target, you can see water splashing up from where the lead splatter hit. This is from a .22, and the effect is even more pronounced with semi-automatic pistols.

From Steel April 18th

One of the "non-traditional" stages, called Shoot 'N Scoot, involved four large rectangular plates that had to be engaged on the move. You had to move at a diagonal to the plates, which created some interesting problems for right handed shooters. Some choose to shoot the 4 big plates strong hand only, and then go to a two handed grip to engage the 10 inch round stop plate at the end of the line. There was a lot of running on this stage.

From Steel April 18th

From Steel April 18th

The fun thing about taking pictures for these matches is looking at the moment that you froze in time - wondering what the person was thinking while you're snapping away.

From Steel April 18th

And of course, it wouldn't be a Gun Nuts photo set if I didn't get at least one photo with brass in the air.

From Steel April 18th

The guys at Atlanta CC put on a great match as usual - as soon as the scores are emailed out, I'll get them posted up here. If you're in the Indy/Metro and looking for some shooting, check out Atlanta Conservation Club's schedule of matches, and you won't be disappointed.

Edit: The Match Results are now available in handy .pdf format! I didn't do poorly, finishing 7th out of some 30-odd centerfire shooters. Seeing as I was running my Para 7.45 LDA with full house .45 ACP rounds (gotta practice that trigger), I'm pretty happy with a top 10 finish, as well as having the third best stage time on Smoke & Hope (I even beat the Open shooter on that stage, sweet). Roundabout really killed me, for some reason I couldn't get dialed in for speed - I was accurate, but really slow on that stage, and that's where I lost most of my time. Next match, I'll have to bring out the Tac-5 and see what I can do with my "real" Limited gun.

Steel Challenge at Atlanta CC

If you're interested and have ammo to burn, there is a Steel Challenge Match this weekend at Atlanta Conservation Club. Click here for the details!

IDPA Divisions: Enhanced Service Pistol

Part 2 in the continuing series on the competitive divisions of International Defensive Pistol takes a look at my favorite division, the Enhanced Service Pistol Division. From the rulebook, here's a description of the division:

Handguns permitted for use in this division must:
A. Be semi-automatic.
B. Be 9mm (9x19) or larger caliber.
C. Have a maximum unloaded weight of 43 oz., including an
empty magazine.
D. Fit in the IDPA gun test box measuring 8 ¾” x 6” x 1 5/8.”
with an empty magazine inserted.
E. Be loaded to the division capacity of ten (10) rounds in the magazine plus one (1) round in the chamber. Should division capacity not be achievable because of lower magazine capacity, load should be to maximum mechanical capacity of
magazine plus one (1) round in the chamber. Competitors must use the same capacity magazines through out the competition (Example: if you start with a 9 round magazine, you must use that capacity magazine throughout the match). Pistols approved for SSP may also be used in ESP and CDP depending upon caliber, even if the pistol in question has a full-length dust cover. However, should the pistol in question have a modification that removes it from SSP, it must meet all other division criteria for ESP or CDP, again depending upon caliber.

In recent years, there has been a bit of a resurgence in this division - previously it was populated primarily by guys running 9mm 1911s and the Browning Hi-Power. However, IDPA classified the Springfield XD pistol as a single-action only pistol (and correctly, based on my understanding of the action), which means that the popular pistol from Springfield in 9mm will put the shooter in the Enhanced Service Pistol division. While not as popular as the Stock Service Pistol division, this "boost" has allowed ESP to grow as a competitive division and has helped to attract more shooters to the sport.

Myself, I'm an ESP purist - I run a 1911 in 9mm when I shoot this division, but that's because I figure that an all steel handgun is going to sit down better in the hand than a polymer gun. Nothing against the XD, I think it's a fine pistol. The fun thing about ESP is that at the club level matches, it's also the place where you are most likely to see a USPSA shooter with a tricked out Limited Gun. Since single action pistols in .40 S&W fall into this category, it's where all the USPSA Limited/10 guns shoot. You'll often see the fastest course times out of ESP shooters, as they're running their semi-race guns right to the edge of the performance envelope.

The next division we'll be discussing will be the most popular IDPA division: Stock Service Pistol. Keep checking the Gun Nuts Radio Blog for more on IDPA!

Running with a Gun

In the first (and admittedly rough) video from Gun Nuts TV, I'm talking for a bit about moving and shooting. Not shooting on the move, but firing from a fixed position and moving to another fixed position.



The hard part about moving with a gun is controlling your muzzle direction when you're running. While it's hard to see in the video due to the camera's location, I'm running at about a 45 degree angle, relative to straight downrange. When I'm moving, you can see that the muzzle of the gun is directed downrange, across my body. Before you can start sprinting across your range with a loaded gun though, you need to practice that muzzle control aspect.

A good way to do that is to set up a drill like what I have in the video - where you're moving in between two fixed shooting positions. When you first start with the drill, you should just walk the space between the two positions, making sure to keep your finger out of the trigger guard, and keeping the muzzle of the gun pointed downrange. As you get comfortable with this, you can gradually increase the speed to a slow jog, and from the eventually work your way up to what I like to call "The IPSC Wind Sprint" - the drill posted in the video, run over the course of about 200 rounds of ammo will definitely give you a decent workout. It was 50 degrees outside yesterday, and by the end of my practice I was sweating.

All you need for the drill are three targets (and stands), and two fixed objects to mark your shooting position. Here's an idea of how you can lay this course of fire out for your training. The link goes to a .pdf file of the course of fire layout. If you have access to the facilities, this a great beginner's exercise, and a fun way to spice up your shooting! Practice this enough, and soon you'll be sprinting from one shooting position to the next!

From 04-01-2009

US Steel Nationals Start Today

Paul has the breakdown on what to watch for at the US Steel Nationals, which start today in Titusville, FL. As usual, this year's match looks like a three-horse race between Max Michel, BJ Norris, and KC Eusebio. Max is the reigning champion of the US Steel Nationals, and KC Eusebio won the most recent Steel Challenge match, so it should be a fun match.

Of course, there are more than just those three in the running - as Paul points out at the DownRange blog, both Todd Jarrett and Dave Sevigny are knocking on the door of the kings of speed. Todd finished 4th at last year's US Steel Nationals (Max, BJ, and KC finished 1,2,3) and can put together the kind of performance necessary to knock one of those guys out of the top spot. Dave Sevigny has been busy crushing everything in the Production/Stock Service Pistol divisions, but is more than capable of putting together a speedy performance with that weird Open Division Glock he shoots.

Keep checking back here for results and updates as I get them!

Gun Nuts Radio: Julie Goloski

You know, every week I say that if you missed the live show last night, then you missed out. It's true every week, but some weeks even more so than others. Last night it was our pleasure to have Team Smith & Wesson pro shooter Julie Goloski on the show. Julie spent the better part of an hour talking to us about the shooting sports, her background, and what we can do as shooters to get more women into the action shooting games. If you'd like to download the show, just click here for the show page, or click the following link for an .mp3 copy of the show.



Of course, you can now also download Gun Nuts on iTunes (or Zune). For Gun Nuts on iTunes, just click the link for instructions, or visit the iTunes store and search for "Gun Nuts Radio".

If there was one section that I think every male shooter should listen to, it was when Julie and Breda were talking about bringing wives, mothers, girlfriends, etc into the shooting sports. A big focus in that conversation was on how to make the shooting sports and the range in general a welcoming place for female shooters; there was a lot of advice in there that's useful for everyone. One of the best topics we discussed was the Babes With Bullets program, which are a series of ladies only shooting clinics that Julie's helped run in the past. In fact, one of her former students was a caller, which was pretty neat.

For more information on Julie Goloski, check out her website at www.juliegoloski.com.

Coming to Gun Nuts Radio!

On March 24th, we're going to have a very special guest joining us for Gun Nuts Radio. That evening, we'll be joined by Julie Goloski (whose real name is now Julie Golob, post her marriage), one of the top shooters in the world, and a member of the Smith & Wesson Pro Team. I'm extremely excited to have Julie on the show with us, as she brings a unique insight on being a pro shooter as well as a woman in the shooting sports. This will probably be our best "Chicks and Guns" show ever, so don't miss it. Mark you calendars now for Gun Nuts Radio on March 24th, with Julie Goloski!

Shooting Sports Vocabulary: Barney Magazine

If you're new to competitive shooting, you may hear the term "Barney Magazine" used from time to time, and wonder what exactly it is that people are talking about. This term is usually used by shooters who are, shall we say, no longer in the flower of their youth.

The term "Barney magazine" or more commonly "barney mag" is used to describe a magazine with a single bullet in it. This is for people with 10 round magazines, where they have their 1 bullet magazine, which they load into the gun, chamber the round, eject the now empty magazine, and then insert a full, 10 round magazine. This allows you to have the gun at "division capacity" (10+1).

Of course, that doesn't answer the question as to where the term comes from...unless you have an extensive knowledge of TV shows that were off the air before I was born. If you're familiar Andy Griffith Show, you'll know where this is heading. One of the characters, Barney Fife was a local cop who kept a single bullet in his pocket. 1 bullet in the pocket, 1 round in the magazine...and thus you get "Barney magazine." Amazing how pop culture influences different aspects of our lives, isn't it?

Gun Nuts: Better Shooting Through Science

Last night's Gun Nuts, aptly titled "Better Shooting Through Science" was a great show to do - the sheer volume of call ins from people sharing their shooting experiences and their tips and tricks to become a better shooter was absolutely fantastic. Notable among those calls was a call-in from the Texas State High Power Rifle Champion, who was kind enough to share his wisdom on one of the most critical aspects of shooting: the natural point of aim. Of course, you don't have to take my word for it - you can just listen to the show.



Of course, you can also download the .mp3 file of the show if you'd like to listen to it that.

If you'd like to simply subscribe to our show so it downloads automatically into your iTunes, you can follow the simple instructions at this link to set up Gun Nuts for iTunes (and Zune), or you can visit the "iTunes Store" and do a search for "Gun Nuts", which will lead you to the downloadable podcasts.

Also new on the shows, is that if you click direct link to the show itself, you'll get to see our product of the week, you can purchase off of Amazon.com. Each week we'll feature a product that ties into the subject of the show. This week it was Jeff Cooper's excellent book "Principles of Personal Defense".

Join us next week, when we'll have Gordon Hutchinson on the show, the author of "The Great New Orleans Gun Grab", who will be talking about his experiences in Louisiana during and after Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent illegal firearms confiscations.

Bianchi Cup Production Division

I have talked a lot on this blog and on Call me Ahab about the new production division that I'll be shooting in at this year's Bianchi Cup. If you visit NRA's website, you can download the "Rule Change" .pdf file which details the rules governing the new Production Division at this year's and future competitions. Here is a link to the .pdf file for the new Production Division rules. I've also reproduced the key areas below - if you're an IPSC/IDPA production shooter, pay attention because these rules are what will govern your gun in Bianchi Cup/NRA Action Pistol shooting.

(a) Grips may be replaced or modified to fit the competitor’s hand or to facilitate loading. Checkering, stippling, grip tape and grip sleeves are permitted.

(d)Only open sights may be used. The front sight must be a non-adjustable post sight. The rear sight may be adjustable if the firearm was originally manufactured with an adjustable sight. Sights may be replaced but they must use the original dovetail cuts and must retain the original configuration of the firearm. Fiber optic sights are permitted.

The following changes are prohibited

(c) Changes in the original factory sight configuration of the firearm are prohibited. Front adjustable sights are prohibited.
(d) Peep, ghost, optical, electronic, Bo-Mar and Aristocrat type sights.

What's interesting about that is what it means to you. For example, my Springfield XD came from the factory with fixed sights, which means that I can't modify the gun to an adjustable sight gun, and I most certainly can't throw a Bo-Mar sight on there, as they have been specifically prohibited for use in Production Division. The new division rules make the game both accessible for new shooters, but allow for most of the common modifications that you could or would make to a gun for Production division in USPSA. I've put special note on the sights of the gun, as it seems like that would be the area that would most likely trip up a competitive shooter, and land their gun in the "Metallic" division as opposed to the Production.

I'm definitely looking forward to shooting this match in May - it will be a challenge unlike anything I've done before!

Consistency in competitive shooting

The title of the post says it all, actually - in competitive shooting, the best and greatest shooters are the best because they are extremely consistent. They've practiced every action from drawing, firing, and reloading to the point where their ingrained muscle memory allows them to perform physical actions with little to no variations during repetitions of the action. That allows the top shooters to minimize wasted movement, which then makes them faster.



In the above video, watch Dave Sevigny reload his gun - everything is done on the shortest path possible, so that he doesn't waste any energy with excessive motion. The same goes for his actual movement. By taking the fastest line through the course, he minimizes lower body movment, allowing him to have a solid base to fire from.

With phsyical consistency, you also need mechanical consistency; meaning that your gun and gear have to be 100% reliable. I had a "mechanical" issue at a steel match this weekend, which added about 15 seconds to my time on a stage, and dropped me from what would have been approximately a 3rd place finish all the way to 6th. While a top 10 finish is nice, a top 5 finish would have been a much better way to start off the Steel season at MCF&G.

The problem with mechanical consistency is that while we as the shooter can control many of the factors that contribute to your guns and gear running flawlessly, not everything is 100% under your control (although mine was, I hadn't cleaned my magazines since the last time I shot, and dirty magazine = malfunction in the gun). Sometimes, weird things happen to guns, and when you're running high round counts, your statistical odds of a weird thing happening increase. However, there are things we can do to ensure that our equipment is as reliable as we can make it.

1. Keep it clean - this includes your magazines (stupid mistakes), holster, magazine holders, and of course your gun itself. I try to clean my gun every 200 rounds at a minimum, and I usually clean it in between every match. Note: if you're cleaning your match gun, make sure you test fire it after you clean it before you take it to a match.


2. Replace parts regularly - magazine springs, recoil springs, magazine holders, etc. By keeping your parts fresh, you avoid any jams or malfunctions that would be caused by a worn out piece of gear.


3. Keep records - starting this year, I'm keeping a record of every round I fire, whether it's in practice or competition. That way, I can track round counts on various guns, and have a much more accurate idea of when I need to get them "in the shop" for serious maintenance.

Three simple steps, but they may save you a major mechanical headache at your next match.

Gander Mountain reports profitable third quarter

In 2007 in Q3, Gander Mountain posted a net loss of $5.1 million; which obviously is the kind of thing you don't want to see from a shooting/hunting store. However, in Q3 of 2008, Gander's financial statements are reporting a net profit of $0.77 million, which is a swing of about about 6 million dollars, give or take a few hundred grand.

Now, I know I post stuff about gun company's financials every now and then, and it's kind of dry - but there is a method to my madness. You see, whether or not you shop at Gander Mountain, their profitability has a direct affect on us. If Gander Mtn does well, it's a sign that the shooting and hunting markets are doing well; a statement which is reinforced by the screaming rise in NICS checks during the month of November. Now, if Gander Mountain is doing well, it means that people are buying ammo, guns, outdoor clothes, and all the other awesome little things that we need people to buy to support our sport.

Now, while a boost at Gander Mountain may not mean a boost for your local gun shop, the overall effect of a major retailer turning a profit in the third quarter speaks good things about the condition of our sport, from an economic standpoint. Of course, voting with your dollars also sends a strong political message, so if you've got ammo to buy, buy it up!

Action Airgun Premier Season

The premier season of Action Airgun has wrapped up as of yesterday, and I wanted to give some final thoughts on the game, and where I hope and think it's headed in the future. I had a lot of a fun shooting this game, and even managed to come out as the champion of the Premier season. I finished with a quite comfortable lead over 2nd place, who seemed to stop shooting the courses of fire after about 6 weeks; which actually was a problem across the board. Before I get to that, let me talk a little about what made this fun, and what gives it the potential to succeed.

One of the things I really liked about Action Airgun was the ease of access - all you have to do to play is go to their website (www.actionairgun.com) order the kit and sign up for the season (which would now be Action Airgun Season 1) and you're ready to play. The courses of fire were fun without being frustrating, and were so accessible that Mrs. Ahab was able to shoot some good times on many of them. The kit contains everything you need to shoot, from a holster to a shot timer and even safety glasses. I did use up the included CO2 cartridges very fast, because I like to shoot a lot, and burned through 1500 BBs during the course of the season. Luckily for my shooting habits, CO2 cartridges are a lot cheaper than say, real ammo, so I was able to buy them in bulk and keep shooting.

The courses of fire were also a big bright spot for me. As I mentioned above, they were fun and challenging without being frustrating; and there were lots of courses of fire that played to my favorite method of shooting, i.e. as fast as possible. The week that stands out the most was week 3, where all three courses of fire were speed courses - one or two targets engaged as fast as possible. Great course of fire, and easily my favorite week of the season.

Speaking of weeks of the season, that leads me to my major bone of contention with Action Airgun, and the one thing that I feel like stands in the way of them being a really successful shooting sport. Primarily, it's the length of the season. The "Premier" Season was 12 weeks long; that meant shooting three courses of fire every week for 12 weeks, and I honestly ended up missing some courses of fire (although not many) as a result. If you look at the scores, a lot of people just stopped shooting after a while - they started strong and then just stopped caring about it, and that hurt the competition. While I believe the format of 12 straight weeks of competition has been continued for Season 1, for Season 2 I hope it changes. Honestly, at the end, it had become almost a chore for me to saddle up and shoot the courses. Based on the amount of people that didn't shoot all the courses, I'd imagine I'm not the only one. If it were my league (and it's not), I'd change it to one or two stages per month. If I did 1 stage, I would have it be 5 courses of fire, if I did 2 stages per month I'd have one stage be two long courses of fire, and the other stage would be 3 courses of fire. Either of those would give the shooter more time to shoot the COF, and would hopefully prevent the amount of burnout that happened with the Premier Season.

However, the end result was that I had a lot of fun shooting Action Airgun. And since I'm the defending champion, I'll probably be back for Season 1 to defend my title - if you want to take a run at it, head over to www.actionairgun.com and register for the next season!

Dear NRA Action Pistol Coordinator

This weekend, I was looking up information on NRA Action Pistol, specifically I was trying to find information on the different competitive classes - Open, Metallic and Production. I was intensely frustrated by this, as the information on the website at www.nrahq.org is obtuse at best, and irritating at worst. As an example, to find the rulebook for the game, I first click on "Competitive Shooting" and then on NRA Action Pistol, which seemed like a pretty logical path. Unfortunately, the page I landed on, while descriptive of NRA Action Pistol to a small extent, did not contain a link to the competition rules.

Next, I tried clicking on "Getting Started", and then on the Action Pistol Shooting link on that page. While the resulting page was more descriptive than the previous Action Pistol Shooting page that I had landed on, it still didn't fully explain the difference in competitive classes in such a way that a new shooter could know what gear and guns to bring to their local club match and be allowed to shoot.

Finally, I clicked on Rule Books and Scoring Materials, which I will confess is a logical place for the action pistol shooting rulebook to be kept, and I was right, because there it was: a link to the .pdf file of the rule book, which I gleefully clicked. Much to my dismay, this opened an index .pdf with references to other .pdf files which when you click on the index returns the error of "file not found". Finally, to find the information I wanted, I had to deduce from the "file not found" error what the URL of the .pdf file I was looking for was, and manually type it into my browser. Needless to say, this was a tremendously frustrating experience for me, and I can only imagine how frustrating it would be for someone who isn't extremely interested in Action Pistol.

It would have been extremely simple to alleviate my frustration by placing a link to the full .pdf rulebook on either of the pages labeled "NRA Action Pistol Shooting", and not having to hunt and peck through three different categories to find the info I need. Now, I'm not trying to rip you guys here - obviously I was extremely frustrated when I was searching for the info, but I really do feel strongly about web sites being user friendly. As a comparison, it took me all of five seconds to find the rulebook for USPSA, and about the same to find the rulebook for IDPA.

Now, I have a big ol' soft spot for NRA Action Pistol and the Bianchi Cup, which is why I'm disappointed to see how difficult it is for new shooters to get information on the sport. I do love pistol shooting, and it's important to me and the future of our sport to see that more people pick up pistols and get out and shoot some courses of fire. That's why I really feel strongly that this information should practically be sitting in the laps of the casual shooter who sees an episode of Shooting USA and thinks that "that Bianchi stuff" looks fun.

Action Airgun Update

We just finished shooting the third week of Action Airgun, and I have to tell you that I'm having a blast. This last week's courses of fire were all "speed courses"; draw from the holster and engage a single target downrange. Now, that sounds easy until you realize that the foam targets used in Action Airgun are about the same size as a playing card - not easy to hit in a hurry. My very fastest time was 1.01 from leather to target down; and I threw away a 0.95 run because I fired a second shot and my split was 0.20, which left me with a 1.15 or something.

But the very best part about Action Airgun is that I've finally got Mrs. Ahab shooting, and shooting regularly. She ran a 1.56 run, which was no slouch of a run herself, and is starting to get interested in doing more shooting with me on a regular basis.

We're 3 weeks into a 13 week season, and like I said, I'm having a great time. My wife's interest in the sport has only led me further conclude that Action Airgun is a perfect "gateway drug" in terms of shooting sports - she's having so much fun burning down targets with an Airsoft 1911 that the next thing you know she'll be smoking steel with a rimfire race gun, and then soon as you know it, shooting IDPA or maybe if I'm really lucky some Cowboy Action.

Hats are off to Action Airgun for creating a shooting game that is both easily accessible for new shooters, and a hell of a lot of fun for everyone.

Gun Nuts Radio: Competition Shooting

Last night's show was another good one - it's good to have The Breda back and co-hosting, because honestly I'd hate talking to myself for an hour like I did two weeks ago. Here's the player for last night's show, where we covered competition shooting, as well as a look at the traditional activism activities of an NRA-EVC.



If you'd like to download an .mp3 copy of last night's show, you may do so by visiting this link and clicking "Open in your default player", or by clicking here.

On the topic of competitive shooting, we were able to cover modern bullseye pistol shooting, as well as some information on metallic silhouette, a brief glossy look at IDPA and IPSC, some talk on Steel Challenge, and finally a look at bowling pins. Honestly, I could do an entire show about IDPA and IPSC, just because of the variety of guns and gear that you can use to compete in either of these sports. We ended up focusing primarily on the Production and Stock Service Pistol classes for IPSC and IDPA simply because those are the most accessible categories. For those, you can take your Glock 17, a Fobus holster and magazine holders and run that gun. Everything you need to play those games you can buy off the shelf at your local Gander Mountain and then go and get in the game.

After we finished talking competition shooting, I spent some time talking to my friend, and NRA EVC, Sebastian of Snowflakes In Hell about traditional activism, and what us gun owners can do to get involved. With the election looming, it's important that in this final month before the election we do everything we can to "get in the game" and push not only for the Presidential race, but for local races as well. We talked for a bit about how easy it is to lose sight of extremely important Congressional and State races because of all the focus that is being placed on the Presidential election.

As I said, last night's show was pretty good - and although we didn't pull in a lot of listeners do to the Presidential debate, I still strongly recommend you check it out at www.blogtalkradio.com/gunnuts - and we'll be back next week with even more Gun Nuts radio!