Gun Nuts

I like training classes.  A lot.  Pistol and/or carbine.  I learn things at these classes.  Training classes, while (sometimes justly so) derided as “entertrainment” are a quite viable way to learn, to brush up upon, and advance your own personal level of skill with the martial art that is shooting.  I always point new shooters towards a good two day pistol training class as the most important building block in enhancing one’s shooting proficiency with any firearm.

Yes, technically one of these is a pistol. But they’re all awesome. Top to bottom:

• Beretta ARX-100: Trijicon RMR, Troy BattleSights, Crimson Trace Railmaster, Troy Battlemag
• SB15 pistol: DPMS upper, Magpul rear sight, Troy Battlemag, Colt BCG, Aero Precision lower
• Troy Defense Lamb Carbine: Leupold 2-7 power scope, sexy 20 round mag

Mmmmm carbines.

Here is a terrible story: a man at an shelter dog rescue event stabbed a pit bull to death. There are so many tidbits of this story that we could discuss today, from the way the man’s language about pit bulls 100% reflects the deranged language of the anti-gun crowd about rifles (‘f***ing pit bull, why are you even allowed to have these dogs – direct quote from the man), we could comment about how some people are just wrong in the head, but instead I want to talk about acting in defense of a pet.

There’s no question that the expert consensus on rifles for home defense is that they’re good to go. In the AR15 platform, a rifle offers a considerable amount of firepower, easy handling in tight quarters, and good shootability. Most members of the family over age 12 can quite likely handle a carbine and get good hits with it. However, if you do choose a rifle for home defense, here are some things you should remember.

I’m now ready for next year’s 3Gun season. As soon as I order an RCI Extension for this, of course.

My quest for the perfect revolver holster continues. You’ll remember last year before Indoor Nationals, I talked about making sure my Blade-Tech holster met the IDPA rules for concealment, specifically the dowel rule. If you remember that post, the Blade-Tech holster in its stock configuration failed the dowel test for two reasons: additional offset due to the cylinder bulge, and I’m not 300 pounds. I was able to make it legal by swapping out the BT belt loops on the back of the holster in favor of a Safariland paddle. To be honest, I sort of assumed that putting a Safariland paddle on a Blade-Tech holster would open a portal into the nether, but I was wrong.

Not a bid video there, NRA. A little overwrought for my tastes, on the balance not bad at all. 8/10.

You know that story about the wee little girl who accidentally shot her instructor with a buzz-gun? Tam has some smart talk about the problem with how everyone is treating the incident.

I guess I could have called it an unbagging video, but that sounds weird on the ears. Also, this video is terrible and I should be ashamed. I bet it gets way more hits than my good videos.

Two years ago I wrote a pair of humor posts called “What your Carry Gun says about you” which were fairly well received. Mostly because I like jokes. There’s nothing quite like hauling a reliable old joke out of the barn for another ride.

Several weeks ago, reports circulated that reality TV show star Will Hayden of Discovery Channel’s Sons of Guns had been arrested on charges of child molestation. He was released on bail, only to be arrested again, this time on charges of aggravated rape.

Let me ask you a question: What, do you suppose, is the most popular, most prolific, most widely produced repeating firearm intended for personal defense in history?

For some reason, I decided it would be fun to try to an answer a question that has been the source of many forum slapfights. Yesterday I looked at both sport’s classification systems, and from that was able to determine…basically nothing. USPSA does a better job of breaking shooters down into tiers of skill, and it turns out that the top shooters in IDPA are almost always pretty good USPSA shooters as well. Today we’ll look at match performance and depth of competition.

One of the things I like to do is put together simple practice sessions for shooters who are on a time and money budget. Let’s face facts, ammo costs money, and range trips cost time, the most precious resource of all. But there has to be a way to practice the fundamentals of marksmanship in a fairly compressed time frame. Revolvers add a further complication w/regards to ammo management. Here’s a simple 100 round practice session you can do with just 100 rounds and one IDPA, Pistol-Training, or USPSA target.

New 7TS fits also now available for light-mounted firearms

One of the most common arguments among shooting sports enthusiasts is “who is better, IDPA shooters or USPSA shooters?” It’s a popular argument, because shockingly enough people that shoot competition seriously tend to be competitive. Generally speaking, USPSA matches tend to offer tougher shooting challenges to their shooters than IDPA matches, however the IDPA scoring system places a higher premium on accuracy in a given stage. To really analyze “who’s better” there are three important metrics to compare: classification systems, match performance, and directly related to match performance is depth of the match field.

After spending nearly a year looking for a host range we’ve finally found a range to host the classes that’s withing a reasonable driving distance of Sioux Falls. We’ll be teaching classes out at the Beacon Hill Club in Brookings; because of the time of the year there are only going to be a couple of classes, one in September and one in October. I’m working on getting the dates ironed out right now, but once I do I’ll have links posted to the signup page for each class.

This is what I’ve been carrying for the past week. I’m working on a series about how you can absolutely carry a full size, magnum caliber revolver every day comfortably without resorting to “gimmick” concealment methods. It’s quite fun.

You’ve probably heard about Smith & Wesson’s new M&P22 Compact by now. It’s kind of like an M&P Shield in .22 LR, and that’s pretty awesome to me. I had an opportunity to get some good trigger time with one, which turned into the first published review of the M&P22 Compact. You can read about it the latest edition of GunUp the Magazine, available first for iPad, iPhone, and Android.

iTunes Store link

Google Play

Despite my better judgement, I want to engage in a thought exercise this morning. I think we can all agree that the 2nd Amendment guarantees an individual right to the people to keep and bear firearms for basically whatever reason they want. That’s fine. That is the launching point for this mental exercise. From there, we have to acknowledge the uncomfortable truth that just because a person has a legal right to own a gun doesn’t necessarily mean that they should. This stems from the fact that owning a gun requires a person to be at least marginally responsible, because hey, it turns out that guns are kind of dangerous when used irresponsibly.