Gun Nuts

While practicing and learning 3 gun stuff with Janna Reeves and James Casanova (two members of the Noveske Shooting Team) I learned a little but about how to train. Since running through stages isn’t always feasible and isn’t necessarily the more effect way, we began with some small drills. The first was designed to speed up target acquisition and the second pushed accuracy as well as physical stamina.

To set up the first drill, called a “Par Drill” one needs a shot timer with the ability to sound a second buzzer once a pre-set amount of time has elapsed. The shooter stands at low ready. This drill can be done with any type of gun but the target should be adjusted for whatever firearm is being used. We practiced with our rifles and a gong target set up at about 50ft. The buzzer sounds and the shooter should get thier sights on target and then take the shot. This is done five time and then an average is calculated.

So here’s how it went for me: I shot at the target five times and the average time that it took me to get on target and pull

We are forever telling our fans and readers to “go get training, go get training.” Many shooters want to get training, but don’t know where to get it from. In the training world, there are two options: go to an individual trainer, or go to a training school. A training school has some advantages, larger staff means they can accommodate more students, a fixed location usually means better facilities, and a business oriented mindset can help eliminate a lot of the silly issues you sometimes run into when dealing with individual instructors. To make the list, a school had to be an actual school – a fixed location with multiple instructors. There is a huge selection available of individual instruction out there, and a lot of “schools” that are just one “name” instructor and a cadre of yes-men. They don’t make the list. Want to get good training? Go to one of these places.

1. Gunsite Academy
The OG of training schools. Gunsite is the fountain from whence all other training schools have come. Here’s the deal about Gunsite – they won’t teach the latest and greatest techniques. But the Modern Technique, the Weaver that they teach will still work, and if your goal is to “defend your family and your life” than taki

Px4 Storm Subcompact and Beretta Nano, both in 9mm. Both in need of a stippling job.

Everyone is familiar with the Beretta 92 series of handguns, thanks to their former glory in 80s action movies and the fact that the M9 is still the standard issue handgun to most of the US military. For years Beretta has been producing another line of guns though, guns that some people love and some people just love to hate. This is the Beretta Px4 Storm.

It might come as a surprise to our readers that the Px4 Storm is turning 10 years old in 2014. Introduced in 2014, it replaced the 8000 Series pistols in Beretta’s lineup as the choice for shooters who wanted a Beretta, but didn’t want a 92 series. At the beginning, it was available from Beretta in a number of different action types, starting with the familiar Decock/Safety F-type, the popular decock only G-type, as well as a DAO model (the D) and a strange “constant action” called the “C” model. It used the same rotating barrel lock-up mechanism as the 8000-Series, but came with new polymer construction, interchangeable grip backstraps and magazine releases.

Our test gun is a Px4 Storm Inox in 9mm. I prefer the Inox guns

The alternate title to this post could be “don’t carry generic JHP ammo” – a perfect example are the JHP rounds from American Eagle or WWB that you can get from Walmart. Lots of people will buy these things thinking that “a hollowpoint is a hollowpoint” and load them up and think they’re good to go. The truth is far from that, because not all JHP ammo is created equal.

The biggest reason to not buy the generic JHP ammo is simple: quality control. Actual ammo that’s manufactured explicitly for self-defense use such as the excellent Winchester PDX or Federal HST is generally subjected to tighter quality control than ammo that’s sold under the more generic branding. Part of the reason you pay for more defensive ammo is that it’s more time consuming to produce.

The second reason is terminal performance. The JHP bullets loaded into those bulkpack boxes are not the latest bullet technology, which means they won’t perform as well as modern bullet designs such as PDX or HST. Again, LE agencies carry the rounds that they carry for a reason, and you’d b

The heart and soul of a S&W 625 revolver.

Yesterday, when the news of California State Senator Leland Yee’s arrest for corruption broke, many in the pro-gun community to include myself experienced quite a bit of schadenfreude at the news. An anti-gun, anti-video game, and generally anti-freedom advocate arrested for corruption? Awesome. But the real story is so insane it’s like the news ripped a page out of Unintended Consequences. Because soon to be former Senator Yee wasn’t just hooked up, he was hooked up for being part of an international gun-smuggling ring. It’s glorious. The SF Gate has the affidavit uploaded, and it’s pretty incredible.

Of course, the memes have already springing up around this, and so far the best is this one:

I just cannot express how hilarious this all is. I mean, think about it. An anti-gun politician tries to ban guns, and then gets caught smuggling guns to

In any discussion of self defense you will encounter people who have mistaken a platitude for a plan. Just as any discussion of safety will bring out some goober who reflexively types some spiel about “booger hooks” in all caps (because that’s how people know you’re super, super serial you guys) anytime there’s a discussion of some potential complexities of self defense there will be somebody who squawks “I’ll just shoot him!” like a parrot…and with all the critical thinking skills behind it that you would expect from a bird.

Human beings like to deal in absolutes. (Obi Wan Kenobi: Only Sith deal in absolutes! Tim watching the movie: That was an absolute. Who wrote this crap?) We prefer things that are concrete and binary, something that either is or isn’t. While we find this comforting it’s just not how the universe we live in actually functions, especially when it comes to interpersonal interaction, particularly the violent kind. Our ideas about a self defense scenario matter because that’s setting the “script” in our head. Thinking about the problem is similar to programming a computer. A robust program considers many possibilities and appropriate responses, and is able to produce the proper action in the moment whe

California State Senator Leland Yee (D), the representative of California’s 8th District which includes San Francisco, was arrested today by the FBI on charges of bribery and corruption. Sen. Lee’s arrested was part of multiple arrests conducted by the FBI as part of a large scale investigation.

Sen. Yee’s arrest has been linked to the arrest of Chinatown gangster Raymond Chow, who was recently arrested on racketeering charges. Sen. Yee is currently running for the office of Secretary of State in California in addition to his duties as a state Senator.

.38 Special Man would like to wish everyone a happy hump day!

There are lots of little things you can do to make carrying concealed easier on a day to day basis. When I first started out carrying, there were quite a few things that I wish I had known at the time.

1. Try new guns and holsters out around the house before you wear them out in public
Whether you’re getting ready for your first CCW or switching gear, it’s a good idea to take it for a test run around the house on a weekend. This way you know how the gun/holster combo works when you have to perform regular actions like bending/sitting/going to the bathroom.

2. No one can see you gun, but they can see you fiddling with your shirt
People obsess about concealment. We worry about printing a lot, when the real truth of the matter is that most people won’t notice your gun. What people will notice is you fiddling with your shirt and constantly picking at the tail of it to make sure your gun stays concealed. Relax and stop picking at your shirt.

3. Actually practice with your carry gear before you wear it “for real”
Remember, we’re betting on this gear to save our life in an emergency. Never carry an untested gun/holster combo, because in the terrible moment where you need it, untested gear is more likely to

Does expensive gear make you a better competative shooter? We’ve all seen that guy, rolling up in a zombie hunter H3, is always buying guns, but never actually goes to the range to shoot. It’s easy to get into all the gear, especially in 3Gun, but knowing how to use it is key when the buzzer sounds. Should a beginner spend a few thousand on their first long gun so they can get into competing or just a few hundred and then dive into training? Extended controls and low drag whatsits may make a person appear knowledge-able, but will they shave seconds off your time, like they do for the pros?

The guy in the H3 (from earlier) doesn’t even know how to field strip and clean most of his guns. He doesn’t hang out and talk guns at the range, because he doesn’t know anything more than what the sales guy tells him. A beginning competitor with H3 guy’s bank account could do some serious damage on the 3gun web sites. Unfortunately, once that beginner got into shooting matches, half that gear would never be touched again. The reason is, different metho

I choose to carry a gun to defend myself. I choose to exercise. I choose to not always eat like a 20 year old. All of these are choices.

Self defense is all about choices. By carrying a gun and getting training, I’m choosing to violently resist anyone’s attempts to do me harm. But my choices aren’t your choices. For example, I choose to exercise because strong, fit people are harder to kill and generally more capable. But I also choose to eat pizza and drink beer because pizza and beer are delicious. Again, choices.

I know people who don’t drink alcohol. Choices. I know people who don’t drink coffee, and while I assume those people are monsters, I respect their choices. And that brings us to the concept of respecting choices, something we struggle with a lot. If you choose to carry a Hi-Point and get training at the DerpShow Academy, I respect that it’s your right to make whatever choices you want, but that doesn’t mean I agree with them. There is a difference between respecting a choice as someone’s right, and validating a bad choice with support.

Not everyone’s choices are equal. There are good choices and bad choices. We crusade against bad choices by providing education about guns, gear and training, but ultimately it’s up to the ind

Lionheart LH9 in G-Code OSH RTI holster with Haley Strategic INCOG and G-Code single magazine pouches. The single mag pouches are a lot better than the double pouch that came with the gun, and once I backed the retention off allowed fast reloads and easy on/off for the belt.

Ammoland has the story of how past champion Vera Koo is walking the hard road back to Bianchi Cup after breaking her leg.

Many members of the shooting world are aware that last year I did not defend my Bianchi title. I was not even in Missouri during my favorite event of the year. I was in California, attempting to re-learn how to walk.

In 2013, just a few weeks before the Bianchi Cup, I broke my leg, a spiral fracture of my right fibula and tibia. My doctor felt it would take 6 months until I could walk normally, and a full year for the swelling to reduce, as I mentioned in my inaugural column for The WON. But, while I lay in a Missouri hospital, I had the same tunnel vision that I have while competing. I knew that in less than 1 year, I needed to be completely recovered from a potentially permanently debilitating injury, so I mapped out my plan for a full recovery from my hospital bed.

Read the full story at Ammoland.

Lighten up, Francis. It’s great to train and take your self defense seriously, but I can’t imagine how exhausting it must be to make your entire lifestyle revolve around always being ready for a fight that probably isn’t going to happen.

A good friend of mine recently said “Not every gun has to be for jumping out of an airplane with a knife in your teeth” which is pretty good advice right there. It’s all about balance. I’ll pull a parallel example from the world of fitness. It is a perfectly acceptable and laudable goal to run a marathon or bench four plates or have a perfect six pack. It’s also a perfectly reasonable goal to work out just to be healthier but still have pizza and beer, because pizza and beer is delicious. The guy who wants to run a 5k under 21 minutes and trains obssesively for that is going to have a different definition of “success” than the guy who wants to run a 5k under 35 minutes because it’s good for him.

So hey. Maybe you don’t have to make your entire life about being ready for the fight. Maybe you could take up fishing,

We’ve got jokes!

I’m disturbed by the number of times I’ve heard people tell new shooters who are cross-eye dominant that the shooter should switch hands to match their eye dominance when shooting handguns. It’s mind boggling.

Those words of wisdom come from former heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson, and while he in later life may have encountered some struggles, he is 100% correct about that. To circle back to last week’s post on Krav Maga, many people questioned why hold up contact sports like BJJ, american Boxing, or modern MMA as the best options for self defense training. The answer is the same reason I encourage anyone who’s serious about their self-defense to shoot competitions. Competition shooting is the only venue where you can test the entire range of your gun handling skills under the stress of a timer, audience, and scoring. It is not a real gunfight, but it is as close as you can probably get short of joining the military.

Similarly, while contact fighting in boxing/mma and grappling in BJJ aren’t “real” fights, what you get when you strap on the gloves is an opponent who is fully committed to opposing your will with violence of their own. Yes, there are rules – but anyone who has stood in the ring and taken a punch has a much more intimate understanding of violence than someone who has only ever ha