GUNS Magazine

Having been in the training business for a while now, there are a few things which might prove helpful to the average or new shooter in regards to practice techniques.

The goal in training, of course, is to approximate as closely as possible the realities of conflict without actually killing off the client base during training. Without starting WWIII for the editor, the “shooting past people’s heads” and “run and gun flaming death” stuff is of course exciting, but then again arguably it can often be dangerous—especially if not done correctly by trained people.

“Trained” here is subject to interpretation like, “I was in the Army for 10 years.” It’s cool, but it doesn’t mean they can teach anymore than it means if you’ve got a car you can drive. Not to be ugly, but lots of folks have been killed in “fake” ammo drills that were not, and think back to all the people you have heard of killed by unloaded guns that weren’t.

A tremendous issue in shooting, like in self-defense is speed. Speed defined in shooting is hard to clarify because it means so many different things to different people or applications. Speed is probably most often thought of purely in a timed, “I am faster than you” gig. Rightly so, in competition we reward the person who shoots fast but historically, and, correctly so, speed needs to be balanced with accuracy. In layman’s terms, if you shot first or a lot and don’t hit zip, who cares? If all you needed was noise, you can chunk firecrackers at a threat. If you wanna scare them, get a big dog.

We need to hit stuff we shoot at. In a war, shoot a lot or as much ammo as you have or as long as supplies last, your call. Today so far, there is still an accountability for rounds fired, so I would try to ensure my hits are on target. You’re gonna be sued by the bad guys you shot or the remaining family pukes, and just imagine the furies if you shoot bystander kids.

The “tried by 12, carried by six” is a cute concept unless you wind up in court. Bluntly, as I advance in age personally and as I continue to train and teach others, I work and teach people to shoot as quickly as they can and yet hit the target.

It sounds stupid but it is true: “If you miss don’t shoot faster, shoot better.” And I admit it will be hard, stressful and more. When I get in an “at-ease comfort zone” or a student gets in the “shoot small groups zone” I press them and myself to go a bit quicker or increase range or decrease target size. Skill, size, distances all affect marksmanship. If I could give my students one “gift” it would be the gift of timing; how long does it take you to hit that target as quickly as possible with the first round?

Anything that moves as a target in training is a good thing. Balloons, anything is good to press the issue home that most often the threat is moving and we may have no other choice but to move also, move to contact, move to break contact, move to cover or concealment. Up front most people don’t like shooting stuff that moves because they don’t hit stuff that moves. The proper response is, “I didn’t hit it, I am going to keep shooting until I do hit it and be able to do so with two hands, one hand, left-handed”—yeah, you get it. You’re getting better by doing stuff you can’t normally do by doing stuff you can.

I worked with a guy once who said that the wobbler like targets weren’t realistic as they sway sort of back and forth. Duly noted. But it is still better than stationary and if the swaying can be interrupted into a lean or lean out from behind a representation of concealment it is better. We used to have a system called the Charger Deck in Texas. The targets ran directly at you and you better back up or you’d get run down or over.

It was clearly the most dangerous system I ever designed, and the darn thing was quite a training aid. But if you jumped up on that deck you had better be wired up to shoot and move. It morphed through several stages to get it to where we could use it without our peeing our pants while it was working—an example of a client-base killer. If you ever shot on the deck as a student, you loved it, but it was a wa-a-a-a-y big pay attention time.

I use Action Targets and Salute targets and homemade targets of every size and shape. Another good source with some cool stuff to help me get my work done is the MGM line. All are good targets and these good people make just a couple of targets I like.
This thing is slick as the targets discs move and you know what I think about moving targets. It has several different sizes of plates and the shafts are available in rigid or flexible versions. Both are good but the flex one is the real get your money deal. After the initial hit, the plates move kinda wherever it wants if you successfully hit it again ASAP, the movement simply increases. I like it a lot for partners or team drills were one person hits it and the other needs to pick up their first target while it is moving.

It does what it says, so it is moving and we discussed moving. I set the spinner so only one plate is visible then off color the low plate. When the top plate is struck the low bright-colored “flashes” to confirm a hit. Using handguns if you stay behind the sights and continue to hit the top plate you can roll the spinner completely over, and it is moving the whole time.

Pretty simple, yet effective when hit, it rolls back and then resets itself, the higher the hit the quicker the plate “drops.”
So with the use of either simply targeting or some stout affordable steel like the likes of MGM you can increase your skills. If you need a stop watch/timer, good for you, but remember you need to hit stuff first then add speed and then add distance.

You can never go wrong working timing and movement shooting exercises.

Action Target
P.O. Box 636, Provo, UT 84603
(888) 377-8033
action-target.com

MGM Targets
17891 Karcher Rd.
Caldwell, ID 83607
(888) 767-7371
mgmtargets.com