The Gun To Carry If You Can Carry Only One

There’s been some discussion lately over whether the new, popular pocket 9mm are really useful or not. I can dig it. They do seem like a solution in search of a problem. They’re pushing the boundaries of what could be considered a “pocket pistol”, but don’t offer the control and accuracy of a compact or subcompact 9mm. 

But. 

I consider the ultra-compact 9mm to be the “scout rifle” of concealed carry. No, they are not as concealable as a pocket .380, and no, they are not as powerful as a .45 and no, they are not as accurate as a compact 9mm like a Glock 26 or a Springfield XD-M. 

However, a small single-stack 9mm is 85% of all those guns. Just like a scout rifle is the rifle to have if you can have only one, a single-stack 9mm allows you to carry your gun in the front pocket or on your waist and gives you seven rounds (or more of 9mm) to stop the threat. 

Small 9mm’s don’t do one thing really well, but an ultracompact 9mm does a whole lot of things fairly well, and they work really well as the CCW gun to have if you can only have one. 

Tips For Women Buying Their First Handgun

Carrie from The Well Armed Woman has put together a two-part video series that is designed to help women who want to buy a gun, but don’t know where to start or how to shop for a handgun.

I’ve also got a few quick tips that might help make your first gun store trip a little easier:

• Make sure you’ve handled and fired as many handguns as possible so you know exactly what you are looking for before you step foot in a store. Ladies nights at indoor gun ranges that offer rentals are perfect for testing out a variety of handguns at a minimal cost.

• You may feel overwhelmed and intimidated the first time you walk in to a gun store.  Relax, everyone’s there to help.

• If you end up buying a handgun and it’s just not working for you, don’t stress, you can always sell it.  You might lose a little money, but almost all guns retain a good portion of their value, so it won’t be a huge mistake.

 

Competition is a proving ground.

Don’t be this guy.

“Man in a Rush Accidentally Shoots Himself Outside Walmart“

Police say a man was shot in the hand after his gun fell out of its holster while he hurried across a parking lot to avoid holding up traffic outside a Pennsylvania Walmart store.

So he was doing the right thing (carrying his sidearm in a holster), but the holster wasn’t up to the basic task of keeping his gun on his person while running across a road. 

Chances are, this guy bought a holster because it felt right or looked nice or was comfortable to wear, and unless you’ve taken a serious training class where running around and “stress fire” with your daily carry gear is part of the agenda and sidearm OR competed in USPSA/IDPA with the same kind of rig, you’ll never know if what you have on you is capable of handling physical activity beyond pulling yourself up off the couch. 

A practical pistol match subjects you AND your equipment to a certain amount of artificial stress. Is it the real thing? No. Is it the closest thing you’ll get to the real thing? Todd Green, Mike Seeklander, Michael Bane and Massad Ayoob say yes, and I believe them. Finding out if your holster of choice keeps your gun safe in a match will spare you the embarrassment and danger of failing to keep it safe on the streets. 

Choosing a second gun

If you’re one of the thousands and thousands of new gun owners who have purchased a firearm for home and personal defense, chances are, you’ve purchased some form of small, concealable pistol that’s easy to carry and conceal on your person. 

This a good choice, because a firearm that’s ready and safely close by is more  much more likely to help defend your life than a gun that’s unloaded under your bed. And make sure you get training above and beyond what’s required to own and/or a carry a firearm in your state. A CCW permit is just that: A permit, it is NOT a training program. There are many, many, good firearms training programs out there to choose from. Personally, I’m a fan of the NRA Personal Protection classes and Combat Focus Shooting instruction, but if you look around and ask around, I’m sure you’ll find a good instructor who’s near where you live.

So what’s a good gun to buy after you’ve purchased and familiarized yourself with your defensive firearm? What gun should you buy next? We’ll, that depends on a number of factors. If you’ve bought a rifle, shotgun or larger pistol for home defense, you may want to consider buying a smaller pistol for concealed carry so you can stay safe outside of the home as inside of it. 

If you have a pistol that works for concealed carry and home defense, consider purchasing a rifle that shoots .22 Long Rifle ammunition. .22 rifles are lightweight, VERY easy to shoot and the ammo is cheap to buy. .22 rifles are very common guns and will help teach trigger control and sight picture: There’s a reason why the Boy Scouts use them to teach marksmanship to young kids, and they’ll help shooters of any skill level get better. 

Something like the Ruger 10/22 is perfect for this job. It’s inexpensive, easy to find and can be endlessly accessorized and customized so you end up with a gun that’s right for your needs. Buy one today, and you’ll have a gun you can keep as an heirloom for future generations, 

Will Shooting Firearms Competitions Get You Killed?

Short answer: No. Doing dumb gun stuff in the midst of a gunfight gets you killed.
You can avoid doing dumb gun stuff under pressure by shooting practical pistol matches because they help vaccinate you against such things, one match at time. However, if you treat a real gunfight like it was a shooting match, you’ll be in a world of hurt.

Long answer: 

Massad Ayoob is probably THE most respected firearms instructor and personal defense consultant alive today. He literally wrote the book on personal defense with a firearm and his MAG40 pistol class is considered to be one of the best classes for dealing with what happens before, during and after the defensive use of a firearm. What does he say about shooting practical pistol matches? 

“A shooting competition isn’t a gun fight, but a gun fight is most definitely a shooting competition.” 

And he prefers IDPA as well.

Another firearms expert, Todd Green, formerly of Beretta, H+K, Sig-Sauer and now of pistol-training.com, explains his reasons why he recommends shooting competitions. 

“Possibly the biggest benefit of competition is that it is often the most stressful shooting many people will ever be exposed to. While obviously not the same as being in an actual gunfight, shooting in a competitive event in front of peers and strangers will do a great job of showing you just how easy it is to make mental mistakes under stress. Learning to stay focused on the task at hand and building experience fixing mistakes under pressure both have legitimate real world payoffs.
At the end of the day, there are pros and cons to competition shooting for the ‘defense-minded’shooter. But, the pros are pretty universal and the cons are really only cons if you let them be.“ (Emphasis in the original) 

Here’s some more expert opinion from top firearms trainer Mike Seeklander: Marine veteran, former law-enforcement officer and host of The Best Defense on Outdoor Channel. 

“I’ve always been a proponent of competitive shooting, as long as the individual competing understands what they are going to get out of shooting matches. They’re going to love it. They are going to get some energy from it. They are going to want to do it more. It will make the average person, especially the average police officer who doesn’t get to train much, WANT to train because every human wants to be better at something. BUT the rules of the game are different than the rules of defense with a gun.” (emphasis in the original)

So, will firearms competitions get you killed?

Yes, if you expect that a gunfight will play out by the rules of your game of choice. 

But if you want to shoot accurately and quickly during one of the worst days of your life, you may find that regularly shooting practical pistol competitions like IPDA or USPSA will provide you the skills and mindset you need to survive a gunfight and come out on top. 

Firearms Training has become mainstream

When The Art Of Manliness posts an article about attending the United States Shooting Academy and how to train with an airsoft gun, you know that learning how to operate a gun safely and effectively isn’t something for the military or mall ninja wannabes. Brett lists out some of the benefits of airsoft guns for firearms training, including… 

1:1 replica of your real gun. You can buy airsoft guns that look and feel like your real gun. They’ll fit in your holster. You can also add real-life tactical attachments to them. 

Provides near-realistic live-fire experience. Gas blow-back handguns do a good job simulating firing a real handgun. Great for practicing gun manipulation and drawing.

Low cost. This was the big selling point for me. A box of 50 real rounds can set you back $20. I can buy a bag of 3,500 airsoft BBs for $7. The low cost of airsoft allows you to experience a simulated live fire session for a fraction of the cost.

Safe. While you should treat an airsoft gun as if it were a real gun and take the same precautions as you would when practicing, you can rest easy that a BB won’t shoot through your garage wall and kill somebody.

You can do it anywhere. Instead of having to trek 20 miles to the gun range a few times a week, I can go to my garage every evening and practice to my heart’s content.

Provides opportunity for affordable, safe force-on-force training. If you want to practice real, force-on-force tactical scenarios, airsoft can help provide that experience. You can fire it at your buddy pretending to be a bad guy in your house and all he’ll feel is a sting (make sure he’s wearing eye protection though).

Awhile ago, I bought an airsoft replica of my daily carry gun, a CZ P07, and I found that practicing with it REALLY helped with practicing for practical pistol, and it was a great gun safety teaching tool for my wife and kids as well. If you’re hurting for training and practice because of the ongoing ammo shortage, consider purchasing airsoft replicas of your most-used guns and keep your skills up to date by practicing everything but the BANG with them.

Another Reason Why This Website Exists

The National Shooting Sports Foundation recently completed a survey of new gun owners and found that…

• The majority of first-time buyers (60.3 percent) tend to be active, using their gun once per month or more, with one in five reporting usage of once a week or more.
• Target shooting is by far the most popular shooting activity among first-time gun owners, with 84.3 percent of respondents saying they used their firearms for this purpose, followed by hunting (37.7 percent) and plinking (27.4 percent). Practical pistol shooting (17.3 percent) and clay-target shooting (14.6 percent) were shooting sports also enjoyed by first-time buyers.
• First-time gun owners who have participated in hunting (53.2 percent), practical pistol shooting (46.3 percent), clay-target sports (44.0 percent) and gun collecting (42.4 percent) said they want to increase their participation in these activities.

If you’re one of the many, many people who has purchased a gun in the last few years, welcome, we hope you’ll find something you’ll find useful and enjoyable. 

Stick around, and we’ll both learn something. 

A Quick Start Guide to Practical Pistol Competition

As a relative newbie who still remembers his first pistol competition, I thought I’d jot down a few notes to help others get started. I ain’t Rob Leatham (yet), but I sympathize with those who want to get into practical pistol but don’t know where to start.

• Shoot your daily carry pistol to start, but only if your daily carry gun is a compact 9mm or larger. If you carry a .38 snubbie or a compact .380, shoot something else. I started out with a CZ75 for home defence, and that’s what I still use in competition.
• Don’t succumb to the temptation to lowball the holster. A $30 Fobus may look the same as a $70 BladeTech, but they’re completely different to use. One releases smoothly and easily every time, and the other can hang up and turn into an embarrassing, slow and potentially dangerous tug of war. I found this one out the hard way.
• Don’t be intimidated by the other shooters. Even Brian Enos started out as a newbie.
• Go to a match just to watch and learn the etiquette, safety routine and procedures of shooting before you compete.
• Be sure to tell the scorer it’s your first time competing in a match: Chances are there will be a safety briefing you’ll need to go through before you compete, and that gives the scorer a chance to team you up with a more experienced shooter who can show you the ropes.
• Practical pistol is a good way to learn how to shoot in a stressful environment, but it’s also a sport, so…
• Relax. Be safe. Have fun.

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