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In my last piece I spoke of the fundamentals of marksmanship, and promised a practice method would follow. Wait no more, here it is. The following will provide a few methods that are pretty well universally accepted as appropriate and effective means to taking the fundamentals, and building your foundation in marksmanship. As this piece is geared toward beginners, I will tailor my firearm suggestions to that end. While the same methods apply just as much to .50BMG as they do to .22LR, cost and the potential to develop a nasty flinch widely seperate the two.

For the purpose of general practice, and the development of good marksmanship skills I suggest the following pistols, rifles, and calibers.

Pistols:

• Browning Buckmark, .22LR
• CZ75 (Cadet), 9mm (.22LR Conversion)

Rifles:

• Remington Model 572, .22LR
• Savage 11FXP30, .223 Remington

None of these firearms will break the bank, and all of them fire widely available and inexpensive ammunition. As an added bonus, each of the listed firearms are of a high quality, and are more than accurate enough to boost confidence. The goal here is to spend a little and get a lot.

The Dime/Washer Drill:

This technique works wonders in the world of stability, breathing, and trigger control. The dime/washer drill is also free (or very close to it.) I would not recommend this on a striker fired weapon, so we’ll go with centerfire only for this drill. For this drill you’ll need a straight rod that fits snug in your barrel, and as the name implies a dime or washer (any coin should work).

How does it work? First thing’s first, clear your weapon. Drop the magazine and cycle the action, release the cylinder and press the ejector rod, do whatever is required to cycle the action and visually verify that the chamber is clear. Now, take the rod and place it in the barrel such that between 2″ and 4″ protrude beyond the muzzle. Now, take your coin, and balance it on the rod. Usually you can manage this solo with a pistol, but with a rifle you need a partner to do the coin balancing for you while you maintain a steady firing position. The goal here is to aim at a safe point, preferably a target with a solid backstop, and from a steady position, execute a smooth trigger squeeze. When your position, breathing and trigger squeeze all come together properly the hammer will fall and the coin will remain balanced on the rod. If you have a double action/single action (DA/SA) pistol, you might want to do this drill both through the double action pull, and the single action pull.

At the Range:

Once you have reached the point with the dime/washer drill where more often than not, the coin remains on the rod after the hammer falls it is time to head to the range for some live fire exercises. Still being aimed at new shooters, things like controlled pairs, weak side shooting, and other more advanced methods will be ignored for now. The key, as I see it, has been said many times before “Aim small, Miss small”. If you practice aiming at, and hitting small targets – aiming at, and hitting large ones becomes much easier. For new shooters, I’ll suggest a range of less than 10m for pistol practice initially, and 100m or less for centerfire rifle (50m or less for rimfire). You can use the same targets for both, download one here.

For pistol and rifle, I suggest the same practice routine, scoped or not. Load the firearm, and take time to get a good sight picture, and fire three rounds using the fundamentals of marksmanship and a consistent point of aim. Repeat this on each target on the page, and as many targets as you have posted. For a range session, do not continue firing when fatigued, shoot 30 to 50 rounds. Slowly firing three round groups will allow for two things – sight adjustment if necessary, and a means to gauge any problems with your fundamentals. Provided proper execution of the fundamentals, and a consistent point of aim, you should have nice tight groups on the paper. If that group is not in the center of the target, a sight adjustment is necessary to shift the group to the center of the target. Do NOT adjust your point of aim to put rounds in the center of the target.

That’s all for now, happy shooting. Next time, I’ll cover some more advanced techniques.

My goal here is to fill a hole often left in training both new shooters, and seasoned shooters. All too often people ignore the basics, either because they never learned them, or because they are too caught up in the latest and greatest “tactic”. When it is all said and done shooting on a solid foundation, with proper fundamentals of marksmanship is key to success (and potentially survival). The following are the items I hit on every time I shoot, or introduce someone to shooting. I used these fundamentals long before enlisting in the United States Army, but found when I got there that the Army’s BRM (Basic Rifle Marksmanship) program was based on the very same points, in fact every major marksmanship program I’m aware of uses the same fundamentals.

The first major hurdle to a good foundation is just that, your foundation. By foundation, I’m talking about your personal shooting position and firing grip. You need a solid position and grip regardless of what firearm you’re firing, be it a rifle, pistol, shotgun, or M203 grenade launcher. Your firing position needs to be comfortable, and natural. It must also be solid. Whatever position you take up, strive for consistency, together with the other fundamentals, this consistency will pay in dividends on your target.

Once you find a position that is comfortable to you, check your natural point of aim. That is, the position at which you can be jostled or moved, with your eyes closed, and when you settle back into your position and open your eyes, you are still on target. Practice your grip and position to your natural point of aim and it will eventually become a thing of muscle memory. For myself personally, there is a specific position in the prone, and seated with my M16A2 in which I know by feel (both in and out of body armor) that puts my rifle on target with my line of sight. The same goes for pistol shooting in a modified weaver stance, there is an ingrained position where I know my sight picture will naturally line up.

This moves us on to the next fundamental, sight picture. Now, this will vary based on your style of sights, and weapon system. For this, I’ll go with a standard post and notch system. I will get this out of the way early – front sight, front sight, front sight. This goes for any iron sight system I can think of – focus on the front sight. Your rear sight should be slightly blurry and your front sight crisp and centered in your target, the top edge of your front and rear sights should be lined up. In time I will put some images of proper sight alignment, but for now a quick Google on the topic should turn up good information.

Your breathing pattern is important to marksmanship, erratic breathing will adversely impact your position, ability to focus clearly on your sight picture, and your trigger pull, ultimately resulting in a poor shot. This is not to say firing accurately under stress in impossible, far from it. In the Army we practice stress fires, by putting on full battle gear, and running at times several miles to targets where we have a two minute limit to engage 40 targets. It is important to be aware of how your breathing relates to your shooting. There is a natural pause between each breath, and this pause is the ideal time to execute your trigger squeeze. You do not need to hold your breath, just be aware of the natural pauses between each breath, and use these pauses to fire in.

Finally, you have your trigger squeeze, if you botch this part, the chances of hitting even a well aimed shot from a steady position, with proper breathing decrease greatly. The trigger squeeze should be accomplished through smooth constant pressure on the trigger, in one fluid motion, directly rearward to the trigger stop. There are many philosophies as to which portion of the finger to use, personally, I use the pad of my finger before the first joint.

Combine these fundamentals to make a good foundation as a shooter, and your results will show it. When training new shooters, introduce them properly, cover safety first, and then move to the fundamentals. Later, I will write about some techniques one can use to practice the fundamentals, and obtain muscle memory without range fees and ammunition costs being a factor.

First things first, when dealing with firearms of any kind, for any reason, safety should be your number one priority. It doesn’t matter if you’re plinking, hunting, or engaged in combat, safety is still number one. There are no valid exceptions, period. If you glance off to the side, you’ll see four very simple rules that you should never break, ever.

Allow me to elaborate, some seem to think rules exist to be broken, these rules exist to maintain safety, and to ultimately save lives. If you’re wondering what I’m talking about, I’ll go a bit further in depth. The rules, as I know them, if followed, will remove any and all possibility for any sort of negligent discharge. Note I said negligent, I can recognize a select, and very few cases in which a discharge can occur by genuine accident and these are all the result of the mechanical failure of a firearm. That said, poor quality, or freak manufacturing flaws aside, mechanical failure can also typically be traced back to – you guessed it: negligence.

I will state for fact, that if you treat your weapon as if it is loaded, at all times; keep your finger off the trigger and the safety engaged until you are ready to fire that weapon; never point your weapon at anything you do not wish to destroy; and continuously maintain awareness of your target, and the area around it; at no time will you ever accidentally shoot anything. I have followed these rules for some 16 years, and have yet to so much as “accidentally” have a hammer drop on an empty chamber.

Rather disappointingly, I have seen people who have been shooting longer than I have been alive fail to uphold, or even grasp those four simple fundamental rules of firearm safety. More alarmingly, I’ve seen younger people have no concept of safety at the range whatsoever. Thank God for Range Safety Officers, here in the Army they tell us that everyone is a safety on the range, and they’re right. If you see something unsafe, you need to either point it out to an RSO, or tactfully alert the offender.

The range is not the only place I’ve seen this happen. Even here in Iraq I’ve seen soldiers, people who have been professionally trained, and undoubtedly sat through countless safety briefings, walk around with a round in the pipe, and their safeties off – sometimes with a finger inside the trigger guard. I’ve seen soliders jokingly point their weapons at their battle buddies face – and pull the trigger. I’m sure you’ve all read the news stories that start that way. Now ask these two questions: Could any of that happen if the rules were followed? If death results, is the weapon at fault? Provided you maintain your sanity, and have a rationale grounded here on planet Earth, your answer to both will be NO!

I’m going to go out on a limb here and suggest that the problem lay not with firearms, but with a lack personal responsibility, and in the case of youth, a lack of education. The older offenders have less than no excuse, particularly the service member personnel, their negligence is either the result of a total lack of responsibility, or sheer ignorance, the latter being easily rectified by the motivated. I suggest the following, if you have young children, regardless of your position on firearm ownership, at a bare minimum teach them the four fundamental rules of firearm safety. Do not wait for them to “grow up”, I learned at 5 and the message took a good solid root.

On to the “tactical” rant, inspired by a few magazine articles, and internet forum threads I’ve read recently. There seems to be a ridiculously high population of Chairborne Rangers roaming about, packing the latest and greatest in “tactical” gear – from magazines, holsters, pistols, carbines, rifles, shotguns, and ammunition – training for their last stand when the proverbial fecal matter is shoveled into the fan. I am not saying that the multitude of pistol/shotgun/rifle classes available teaching civilians to shoot, move, and communicate are a bad thing. In fact, I support training, developing, and honing the skills required to effectively deploy your tools (firearms are in fact tools, do not let anyone tell you otherwise) in your defense, or the defense of others.

What I object to is the mentality that one man, no matter how heavily armed, is going to make the mythical stand against an army of home invaders, charging with violence of action into the living room, and single handedly clearing his home and emerging the victor of some glorious homestead battle. Can we be realistic please? If you have 5 elite super ninja deathmasters, all dressed in black, fast roping onto your roof from some silent helicopter in the dead of night you either need to wake up, turn off your Playstation, or seriously re-evaluate your business ventures.

Having a home defense plan is a good thing. Being willing to escalate to rapid violence of action to defend yourself and yours is likewise a good thing. However, one needs to be able to differentiate between times where a rapid and explosive offensive response would more likely than not end rapidly in your death or serious demise, and times where one should take up a solid defensive position, and call in the cavalry so to speak (911). Now, I know with all the multi-thousand dollar training you’ve invested in you’re elite, and ready to take on a small army. AHHHHH-NOLD did it in “Commando”, why can’t you!

Allow me to extinguish the potentially fatal flames of over zealous will to fight. Taking a defensive position and calling for backup (in the case of most civilians that would be the police) is not a shameful thing, it is not something “sissies” do, it is a good sound tactic. The men that wear body armor, carry 210 rounds of armor piercing ammunition, and wear BDUs because they have to use the very same tactic – and we clear buildings with platoons of men. If the odds go down the toilet, we defend our ground, and call in backup, artillery, CAS, and anything else we can get our hands on. In short, don’t feel like you absolutely must rush out into your living room to save your television from 3 armed robbers. Those are bad odds. Sure, you’ve aced stages of fire with 4 moving targets in 3 seconds. They weren’t firing back.

In short, unless I happen to be properly equipped, and manned, during a violent home invasion, or other urban (or rural for that matter) conflict. I will execute a plan of defense, using my knowledge of my own surroundings to afford proper cover and concealment while creating an appropriate sector of fire should anyone venture into my direct defended area, and call in the cavalry. In the end, the call is yours to make, and best of luck whatever your choice is, just don’t feel obligated by your tactical thigh holster to rush out into unknown odds and make the paper in the obituary section.

As a note, in extremely dire circumstances, it may well be time to go all or nothing – but that is something you need to decide as the situation dictates

I first handled a Winchester 1894 a few years ago. It was sitting all alone in the back of my Granpa’s gunsafe and I asked about it. I’m not sure how old the rifle was, but it had definately seen its fair share of use.

When I finally picked it up, and held the stock up to my cheek, the rifle damn near aimed itself. Dispite being in less than 10% condition with regards to remaining finish, and stock wear, the action was smooth as glass, and the trigger pull was great as far as I’m concerned. I knew right then and there, without ever even firing one, that an 1894 would make its way into my collection.

Fast forward to mid-June 2003, and I’m in Collector’s Firearms of Houston, TX. Usually I only go to drool, and I wasn’t even planning on purchasing anything. I walked past the rack of lever guns, and this one rifle in particular practically yelled at me when I walked by. I picked it up, took a look down the bore with a light, worked the action some, and tested the trigger. About an hour later, I left the store having completely blown the paycheck I recieved only hours earlier, and with the Winchester 1894, in .30-30 Winchster that is pictured below.

A few days after I bought the rifle, I took it out to the range and ran 20 rounds of Remington Core-Lokt 170gr hollowpoints through it. The gun flat grouped. Not having windage adjustment doesn’t matter with this gun, it hits where you point it. I only shot at 50 yards my first time out with it, and was able to hold sub 1″ groups at varied elevations (I was messing with the elevation ladder) while shooting offhand. Color me impressed.

My first and only revolver. A snub-nosed .38 Special +p from Smith and Wesson. This is one light little pistol, but with +p ammo it recoils much more sharply than my .45 does with heavy +p loads. Those of you that can decipher S&W naming schemes will note the LS, and the fact that it stands for “Lady Smith”. Some might even point out that the Lady Smith pistols are for women! To those that my snicker at an Infantryman with a Lady Smith, I ask this – if a 125gr jacketed hollow point is traveling in your general direction at any thing over slingshot velocity, does it really matter if the words Lady Smith happen to be enscribed anywhere on the source? I didn’t think so.

I’ve given it some thought, and the old reports from my Combat Commander should remain as they were. I’ll keep that bit of the old, old, old site alive. If you want to read the old reports, go here.

• It is ALWAYS loaded, always treat a firearm as such.
• NEVER point the muzzle of any firearm at anything you do not wish to destroy
• Be aware of your target, and everything beyond it.
• Keep your finger away from, and off the trigger until you are ready to fire.

Look for things like range reports, pistol, rifle, holster, ammunition, and accessory reviews, and my general thoughts on a few firearm related topics. More content will follow as I import my old entries into WordPress.