SensibleShooter - About Us

What's right about practical shooting

Practical shooting tests skills useful in real world applications. It has its roots in martial/combat shooting. First came conventional ("bullseye") shooting, derived from the first formalized marksmanship training programs. This was an important step and the principles founded in conventional shooting serve as the back bone of all forms of marksmanship. But group shooting is the beginning step, albeit an important one. Eventually, if the firearm is to serve any useful purpose, the shooter must learn handling skills and develop consistent smoothness with them. Getting into position, on target, ready for sustained action is as critical as raw precision for real world use. Practical shooting tests all these elements like no other discipline before it.

What's wrong with practical shooting

A common complaint against practical shooting is unrealistic guns, gear and scenarios. While there is truth in this, it only scratches the surface. Even the most "gamey" practical events have provisions for basic issue/production equipment, which is what the majority of participants use, and the "unrealistic" gear of today may find real world application tomorrow. For example, "unpractical" optical sights have now become commonly-issued sights in the military and on police tactical teams and the trigger blocks first used on skimpy "full race" holsters have found use as retention devices in security holsters.

A bigger issue with courses is that they are ineffective at teaching practical shooting. Shooting a stage won't help you learn to be a better shooter without a break down analysis. Let's ask a top pro shooter about this:

When I shoot a match, I break down a stage into basic shooting functions. I then practice those functions as a drill until I perfect my performance.
I only train using drills... Stages are too complicated and don't allow you to properly improve a specific area.
- Rob Leatham

If a long time, top shooter like Mr. Leatham still has to break everything down into a drill, then so do the rest of us. Why not dispense with the circus-carnival stages and focus on running real, skill-building courses at matches instead? Would that not be - practical?

Rarely mentioned is the hassle in setting up and scoring typical events. To host any number of separate courses, a range has to have separate bays. Only one shooter can shoot the course at a time, creating a bottleneck for an event of any size. A course that a good shooter can complete in under 20 seconds may take a few people several minutes to score, paste and reset, and several person-hours to set up and later tear down. A practical course should be practical to set up and run, too.

The Sensible solution:

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Yes, there is a real person behind this website. I'm John, nice to meet you. Military side, I'm a small arms instructor in the US Army Reserve with the Small Arms Readiness Group, on active duty since 2003, am a member of the USAR Shooting Team, and have managed a few first-place wins at the All Army Small Arms Championships and AFSAM (Armed Forces Skills at Arms Meeting.) Civilian side, I have a Bachelor of Science degree in Management Computer Systems, hold several shooting classifications at "Master" level, am a NROI-certified Range Officer, and NRA life member.

I'll be away on active duty until 2008, but I'm still working on the project when I can. Hopefully I'll answer your questions in the newsletter (you did sign up for for the free newsletter, right?) If I don't, you can reach me by email (spelled out to fool the spambots!): jbuol -(at)- copper -(dot)- net