Range Day 29 Aug.14

Fridays are range day at our house.  This past Friday was another great day for shooting at our local range, Gateway Rifle and Pistol Club (http://www.grpc-jax.com/) in Jacksonville. The usual crew was there my DW, and my DS as well as a couple of DS’s buddies (J.W. and M.P.) and I had a new student as well, Mrs. G.

The morning was bright, clear and, of course, warm as any good day in North Florida in late August can be.  Glad I am cold blooded 😉

While the guys and my DW worked on their pistol skills I took Mrs. G over to the next shooting lane to get her started.  Now, Mrs. G (a close family friend) is an entirely new shooter.  So we started from scratch.  For those of you who don’t know, I am a firm believer in the KISS principal.  Which, I think, works our pretty well when teaching any new shooter.

Mrs. G was a little nervous when we first started, as she had never shot a pistol before.   So we started on one of the best and easiest pistols to shoot, the Smith & Wesson model 22A-1.

Smith & Wesson Model 22A-1 Target Pistol

(Yes, I know this is a poor photograph because of my poor choice of backgrounds, but hey sometimes you have to use what you have handy at the time.)

Now, the nice thing about the 22A-1 is that it is well balanced, has a nice smooth trigger, a long sight radius and virtually no recoil.  Which make it a great starter gun for a new shooter, if the shooter’s hands are big enough.  It does have a rather large hand grip on it, but in this case it fit Mrs. G like a glove.

First, we worked on her grip and hand positions.  As a lefty, the position of the safety was a bit of a problem for her at first . . .  but it only took a few tries to get that worked out.  I had her practice her slow and steady trigger squeeze using my Mark-5 trigger trainer (my ball point pen, the click and release works well for dry fire practice).  Not fancy but it works. Then we moved on to a real target at 5 yards.  Take a breath, let it half way out, and bang a nice shot.  Again and again.  By the end of the morning Mrs. G was no longer nervous and well on her way to becoming a great shooter.

Now meanwhile, the rest of the group was having their own grand old time.  Everyone took turns target shooting and shooting plates, all the while swapping guns just for fun. All and all, it was just another great day at the range.  And remember, any day at the range is better than any day at work . . .  unless, of course, you can do both at once.  It just doesn’t get much better than that. 😉

Take care and be safe out there.  And do yourselves a favor; take time out of your busy schedule for your own range day!  You will be glad you did.

S3