Sunday Range Trip

Given recent events, there was more of a rationale to get to the range and get better.

Met up with Tosh at the range. It was in the low 30s and breezy, 

I had just put a new suppressor on the PS90 , so I took it to the range and got some trigger time in.

It's a Polonium K, replacing the SilencerCo Hybrid 46 that is going to be used on another rifle.  

The Polonium K is both thinner and smaller than the 46 and took only two days of ATFE processing from start to finish (compared to the 46's over a year to get approved) and no tax. Thank you President Trump!

It looks much better on the PS90 than the 46, and given the suppressor bore size, suppresses better than the 46.

 

 

I'm quite happy with it, makes the PS90 package footprint even smaller, and the PS90 keeps running like a champ.

After some rifle and PDW fun, we got on to practice with pistols.

I ran the Walther PDP, and it ran through all the drills without any issues. 

All drills were done from concealment and given the weather we had on rather heavy sweatshirts for the drills. 

We started with the single shot from concealment to the 7 yard A-zone drill.

I definitely had some rust to shake off.  I was getting hits in around 1.5-1.4 seconds once I settled in, with some much higher times as well.

We then did the 3&2 drill and I did better with that  getting under 3 seconds pretty regularly and some runs under 2.5 which was good.

Then on to Bill Drills.  I was able to get under 3.0 seconds which was good, and I'm still chasing the sub 2 second time - from afar.

For the final drill,  the one shot from concealment to an A-Zone at 25 yards we ended with a bang.  My best times were two at 1.60 seconds, and generally I was around 1.78-1.70 on average, which was pretty happy-making for me.

Tosh, by comparison, was averaging a fast 1.65, and had a couple at 1.6, and one at a blazing fast 1.35 seconds which is fantastic. The man can shoot.

A most challenging bit of practice, and it just points out I've got lots to work on to improve.

Gun School: Adaptive Combat Pistol - Day 2

 Day 2 began in the same way as Day 1 - the 3 round fade-back drill and the orange dot drill.  I did an almost clean fade-back, dropping two shots low.  Both drills are really good warm-ups and a good way to make the most out of a limited and pricey ammunition supply.

On the upside, both shooters with misfitting holsters brought proper fitting holsters today.  If you're going to spend hundreds on a gun, and hundreds on a class to learn to shoot it better, spend some money on a properly fitting holster for it.

 Then it was on to some shooting offhand only, starting with the gun on the floor simulating you had been hit in your strong hand and dropped the gun.

Dave Spaulding would explain why each of these drill was done and the reasons for it, and often a lot of the history and development of why the techniques have evolved as they have over time.

Then we went on to shooting from different positions - kneeling, double knee kneeling, sitting, fetal position, and supine and moving through all of them and the reasons and advantages/disadvantages of each.

 Having run through that a few times on a concrete floor and you get a workout and rather sore both.

Then we did shooting from cover with the lunge technique which beats the fan / head leading technique for reducing your visible area to an attacker around cover.   Hadn't seen that before and it was rather enlightening.

Then we shot the 5 in 5 drill - 5 rounds at 5 yards, 10 years, 15 yards, 20 yards, and 25 yards with 5 rounds each from the holster/concealment in 5 seconds maximum time for each distance at an 8.5x11 target.

I made the time for all five areas, cleaning the 5 yards in under 3.5 seconds, but dropped a couple shots so didn't get a clean.

The class then ended with the performance of the 2x2x2 drill.  No one earned a belt buckle this class, even though the record holder with a 1.57 second time - Mike  - was in attendance.  I did it in 2.06 seconds, missing it by .06. 

It was a great class and I learned a lot from Mr. Spaulding.

Sadly, this may be the last year that Dave Spaulding will be teaching classes.  

I'd strongly advise getting out and taking on of his classes this year if you're able as you get a chance to improve your shooting, gain a lot of techniques, and a lot of the background for the development of these techniques and the reasons why for them. 

In short, the class was well worth it.

Gun School: Adaptive Combat Pistol - Day 1

Yesterday,  I attended Day 1 of Dave Spaulding's Adaptive Combat Pistol class held at Detroit Sportsmens Congress.

It's an excellent class with a very experienced, personable, and capable instructor.

Unfortunately, these days, the replacement cost of the ammunition I have burned through exceeds the cost of the class.

There were 16 students attended so it was two squads of 8 on the line at a time.

Class began with some warmups and Dave walked the line and saw things that could be improved as a result.  He spent time with each student and customized advice and also worked on getting everyone to stop pinning the trigger.  We also worked on the draw and grip.

Most were pretty good shooters and a few were really outstanding.

A few though had some holster choices that had me look a tad askance especially when standing behind them.

The gun was not fitting in the holster and the trigger was exposed the whole time.  Another shooter also had a leather holster that similarly didn't fit the gun they were running and was doing the course with the trigger hanging out.

Then we moved on to manipulating the gun and clearing malfunctions, first with both hands then one handed.  We also tried malfunction clearing sitting down one handed.  Then we added live fire to the jam clearing.

And that's when the fun started.

We were doing a one-handed stoppage drill - from standing - point gun downrange, pull trigger, hear click, then clear the jammed case by first a tap to the magazine and then racking the slide using whether the red dot window or shelf of the sights on your belt, holster, or other surface that normally have available to rack the slide. This tends to have the ejector port facing down so gravity helps as well.

Next after clearing the jam you quickly fire two shots at the target.

So one guy was on the line went click, turned his Glock over, racked it on his belt and BAM!

Round hits the floor in front of him.

His finger was not on the trigger.  This got people interested to see what was going on.

He repeated the drill and cleared the jam, this time angling the gun to point at the backstop and BAM!

Round hits the backstop in front of him. His finger again was not on the trigger.

While he had had no failures when the gun was upright, turning it upside down to clear it caused it to fire.  

It turns out he had a Zev extra light striker in it and the cruciform of the trigger bar had worn enough to detach it from the trigger housing.  With the combination of those two issues, once upside down, nothing stopped the striker from moving forward to slam fire the round  when the slide closed.    The striker and trigger bar were replaced and his Glock then hummed along happily after that.  Kinda exciting.

We then moved on to jam clearance while moving, and then on to one handed reload drills including while moving, which were conducted without drama.

 Day 1 ended and I had learned a lot.  I'll write up Day 2 once it is done.

Today's Range Trip - A Great Range Outing With Friends

A bunch of friends decided to meet up at the range today.  Four of them were rolling buddies from jiu-jitsu - it seems there's a large cross-over between the jiu-jitsu community and the firearms community. 

Tosh had also brought Scott along, one of his co-workers that had recently escaped from California and is now enjoying standard capacity magazines and the many other benefits being relocated from CA can provide.

It was sunny out, but the temperature had plummeted 30 degrees from yesterday. Standing in the sun, it wasn't bad - but get under some shade and 30 degrees feels cold pretty quickly.

We started out with rifles/arm-braced pistols and I shot my new build for the first time:

 

It's a 10.5 inch AR on a stripped Spike's lower.  Lower and Upper all pit together from parts. I had a stripped upper lying around for awhile now, and I decided to get it built up, and now seemed to be the time to do it.  I decided to put some decent parts into it, including a flat Geissele trigger which is awesome, a Midwest industries rail and some other decent parts.

It ran flawlessly on this it's first time out, which was nice. Got the scope dialed in as well. It's a Vortex Strike Eagle 1-8 and it is very decent glass.  Very fast at the low magnifications and sharp at the high end.

I also installed the AAC 7.62SDN suppressor onto it and it ran like a champ, but a quieter champ.

Then on to the Tavor, complete with silencer attached as I had installed an AAC flashider on it as well.

It ran like a top with the suppressor attached, and with the suppressor it was still shorter overall than the 10.5 was bare, complete with the Tavor's 13" barrel.  I do think its my favorite rifle at this point.

Interestingly, it appears that 5.56 makes the suppressor a lot hotter, longer,  than the 300 Blackout for some reason. 

Scott had a blast and enjoyed shooting the suppressed rifles, and everyone else's rifle there too.  We're friendly like that.

Then on to pistols.

I had a great set at shooting at a steel A zone at 25 yards.  

On timer, from draw to hit my best time today was 1.4 seconds, with other runs at the 1.67-1.70 second range.  Quite happy-making.

The 3x2 drill was in the 3 econd range so it still needs some work.

Scott and others liked the Masada quite a bit.  A solid 150 rounds through it with zero issues.

Scott also enjoyed shooting my suppressed M&P Compact 22 - so quiet you don't need ear pro, and the sound of the bullet hitting the steel is louder than the shot.  Much fun.

He now wants to buy a suppressor, because he can now.  And another angel gets its wings.

We also helped Jason out quite a bit with appendix carry.  Jason has a lot of reserve muscle mass you might say, so he's shied away from appendix carry as a result.  

He recently got a Shadow Systems MR918 and its a great pistol and he's running an RMR on it with good results.  

With a borrowed PHLster Floodlight holster  and a Surefire attached to his pistol we got him trying appendix carry out. First with just a bluegun, then the real gun and active shooting.

Having him try appendix as compared to his usual IWB hip position, his draws were measurably faster on the timer - At least a second or more faster - and that's trying appendix for the first time after carrying hip side for years.   Pretty impressive improvement just from changing the carry location.

Lots of fun shooting and a great bunch of guys.

Range Time: Fun And The MSP Class Did Improve My Shooting

Went to the range this morning with Tosh, Tosh's brother visiting from New York, and Duffy.

First we did some rifle shooting,  Tosh's brother got to try out lots of this he can't have in New York, like 30 round magazines, modern sporting rifles,  SBRs, and suppressed .22s. 

He really liked the Tavor, and had fun shooting Tosh and Duffy's ARs.

Much fun was had as a result.  He really enjoyed the opportunity getting to shoot all that stuff.

Then on to pistol shooting, and here's where the Modern Samurai Project class and some dedicated dry fire practice trying to learn the techniques afterwards really showed some results.

First for a warm-up we shot the plate rack. I cleared all 6 plates in 4.45 seconds which was decent. Plate racks are fun.

We then shot the various drills that are part of the MSP standards.

My best times were the following.

3x2 drill: clean in 2.79 seconds and a 1.25 second draw.

7 yard one shot: 1.57

Bill drill: 2.8 clean

25 yard single shot - best time was 1.33 with a hit!  

That was pretty darn good,  I also did it in 1.44 and 1.50 with good hits, and all three of which would meet the standard.  Yes, that was with practice, and not nearly all shots were that fast and accurate, but I'm rather happy with those times.  Now that I know that I can do it, I can work to try and start doing it consistently.

Overall it's still not near the MSP Black Belt standards. But, amazingly to me at least,  the 25 yard 1-shot drill did meet the standards, and if I can do it on the hardest part of the standards, I should be able to work to get the other parts up there too.

My shooting has definitely improved in both speed and accuracy due to the class.

That's 200 more rounds through the Masada, zero failures.

A darn good time at the range, now to try and scrounge up some more 9mm.

Gun Skool - Training With The Jedi

This weekend, I along with my buddy Tosh,  was in Holland, Michigan for a 3-day class  The Path To Performance with The Modern Samurai Project - Scott Jedlinski, aka Jedi.

Scott Jedlinski is one of the, if not the, foremost instructors on the use of the red dot sighted pistol and appendix carry.

The class was like drinking from a fire-hose.

Scott began by stating that what he was teaching was not the only way, and that unless your instructor was an actual Mandalorian, any instructor who pronounces their class to be The Way is an instructor that one should be wary of as it is only A Way.  

He encouraged us from the start to question all of the technique and to take from the class what worked for us, and to only adopt what we had thoroughly tested and found to work.

Thorough testing there was.

The class began the first day with appendix carry and why he posits the method of carry is superior to strong side carry in terms of ergonomics and efficiency.  Scott is fully focused on being efficient via technique.

First we discussed body mechanics and why appendix carry makes the most sense in terms of efficiency.

Then on to body positioning.  Scott is critical of the isosceles stance both in terms of foot positioning hampering movement and forward and rearward stability, and how with locked out elbows recoil management suffers.  

Let's put it this way, my default stance prior to this class was indeed the isosceles.  Not anymore. 

Based on actually comparing the isosceles to the stance setup by Scott which is somewhat of an improved weaver type stance (support foot forward a step,  not over-bending the knees, arms bent at elbows, extended forward equally) in the drills we performed, it is very clear that there is significant improvement in recoil control, mobility, and efficiency by dumping the isosceles.  It is now so dumped by me.  Learning occurred.

Then on to the grip.  I have a trash panda grip  (an old style crush grip) that I must continue to work on changing as it is the main thing holding back my performance. Scott promotes a very high grip, with the strong hand only holding the pistol loosely with the support hand, and thumbs high up on the slide.  With the support hand,  especially the pinky of that hand, strongly gripping the gun for recoil control and dot management - with his technique, the dot on the draw drops perfectly from 12 o clock to the center of the sight -- every damn time.  Life changing. This was a revelation.

I still need to work on my draw and grip though until this change is ingrained. I keep reverting and even worse seem to bang my support hand into the gun, stopping it for a moment on the draw which is damn weird to watch on video.  Scott is very big on having you video your practice so you can see what you're doing well or not, and it helps.

Scott first demos each exercise, often several times based on what he is trying to convey, then has the students do it as he watches each student perform the drill, and he gives you immediate personal feedback.   This leads to a lot of reps as he walks the line working with each and every student.  This is not a go off and do drills class while he watches in the distance. He is hands on with each and every student diagnosing issues and helping students get better.   The class then discussed after each exercise if the technique worked for them, what they saw/felt during the technique and what they felt they did right or need to work on.

A few students then tried his Black Belt Standards Test.  There were some amazing shooters there, and while they got close, no one cleared it.  The test as you can see is kinda spicy.

After the first day of class, a bunch of the students and Scott headed into Holland for some food together and we ate some wings, had beer, and chatted.

The next day we met at the range and got on to focus on red dot shooting - everything from 3 yards to 25 yards.  Zeroing was discussed and he put forth his reasons why a 10 yard zero makes the most sense in terms of time and efficiency over a 25 yard zero and he had very cogent points for saying so.  Again he stated you can choose as you like and decide for yourself after trying both and xo long as you know the reasons why for both.

We did the 3x5 drill, and single shot drills at 7, 10, and 25 yards along with multiple other exercises.

Then 11 students in the class decided to try the Black Belt Test -Tosh and I among them.  None of us made it. I wasn't even close, and that's ok.

In the 3x5 my time was 2.51 but had misses, so no good.

At 7 yards I had a 1.12 time with a hit.  Which was pretty darn good for me, but it may have been luck and not skill.

On the Bill Drill I did a 2.48 but with half missing the A Zone.

And the one shot at 25 yards I had a 1.69 and a hit on the A Zone.

Saturday night quite a few of us met at the class host's house for a cookout and a BYOB party.  This was fun and lots of great conversation with some seriously interesting people. 

Since Tosh and I both do Jiu-Jitsu and Jedi is an accomplished practitioner as a 4-stripe purple belt, the talk turned to jitsu and some techniques, and then he offered to show us some pointers.

Yes, I got to learn some jitsu from the Jedi.   Way cool.

We headed to some mats the host had in the basement, and I got some great pointers on technique and really changed my mindset - as a result in rolls yesterday I was a lot more active, dynamic, and controlling in the rolls and won more than I lost, and had much better movement.  Simply amazing.

Sunday was about 25-yard distance shooting, Bill Drills, shooting on the move, and other activities. Lots of shooting and multiple exercise, all useful and learned a lot. 

We shot B8 targets at 25 yards, and I tended to hit in the high 80s, low 90s - it needs some work and it's the grip that is the culprit.

Then on to Bill Drills. I shot a clean Bill Drill in 3.0 seconds exactly during the testing phase of the drill, which was nice.  

Then the class ended with another Black Belt test.  Again, no one cleared it but a few came darn close (no, I wasn't one of them) and my scores were:

3x5 my time was 2.53 clean - while not close, this was still happy making for me as it was a solid clean run.

At 7 yards I had a 1.11 time with a hit. 

On the Bill Drill I did a 2.41 but with misses out of the A Zone.

And on the one shot at 25 yards I had a 1.66 and a hit to the C Zone so it doesn't count. Drat, but at least I hit the target.

The test is humbling and an excellent corrective should you ever think you're too good to get out and practice.  I need more practice and more practice will occur.  

In other news, that was 845 rounds through the IWI Masada with zero malfunctions this weekend, which is nice.

Then the class picture and the class ended with us each receiving a  class patch and everyone gave their thoughts as to how the class went and what was learned.  Yes the class mascot was a well trained K9 Dutch Shepard named Rip, brought to the class by a dog trainer that was attending the course - he's an amazing fur missile.

In short, I cannot recommend this class highly enough.  

As a red dot class, it blew Sentinel Concepts Red Dot class away in terms of content, technique, methodology, and instruction.  

The Class is simply fantastic and well worth the cost. If you want to learn a way to be better with your red dot and appendix carry, Jedi would be highly recommended as an excellent way to learn both red dot and appendix carry.

Range Trip - Some Drill Improvements Noted

So Today I met up with Tosh and his friend Duffy at the range for some more focused practice.

Tosh had ordered and on Friday received a steel A-Zone target, so this was going to be fun. It made scoring the targets much easier and the ping was the thing - if you didn't hear it you missed.  No need to recover the A zone or wonder if you hit it at 25 yards.

We first did 3x2 Drills on paper targets at 3 yards. Typically I was shooting them pretty clean in about 3.5 seconds but was having trouble getting faster than that today.

For the 7 yard 1 shot from concealment, my best time today was down to 1.1 seconds which was happy-making, considering last time I was doing my best at 1.5 seconds so that was a nice improvement. 1.0 is the goal there, and I'm getting close.

Then for the Bill Drills, but the best time I think I had today shooting it clean was 3.71 so I still need to work on that. 

Seems like I'm now having the most problems on the multiple shot drills.  So, more stuff to practice.

For the single shot at 25 yards from concealment my best time was 1.58 seconds which was must better than my best time of 1.98 the last go-round:

 

That felt pretty good, and if I can shave off .08, I can meet my goal on that drill at least. 

A very good time was had by all and we all saw some improvement in our shooting by practicing these drills. A lot of dryfire practice also seems to be paying off as well.

 That's another 350 rounds through the Masada with no issues.  Now, I need to find more ammo.

Morning At The Range: Drills and More Drills

Tosh and I met up at the range this morning to get in a couple hours of focused practice.

First, we started at 3 yards with the 3x2 drill - 3 to the A Zone and 2 to a 3x5 card in the head box.

Drawing from concealment, after practice we were getting it down regularly to under three seconds, but want to get it down to two seconds, which is going to take a heckuva lot more practice.

Second, we did a single shot drill at 7 yards to the A zone.  Again from concealment we were able to get it under 1.5 seconds, but again to improve it is going to take a heckuva lot more practice.

Third we did a Bill Drill at 7 yards.   Again from concealment draw and 6 shots to the A Zone. At times we could get it under 2.5 seconds but not always consistently. Again, to improve it is going to take a heckuva lot more practice.

Finally we did a single shot drill at 25 yards.  Accuracy s generally sucked so lots of hits outside the A zone which didn't count for the purposes of the drill, but we were able to get it on occasion down to 1.98 with a hit on the A box. Again to improve it is going to take a heckuva lot more practice.

So yep, if you haven't guessed, the takeaway from this morning's endeavors was that to improve it is going to take a heckuva lot more practice. 

We've tentatively scheduled another range trip for an early morning next week assuming more ammo arrives in time.

Then, off to get some actual work done.  A range trip was not a bad way to start the day.

That's another 250 rounds through the Masada, and some good practice in before the next USPSA match that is set for this Sunday.

Range Trip - Smile, Wait For Flash

Went to the range yesterday morning with some friends.

Tosh brought his AR15 that he had built, complete with a rather impressive muzzle brake.

Not only does it push the muzzle blast to the sides and away from the shooter, it gives off some very worthy muzzle flash fireballs.

Lots of fun.  Also easy to hit targets at 100 yards.  Just put the dot on the bottom edge of the target and you'll hit it.

I then brought my AR in 300 Blackout for comparison.

That was fun.

Also shot the 6.5 Creedmoor at 100 yards and put most shots into the x ring of a B8 target, which was happy making.  Its functioning great, especially after I gave the bolt some more oil.

We also did some pistol shooting, included some timed drills which were good as they indicated we need more practice. Which we will get in.

A great time had by all, then I went home to be productive and get some work done.

Deputy Has Excellent Shooting Performance Under Pressure

An Eaton County, Michigan Sheriff's Deputy demonstrated the importance of the Tueller drill in a rather dramatic fashion.

Knife attacks happen fast, as this scenario demonstrates.

She also demonstrated how to coolly and quickly clear a failure while being charged at by a multiple blade-wielding attacker. She also demonstrates that you need to keep shooting until the attack ceases, as one-shot stops are nice, but certainly not guarranteed against a motivated attacker, and in this case he took a lot of hits and was still talking at the end of the encounter.

While you may argue she let the attacker get too close before she started shooting, that encounter happened fast, and was still very good shooting and reflexes on her part. Next time someone ignorantly asks why the police can't just shoot an attacker in the leg, show them this video and ask them if they think they could do any better under the circumstances.

I'd say an excellent job on the part of this deputy, and lots can be learned from the video of this encounter.

Great Range Trip Today

So I headed to the range and met up with Jason, Tosh, and Tosh's friend Anthony. It was going to be a nice hot day.

We started out shooting some pistol as Tosh wanted to try and run his ETS HK magazines through my P30s to see if they would work as they did not work in his P2000SK.

Interestingly enough, while they would lock into the gun if the slide was back, they would not do so with the slide forward when the mags were fully loaded. They had issues including not dropping free when hitting the paddle release and not holding the last shot open. Other than that, they did feed ok. They did run fine and functioned perfectly in Jason's VP9, including dropping free when the release was hit on the VP9. This was weird as the VP9 and the P30 use the same exact magazine. So, the ETS mags were good in a VP9, not so good in the P30 or P2000.

I hadn't shot the P30s in awhile, but they cleared plate racks with no issues.

We then switched to rifles, and I shot my IWI Tavor SBR and my M1A which was a lot of fun hitting the steel targets Tosh had brought hat were rifle rated. The M1A seriously made the steel targets and stands rock back when hit.

Then back to pistol and I switched to the Masada.

Anthony had brought a Sig P320 compact and we all got a chance to shoot it, it was good to finally try one of those out. Quite a nice and reliable firearm.

Battle Dots shooting competitions were had and we all had a good time.

Then under the timer. Twice the pressure of both the clock and having your friends watch you mess up.

5-4-3-2-1 drills (5 circles on an 8x11 paper decreasing in size down to 1". You shoot 5 at the largest circle, 4 at the next, and so on), it was a lot of fun.

Then we ran some FAST Drills.

Then we did the 3 yard portion of the Sentinel Concepts Warm-up Drill. Draw from concealment and hit the box with all three shots under 2 seconds. More challenging and frustrating than it sounds.

I managed the best time of 1.76 clean - but only after quite a few rounds of practice and then managed to get it under 2 seconds pretty regularly, which was a lot of progress compared to my prior range sessions where I wasn't getting near to that time. Good progress that.

We then switched to dot torture and I got a 49 because one was just outside the dot - drat, so close to a perfect run. The second and last Dot Torture I got sloppy and did 47/50.

It was an excellent range time. Another 350 trouble-free rounds through the Masada, and 50 each through both the P30 and P30Sk, and 120 rounds through the Tavor.

A great time with some good people.

A Nice Attorney Group Range Trip

Since work is slow, I and 3 other attorneys that do firearms law decided to meetup at the range and discuss firearms law and shoot in a socially distant approved manner. Ok, we really showed up to shoot together, but some law was indeed discussed.

Socially distanced outdoor recreational activities, doncha know.

Nice toys were displayed and passed around and tried by all.

I got to shoot J's CZ Scorpion Evo - a pistol he had papered and turned into an SBR - complete with a very nice red dot on it and a silencer attached. The Evo could knock down plates rapidly and effortlessly. That thing is amazingly nice to shoot.

I also got to try Dean's homemade 1911s again, including one he brought along with a silencer, which were working much better since he bent the extractors a tad. No more did they jam on initial loading.

T brought a FN 5.7 pistol along - that thing is effortless to shoot, with no recoil to speak of at all. But, it was plagued with some major feeding problems - jamming after each and every shot, making it necessary to eject the next round, fire 1, eject 1 and so on. Most likely a bad magazine but still a neat firearm for all that. He also shot an SW M&P 9mm with excellent results.

Everyone liked trying my Masada pistol and its SRO.

J had brought a P80 Glock 19 with an SRO on it that I zeroed for him as it was way off. No idea how the SRO got that far off zero but it was impressively not zeroed - as in missing not just the 81/2x11 target but the entire cardboard silhouette target as well. I managed to get it on paper and on target after some fiddling to find out where it was actually hitting - turns out about half a mile high and left by a quarter mile or so (not quite that much but it sure felt that way).

Thence onto the rifle range. I shot my Tavor and let everyone else try it. D brought his old-school Colt AR-15 that is configured as an M16A1 complete with triangular hand-grips, light barrel, etc, which was fun to shoot.

Just for fun I shot the Masada at 100 yards. Once I got the hang of it, I was able to ring the steel targets hanging on the 100 yard line pretty regularly. The SRO makes it pretty easy. Not particularly practical, but fun. That's another 250 rounds through the Masada.

A good time was had by all and we cleaned up and headed off our socially distant separate ways.

P30SK At 1,750 Rounds

Finally got out to the range with the P30SK. I met up with a friend at an indoor range in Utica, Close Quarters Tactical, trying it out for the first time. Decent range, nice staff, no issues at all.

I shot 200 rounds of Remington 115 grain 9mm brown box through it

No failures of any sort.

Since it was an indoor range, and this batch of 9mm seems to be rather full powered, being marked for military and police training, we saw a healthy amount of muzzle flash, including muzzle doughnuts heading out of the P30SK's short barrel.

Yes, lots of muzzle flash.

It was also markedly loud, which was interesting. A shooter in a neighboring lane was wondering if I was shooting a 357 Sig. Nope, just 115gr 9mm.

No failures or any malfunctions of any sort, and no issues accuracy wise even after 1,750 rounds through with no cleaning or additional lubrication.

Sunday Range Day: Speed Practice

I decided to work on my speed today, both with the P30SK and the Glock 17.

For extra punishment, for the Glock 17 I did all drills by drawing from a Safariland ALS holster that had two levels of retention - the thumb press and a switch over it. The ALS retention is quite good - if you don't know how to operate it the firearm is not leaving the holster. On the downside, if you have any upward pressure on the firearm before you're done pushing fully down on the thumb switch, the gun gets all sorts of stuck in there, requiring you to ease up on the gun and reapply pressure to the thumb switch before trying to draw it. Add gloves for the weather, and many a mess up was had.

The practice drill of the day for the Glock was two USPSA targets 5 yards away and to draw and put two hits on each target in the A zone within a par time of 2 seconds.

Leah got lots of practice with commands of "shooter ready", "standby", and then hitting the timer whenever she felt like it.

The timer started in the 4-3.5 second range and with practice started moving lower. Leah provided an enthusiastic cheering section as the time kept creeping toward the goal.

The best time I could get today was:

Yes, 1.94 seconds! So I managed to beat the par time of two seconds and then I got stuck at 1.94 as the fastest time, with a few runs equaling that time.

I'm pretty happy with that for a first attempt, and expect with a non-retention holster I'd be a lot faster as the draw was where the hang up seemed to be.

Prior to practicing if you told me I could do that drill in two seconds I would have been rather doubtful, now with practice and pushing to improve it is doable, and I might as well keep on practicing to keep improving and getting faster.

Leah tried it with her Compact .22 and had quite respectable scores from a low ready position, she also shot the M&P 9 for the first time and liked it, although it had a weird trigger reset failure twice in two separate strings - the gun loaded a round fully into battery but the trigger did not reset. She had to rack the slide, ejecting an unfired round to get the trigger to reset. Kinda strange and that gun has done it before to me at matches before which is rather irritating, especially as I had sent it back to S&W to be fixed. It may need to head back again.

That's 100 more rounds through the Glock 17, making it 200 rounds with zero malfunctions.

We had a very nice time at the range, even as we had to take a warm up break in the car prior to continuing shooting due to the cold. Lots of fun was had and its nice to leave the range with a pracice goal accomplished.

Sunday Range Day: P30SK Hits 1,550 Rounds

While snow fell yesterday night and it was cold and windy, today broke to bright sun and a light covering of snow.

Warm enough to head to the range and that's where Leah and I went.

As Leah shot the M&P 22 Compact, I shot a Winchester White Box 200 round value pack through the P30SK.

No failures to report and I can be happy to say I'm getting faster and more accurate now that I've been getting some practice in.

Today was 200 rounds, a rack of plates and Leah running the timer and a start from low ready.

I managed to get down to 6 shots, all plates hit in 3 seconds even but couldn't get below that. Something to work on and certainly better accuracy than the previous visit.

No failures of any kind even as some snow got on the magazines and firearm.

Sunday Range Day Part Two - The Other Guns

The Kahr PM9 was feeling rather unloved. Being a very concealable and convenient pocket pistol, it does tend to get the nod to be carried whenever I heading out the door. Very much a nice small gun for when you can't easily carry a compact or full size gun, it's been carried a lot and not shot all that much recently.

So I decided to give it a go after shooting the P30SK.

Right out of the pocket holster and just changing over to some FMJ for practice, it fired all 50 rounds of FMJ I fired through it without a hitch.

Recoil was definitely felt more in the smaller pistol.

After shooting the P30SK the trigger on the PM9 also felt rather different and inferior.

The PM9 has a very long almost rolling feel to the trigger - you squeeze it back, and squeeze it back, and keep squeezing it back and finally it goes off and hits the target. Basically it is a safety to stop you from prematurely firing and it is rather good at that. It is smooth with no hitches but really long.

It's so long it feels like a trigger you pull on Monday and it finally goes off on Sunday. By itself, it really is not bad. But, when compared immediately to a trigger like that on the P30SK or a Glock, it is a noticeably long, long, pull.

Accuracy was not bad at all. After the range trip I brought it home, cleaned, lubed, and reloaded it, and got all the pocket lint out of the spare magazine that rides along in my offhand front pocket. If you carry a mag in a pocket, expect that it will pickup pocket lint.

Next up was a nice new out of the box Glock 17 Gen4.

I managed to pick it up for a very good price and I'm rather happy with it. It's a Glock so nothing much to say about it really, but the grip texture does seem better than the prior versions. I did not add any back-straps as it fits my hand fine as is.

I did install some Trijicon HD XR Orange Front Outline night sights to it, replacing the stock factory plastic sights with a much more durable and usable set. Installation was easy using a sight pusher and it was no big deal. The orange outline on the front sight is very easy to pickup and accuracy was very nice.

I fired 100 rounds of the 9MM Nato FMJ through the Glock 17 with no issues, which is to be expected.

Accuracy was excellent, I had installed the sights on just right and they were right on. The stock trigger was the best of the three pistols I had with me at the range. Considering it was the largest pistol there, it was indeed the easiest to shoot fast and accurately. For whatever reason, it felt

It was a darn good range trip and very badly needed practice session. I need to get out to the range more often and will make it a resolution for 2019.

I figure I will get out more often to complete the P30SK 2,000 round test, and then do a 2,000 round test on the Glock 17 Gen 4. This should get me out to the range more often to work on shooting better.

Friday Networking - At The Range

Yesterday morning I was able to do a fun networking event.  Instead of golf or a mixer with a crowd of people, the business networking group I'm a part of met up at my range for a shooting event.

Lots of safe fun ensued, and we had the range all to ourselves.

We shot at the pistol range first, I had brought a few different 9mm pistols for people to try. My Smith & Wesson M&P 9, my Inglis Hi Power, and the HK P30.  I had the plate rack going and some paper and a popper and supervised people shooting. 

 A client of mine Ed of Wicked Grips had also come to the event and he brought some nice customized firearms with him.  He's a custom grip maker and some of his grips have appeared in various films. If you want some very cool grips for your 1911 or Beretta, and lots of other cool stuff, checkout wickedgrips.com.

He had some cool Smith Revolvers including a a Jerry Miculek 45 ACP custom job that was a dream to shoot, and a custom 8-shot .357 Smith that was incredible to shoot.

Here's Steve shooting the 8 shot .357. He's a new shooter and had a great time.

At the rifle range we shot my Tavor, 300 Blackout, The SAR-1 AK and Mighty Mite, my AR-15 pistol.

Here's Dave shooting my 300 Blackout AR. It's nice and quiet with subsonic ammo and it rang the hanging steel plates with a louder noise than the shot itself. I let everyone give it a try and there was a lot of grins going around when each person had shot their allotted rounds.

Might Mite was a crowd pleaser, between the loud muzzle blast and huge flame with each shot along with a satisfying ping as each round hit the swinging steel plates it was a lot of fun for people to shoot.

For example, here's Ed shooting a round from Mighty Mite

 Ed brought along a Bushmaster ACR, which was a really sweet shooting 5.56 rifle. My first time trying one out and it was quite nice indeed.

For fun Ed and I shot pistols at 100 yards. I shot the P30, and more often than not, I could hit the steel plates from standing offhand. Likely a lot of luck was involved, but it was neat to push my ability and try to ring the steel plates at that distance. 

That's 120 more rounds through the Tavor with no issues.

That's also another 250 rounds through the P30 with no cleaning and no issues except unfailing reliability for 800 rounds now.

Everyone had a great time at the range and it was a very successful networking event indeed. 

A Weekend In The Trees and On The Range

The weekend got better starting Saturday night.

We had Havdalah in the Trees with members of our synagogue at the Adventure Park.
We started out with a group of 35 parents and kids gearing up after dark to tackle the courses. It was cold out but we rapidly warmed up making our way through, over and under the obstacles.

Making your way as a family through an obstacle course that is dimly lit and when you can't even see the ground most of the time is a very different feeling than tackling the same course by day. Zip-lining across nothingness in the dark is very cool indeed.

We ended with a small service to celebrate the end of Shabbat and went home exhausted from the courses that we did.

Then today I took the kids with Manuel and his kids to the range this evening and we had a blast even in the cool weather.

I had the P30 out and 100 rounds later there are no malfunctions of any kind to report. Manuel liked shooting it as well, and it knocked down steal plates with aplomb. That's 550 rounds with no issues.

The kids shot the M&P 15-22 and knocked down plates with it quite nicely. Leah also shot the Ruger MKII and Abby tried out Manuels GSG .22LR Uzi, which is very heavy for a .22 - no recoil but it was not comfortable for her due to its weight.   She stuck with the M&P 15-22.

Manuel had also brought along a pretty cool new toy.

Yes, that's his Tavor, but it's now sporting a silencer and a 9mm conversion kit. It uses UZI mags and functions flawlessly.  The silencer makes it very pleasant to shoot and it's much, much quieter than the H&K P30 with the same ammo and with no flash.  While not silent, You could easily shoot it without ear protection without any discomfort.

The 9mm conversion kit is a very slick bit of kit, and shooting it with the silencer is simply awesome. It was problem-free for a good 300 rounds this evening. Shooting down racks of plates was effortless, even when they kept reappearing with the child-operated semi-automatic plate reloading system then in use.

I needs to get me one of these.

Since dusk was fast approaching, we shut down, cleaned up and headed off. We headed off to dine on some pizza and that was the end of a great day and a pretty darn good weekend.

One Hot Match

Today's USPSA match was a real scorcher.

The sun was out and it was brutal with nary a breeze to stir the air during the match.

By the end of the match I was seriously dragging - 9 stages felt like an eternity.

Some bays had covered rest ares which were helpful but they often weren't large enough for everyone, and four of the bays at one end were cruelly naked under the sun and you were in the open to bake for a long time.

Even worse there was a major bottleneck at our very last stage.

Due to an error in course design, there were a ton of re-shoots which slowed everything down so we were stacked up 3 squads behind the squad shooting it in the very next bay. We sat around for an hour waiting to get a turn to shoot our last stage.

The problem was that not only was it a large and confusing stage with 32 rounds consisting of two runs, as well as hidden and angled targets, but it also had a center portion where it had 3 poppers clustered behind 4 no-shoots laid out in the vertical square so you were shooting through a small hole between the no shoot targets to get the poppers. Knocking a popper down through a no-shoot target caused the re-shoot and a pause as the entire stage was pasted and the shooter got to go again. That sucked. Our Squad RO declared that if a no shoot was hit and a popper dropped, he was just going to score it and not declare a reshoot. We all agreed as by then we were not going to drag this out anymore than it had to be to get it done.

Even with lots of sunscreen, a hat and drinking a liter and a half of water I still felt dehydrated. I'll be sure to bring more water next time.

I was dragging badly by the end of the match, so I came in 20th of 28 limited class shooters with 1008 out of 1085 possible points.

The M&P 40 Pro still ran like a champ. One magazine with the Taylor Freelance base did not lock the slide open on empty which is apparently fixable with a stronger spring than kjust the factory magazine spring, while the other worked 100%.

Lots of people had magazine seating fumbles as the day wore on, mostly due to heat exhaustion. There were lots of issues due to reloaded ammo not being powerful enough to operate the guns, especially with 1911s. One Glock shooter had a front sight fly off while shooting in the open, not due to hitting any object, which locked the gun up for a bit as the screw holding the sight jammed the slide until it was cleared. Loctite is a mandatory thing for sight attachment screws people.

It was a long hot match for everybody with over 217 rounds fired.

On the upside, I found out I made C-class in Limited from last month's classifier match. Considering how i flubbed my way through the classifiers that was rather happy-making, but I've got a long way to improve.

A Very Good Range Day

In the late morning, I met up with my friend Jason at the range.

Jason is a newer shooter and a heckuva nice guy. After a safety briefing and my demonstrating how to load and shoot the guns as they came out in order we were ready to hit some paper and some poppers.

The H&K P30 continued to run perfectly, eating another 250 rounds without complaint, making it to 450 rounds with no issues and no cleaning.

Jason shot the P30 quite well and knocked down the poppers in quick succession as well as hitting the paper targets.

I did both Dot Torture and FAST drills with the P30 while Jason knocked down steel poppers and did a Dot Torture sans holster work as he's never drawn from a holster beforevso we're elaving that until he gets a lot more practice and comfort with shooting. I need more work on Dot Torture with the P30 as I did drop a few shots out of the circles.

Happily, with some dry-fire practice since last time, I've at least redeemed my FAST times - my second and third FAST runs today were 7.15 seconds and 7.10 seconds, respectively. The first run's time is lost to history. Jason was running a timer for his first time ever and he hit the start button for a second time as if it was a stop button when I was done. He said I had looked pretty fast doing it that time. Ah well. In any case, it's nice to see some focused dry-fire practice can really shave seconds off your time on a FAST.

I still need to work more to get out of intermediate to reach an advanced time, not to mention improve my shooting overall, but it's a fun work in progress and at least its going the right way now that I finally convinced my brain that the slide release on the P30 is not the magazine release button. I'm also starting to like the P30 more and more as it seems to fit my hand like it was made for it.

We also shot 50 rounds through my M&P 9 - the sight is still slightly to the right even after an adjustment since the last range outing and needs a slight nudge to the left.

We then both shot my M&P40 compact and 50 rounds went through it without the slightest issue. Jason could definitely feel the difference in recoil between the compact 40 and the full size 9mm pistols.

Then it was rifle time:

I had brought out both the Tavor and one of my AR-15s with a Trijicon ACOG mounted on it.

We fired 200 rounds through the Tavor, bringing it to a total of 940 rounds fired through it without a single malfunction.

We also put 100 rounds through the AR15, again with no issues.

Jason liked the Tavor more than the AR-15 and found its manual of arms easier than the AR15 and he shot it better. This was an interesting result considering he had no experience with either rifle before today. He now wants to buy a Tavor as his first rifle.

That was a darn good range trip.