I mentioned in this thread that I would soon be taking my nephews out to shoot for the first time. I don't want to derail that thread, so I've started this one. My nephews are fraternal twin 16-year-olds. Before Saturday, neither one had ever shot a gun, at least according to my sister-in-law. They're pretty cool young men, but fairly typical of their generation in that they seem to spend a lot of time in their heads, rather than doing things with their hands. Admittedly, that's a lot like their Uncle Spats.
Anyway, about 6:45 Saturday morning, I left my Airbnb to head up to the Hobbs State Park Shooting Range. I used the map thingamabob on my phone, which is displayed on a screen on my dashboard to navigate. Unfortunately, I had forgotten to turn "avoid highways" off. This would cost me LOTS of time later, but it meant I saw some absolutely stunning scenery. IMHO, there's very little that can compare to dawn over the Ozark mountains. Anyway, the range has 5 shooting lanes and the range goes out to 100 yards. We only shot at 25 yards, but I suspect we'll be moving the targets out at future range trips. It's also free, so I was only going to be out time, ammo, and targets. I got there just a few minutes after 8, only to discover that 4 of the 5 lanes are taken. I grab the last one, and start setting up.
I'd been hemming and hawing about what to shoot for several days, but finally settled on my 10/22. It was my Standard Issue rifle about 40 years ago, but over the last couple of years, I turned it into, well, kind of a training rifle for new shooters. I figure if I'm going to try to be a good ambassador, I need the right rifle, right? This one has a Hogue stock and a red dot. Even though it's not in this picture, I put my Dead Air Mask on the end, and spent a few minutes at the range dialing it in at 25 yards with the ammo we'd be using (Federal bulk pack). Low recoil, suppressed, with an easy-to-use red dot. What's not to love?
Sure enough, the boys promptly started wearing out the bullseye. As you might imagine, they liked that. They liked it a lot, in fact. So they took turns, swapping out every couple of magazines, until each one had done several (4-6? 8?) mags. I wasn't keeping a real close count.
Then we decided to change things up a bit. I'm still old school (or maybe just old) enough that I think every shooter should learn to use iron sights. So next up in the rotation was my Ruger American Rimfire. I had a Nikon scope on it at one time, but that one's been moved over to The Rat. I kept this one as a no-frills, iron sights, .22 bolt gun. So I moved the bipod over from the Standard Issue Trainer, and let the boys try their hands on iron sights. No suppressor on this one, at least not this time.
As I'm sure you can all imagine, their groups were a little bigger than with the red dot. Nonetheless, I am pleased to report that both of them took to "walking" their shots in pretty well. Once they started to get the hang of iron sights, they started wearing out the bullseye again.
So by this time, they've had a taste of red dots and iron sights. Obviously, this range trip would not have been complete without trying a scope out. So I moved the bipod one more time, and we set up The Rat. Big, heavy barrel, suppressed, bolt action .22, and a Nikon scope. Again, what's not to love?
You really should have seen their faces when I put CCI Quiets in the magazine . . .
By the time we finished with the Rat, we'd been shooing for a few hours. I had plans later, so it was time to wrap things up. I didn't want them to leave the range without shooting at least one pistol, so I gave them a choice: (a) Mark IV 22/45s that I'd brought; or (b) centerfire handguns. They chose centerfire, since they'd been shooting .22s all morning.
First, I dragged out Black Betty. ("Whoooa, Black Betty! Blam, bla-blam.. I said that's no lie....")
She wears different grips now, but is otherwise the same. The nephews were a little nervous about Betty, so I shot a magazine first, just so they could watch. We loaded up Wilson 47Ds with 230 grain military surplus ammo and, as expected, Betty ran like a top. I will also say that every time Betty goes to the range, she reminds me of what a soft and smooth shooter she is. Each nephew put a couple of mags through her without any trouble whatsoever. Unfortunately, the wind blew our target down before we could shoot the pistols, so I just had them shoot into the berm.
Finally, I got out the Shield Plus. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: I don't know what kind of Recoil Voodoo the engineers at S&W did, but all 3 of my Shields have been amazingly soft shooters. My Plus is no exception. The boys had no trouble handling recoil in it, and one of them even preferred the Plus to the 1911.
All in all, it was a very successful day at the range. The next time they come down, we might go to the range, or we might just spend some time taking guns apart for cleaning. We'll just have to see.
Anyway, about 6:45 Saturday morning, I left my Airbnb to head up to the Hobbs State Park Shooting Range. I used the map thingamabob on my phone, which is displayed on a screen on my dashboard to navigate. Unfortunately, I had forgotten to turn "avoid highways" off. This would cost me LOTS of time later, but it meant I saw some absolutely stunning scenery. IMHO, there's very little that can compare to dawn over the Ozark mountains. Anyway, the range has 5 shooting lanes and the range goes out to 100 yards. We only shot at 25 yards, but I suspect we'll be moving the targets out at future range trips. It's also free, so I was only going to be out time, ammo, and targets. I got there just a few minutes after 8, only to discover that 4 of the 5 lanes are taken. I grab the last one, and start setting up.
I'd been hemming and hawing about what to shoot for several days, but finally settled on my 10/22. It was my Standard Issue rifle about 40 years ago, but over the last couple of years, I turned it into, well, kind of a training rifle for new shooters. I figure if I'm going to try to be a good ambassador, I need the right rifle, right? This one has a Hogue stock and a red dot. Even though it's not in this picture, I put my Dead Air Mask on the end, and spent a few minutes at the range dialing it in at 25 yards with the ammo we'd be using (Federal bulk pack). Low recoil, suppressed, with an easy-to-use red dot. What's not to love?
Sure enough, the boys promptly started wearing out the bullseye. As you might imagine, they liked that. They liked it a lot, in fact. So they took turns, swapping out every couple of magazines, until each one had done several (4-6? 8?) mags. I wasn't keeping a real close count.
Then we decided to change things up a bit. I'm still old school (or maybe just old) enough that I think every shooter should learn to use iron sights. So next up in the rotation was my Ruger American Rimfire. I had a Nikon scope on it at one time, but that one's been moved over to The Rat. I kept this one as a no-frills, iron sights, .22 bolt gun. So I moved the bipod over from the Standard Issue Trainer, and let the boys try their hands on iron sights. No suppressor on this one, at least not this time.
As I'm sure you can all imagine, their groups were a little bigger than with the red dot. Nonetheless, I am pleased to report that both of them took to "walking" their shots in pretty well. Once they started to get the hang of iron sights, they started wearing out the bullseye again.
So by this time, they've had a taste of red dots and iron sights. Obviously, this range trip would not have been complete without trying a scope out. So I moved the bipod one more time, and we set up The Rat. Big, heavy barrel, suppressed, bolt action .22, and a Nikon scope. Again, what's not to love?
You really should have seen their faces when I put CCI Quiets in the magazine . . .
By the time we finished with the Rat, we'd been shooing for a few hours. I had plans later, so it was time to wrap things up. I didn't want them to leave the range without shooting at least one pistol, so I gave them a choice: (a) Mark IV 22/45s that I'd brought; or (b) centerfire handguns. They chose centerfire, since they'd been shooting .22s all morning.
First, I dragged out Black Betty. ("Whoooa, Black Betty! Blam, bla-blam.. I said that's no lie....")
She wears different grips now, but is otherwise the same. The nephews were a little nervous about Betty, so I shot a magazine first, just so they could watch. We loaded up Wilson 47Ds with 230 grain military surplus ammo and, as expected, Betty ran like a top. I will also say that every time Betty goes to the range, she reminds me of what a soft and smooth shooter she is. Each nephew put a couple of mags through her without any trouble whatsoever. Unfortunately, the wind blew our target down before we could shoot the pistols, so I just had them shoot into the berm.
Finally, I got out the Shield Plus. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: I don't know what kind of Recoil Voodoo the engineers at S&W did, but all 3 of my Shields have been amazingly soft shooters. My Plus is no exception. The boys had no trouble handling recoil in it, and one of them even preferred the Plus to the 1911.
All in all, it was a very successful day at the range. The next time they come down, we might go to the range, or we might just spend some time taking guns apart for cleaning. We'll just have to see.
