Winchester W Train and Defend Handgun Ammo??

I saw that video, and the only place I could find it was Cabellas, but I won’t give Cabellas a dime if my money. I just wasted to try the ammo. Ultimately I just kept my Federal HST 124 grain 9mm as a SD load. The train and defend ammo concept is interesting, but in reality needing that close a similarity between a training round and a SD round seems an overreach. At the end of the fight all that matters is whether you hit the target and incapacitated the perp. I just do some practice using my carry round. Yes, it costs more than FMJ, but it is training with the actual ammo you will use. Once you develop the skill you do not need to shoot a high volume of rounds to maintain it.

1942bull said:

I saw that video, and the only place I could find it was Cabellas, but I won’t give Cabellas a dime if my money. I just wasted to try the ammo. Ultimately I just kept my Federal HST 124 grain 9mm as a SD load. The train and defend ammo concept is interesting, but in reality needing that close a similarity between a training round and a SD round seems an overreach. At the end of the fight all that matters is whether you hit the target and incapacitated the perp. I just do some practice using my carry round. Yes, it costs more than FMJ, but it is training with the actual ammo you will use. Once you develop the skill you do not need to shoot a high volume of rounds to maintain it.

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Truth. Keep the HST.

Or, if primers ever become available readily again, pick up reloading and tailor your practice rounds to match the ballistics of your carry ammo for a fraction of the price. Best of both worlds.

I need to make an additional point to that I made above. Marines understand fundamentals. It is the basics that count. Accuracy has nothing to do with ammo. It only depends on skill developed by practice. Your revolver or pistol does not know what ammo is being fired. It only reacts to your technique. It will not be better when you shoot 115 gr or 147 gr. It depends on you not the ammo. Get competent with your ammo choice, and that’s it.

I have the defend in two of my nines. But could never find any in stock.

Assuming your gun functions with it I would say there is probably not a major difference in any of the top tier JHP Rounds, HST, Gold Dot, PDX, Golden Sabres, Sig V Crown, Tac XPD...
I currently have Gold Dots but when it is time to rotate out if I couldn't find Gold Dots I would be perfectly happy with HST/PDX/V Crown etc.

So if you want the Winchester and can't find it any of the others you can find would probably serve you just as well.

Making sure you gun functions with the ammo is very important.
Say X shoots .5" groups and Y shoots 1" groups, probably not that important,
because if you every need to use it the odds are you won't have time to be shooting groups
so a small accuracy difference in the ammo won't matter.
Now of course if one flavor shoots 1" groups and the other shoots 3" groups that might be a different story.



https://www.luckygunner.com/labs/self-defense-ammo-ballistic-tests/#9mm

Edit: HST and the Barnes look really good in the above test.
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1942bull writes:

Your revolver or pistol does not know what ammo is being fired.

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To add to that point, neither does the target. Just make the hits count.

Reggie,

I doubt that the TRAIN & DEFEND ammo was really developed with private citizens in mind. Large law enforcement agencies buy thousands, if not millions of rounds at a time. DHS ordered over a million rounds if reports are to be believed and they are still short of ammo.
The practice + carry ammo concept is not unique to WINCHESTER, both FEDERAL and SIG have their own version. When I started in law enforcement, we were issued 150 rounds of .38 Special wadcutters and 50 rounds of 110 grain .357 magnum ammo every three months for carry and practice.

Jim