Front Sight, Press

Spent another wonderful afternoon with Jim Higginbotham, out at Dalton’s place in Meade County, blasting away at the paper, telling war stories, looking at guns and communing with some of the best people in the world. In all there were about 20 shooters there.

The real highlight of the day for me was that I finally convinced my wife, Marian, to come and shoot the session. Her favorite gun is a big old S&W 686 Plus with a 6″ barrel. I have tried to persuade her that a smaller gun and maybe an auto would work better in that setting, but she loves the big wheel gun, so I got a custom built holster and speedloaders for her. The match setting made her a little nervous, but I think she had fun, and said she’d definitely go back. One of the great things about Higginbotham is that he has a lot of patience with inexperienced people and takes them where ever they are and works with them on the stuff they need to learn.

Alex shot my old Springfield Armory Mil-Spec, the pistol that inspired me to put up The Sight M1911 and got me started in IDPA back a long time ago. He loves that gun. I’ll probably give it to him someday, but I’m not ready to yet. I shot my Springfield Armory XD-9 Tactical. It may be a 9mm, but I’m enjoying that gun and it’s allowing me to keep shooting matches while my back heals (and the ammo is a whole lot cheaper too). My youngest son, Daniel, says the XD is “a cool looking gun.”

The stages that we shot were pretty simple, mostly close-range DVC kind of stuff. How many rounds can you put into a target in two seconds at five yards from the draw? Move and shoot. Shoot, move, reload, and shoot. Mozambique’s. Shoot, reload, shoot. The longest range we shot was seven yards and there was only one of those. Jim doesn’t care much for the elaborate IDPA-style stages with lots of no-shoots, hostages, and gimmicks. His philosophy is that gunfights tend to be fast, violent affairs so he emphasizes handgun fighting skills. “The faster you shoot, the less shot you will get.” “Anything worth shooting is worth shooting a lot.” “Movement and distance are your friends.”

The most startling moment of the session came when Jim threw a brand new Para-Ordnance single stack M1911 into the gravel. He was demonstrating a shoot-and-move stage when the Para locked up tight. He immediately and swiftly did a tap-rack-but-no-bang. When the gun wouldn’t un-jam, he tossed it into the gravel and went to his backup, a Kimber Classic Series 1 and finished the stage. This display reminded me why he is such a great teacher — the tactical priorities are always foremost in his mind. He never slacks off, even for a gathering of his pet disciples who would forgive him for not dropping the malfunctioning gun, a new and fairly expensive gun at that. In a real situation, you would drop the gun. The non-functioning gun is no longer a survival tool, and if it is no longer helping you to survive, it is worthless and should be discarded in favor of the backup. The sales slip means nothing when bullets are flying. When he tossed the gun, I said, “Ouch.” Standing right in front of me, he heard me and said, “Oh, it’s a Para-Ordnance.” I said, “I guess it’s OK then. I was afraid it was the Combat Commander.”

There is a such thing as “range mentality.” It involves a sort of fetish toward our gear, guns and match protocol. It operates at an unconscious level. It can blind you to realities and cause you to behave in automatic ways that are not conducive to survival. Dropping or throwing down a gun at a match results in an immediate disqualification. Your day is done; pack your gear and hit the trail. There are solid safety reasons for the rule. On the firing range, when a gun jams, most people take their eyes off the target and examine the gun to try to understand what went wrong. The first reflex usually isn’t to find another way to keep shooting as quickly as possible. In a gunfight, failing to get back into action immediately could make the difference between winning and losing. Range, match and street: different worlds make different rules.

We don’t carry guns because they are status symbols or works of art, even though they are those things to an extent. We carry the gun to defend ourselves and those we love. The beauty and revelation of Jim’s slamming the non-functioning gun into the ground is that it showed everyone where the true priorities are. The gun is a survival tool and nothing more. It serves that purpose only. It serves life. The instant it ceases to serve the purpose of survival, it’s a worthless chunk of metal and a liability. This was a diamond slicing to the center of my brain. It was one of those lessons that stick in your mind.