WHAT IS ADVANCED PISTOL SHOOTING?
Before we define what is advanced pistol shooting, let’s look at what isn’t. First of all, the overwhelming majority of pistol shooters do so in a shooting range environment. Shooting ranges are a very rigid shooting environment. There are clearly marked lines where you cannot cross, or a bench of some sort preventing you from getting closer to the target than any other shooter on the line. There are often lane dividers which separate you from the shooter beside you, and there are rules, regulations, and range officers to enforce them.
The reason for all this structure is not to make you a better shooter; it’s to keep you and the others around you safe. Safety is of paramount importance when shooting, of course. We are not arguing that point. What we are saying, however, is that if the vast majority of your shooting happens to be at a shooting range, you are shorting yourself on your training.
In real life, gunfights do not happen within clearly marked lanes and well lit shooting areas. You might not have time to break off into that perfect weaver or isosceles stance. As a matter of fact, you might not be standing at all when called to defend yourself! It’s not so much that we dislike shooting ranges, it’s that if you are forced to revert to your training in a crisis, and the only shooting experience that you have comes from a shooting range, you will be caught extremely shorthanded in many situations. Your training, as it were, has only prepared you to stand erect and choose one of the two authorized shooting positions at most ranges, and fire from there. Most ranges don’t even allow you to draw from the holster! How do you expect to draw and fire from the holster if you’ve never done it before?
