Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns I don't care about 50 yd accuracy!

I am a civilian and I was talking to my concealed carry instructor and he just laughed when I told him about this forum.
He said there is no way you could convince a judge that you were defending yourself from a threat at 50 yds away.
So all the talk about flat shooting, accurate handguns is not an issue in Minnesota.
What I want is something to defend against home invasion. Which would be a twelve gauge or a second choice would be a 45 acp


I will start the pop corn.
whelennut

Me thinks your instructor is a moron


A recent case in TX comes to mind where a CCW'ER shot an assailant with a handgun at 65 yards..

Judges and their rangefinders...it ain't right!

In a city 50 yards might seem like a long way not so much in a rural environment

Mike

If you see that super awesome instructor again, tell him that I said to eat a bag of dicks.

Fifty yard handguns are for deer hunting,........aren't they?

If I am forced to defend my life from a distance of fifty yards, in most scenarios, I would have access to a rifle.

Inside my house, when I thought the threat was imminent, I slept on the recliner with a Marlin 1894 in 41 mag across my lap and a Mossberg 500 w/ 12 ga #4's propped against the wall beside me.

A handgun is for when you really just don't expect any trouble.

This.

What guarantees that trouble will only occur within 7-10 feet?

[quote=
He said there is no way you could convince a judge that you were defending yourself from a threat at 50 yds away.

I would think that would depend on the circumstance(s) that lead up to confrontation.

I am just glad I sleep in the trailer when I visit.... Knock-knock....BOOM..."whose there"....

Well your instructor is about 99% correct...95% of civilian shootings take place within 7 yards...rarely over 25...but what if you were in the theater during the showing of Batman...or in one of the mall shootings.. Or drive around the deserts of the SW with Ron some time...

And quiet honestly I don't own a gun that I regularly carry that won't hold "minute of badguy" at fifty yards.... I know the three guns I regularly carry will do it...

Bob

So if I'm walking in my yard and a guy starts slinging shots at me for 150 yards I should just accept death?

Also, be sure to remind him that he is a Conservative Yankee, which as we know means a liberal.

A number of years back I responded to an incident on the snake river where some A-hole outlaw biker types were taking pot shots at some boaters/kayakers on the river. They were on the bluffs up top and were shooting down onto the people on the water.

The range was well in excess of 50 yards.

Again, years back, I responded to an incident where an estranged husband/boyfriend was shooting at a house occupied by his ex wife/GF.

The range was more than 50 yards from the road to the house.



Not too long ago, I responded to a hotel, in which a person murdered one guest, and shot one trooper, before shooting a bunch of rounds at me.

While the range was quite close where I pinned him up (in a stairwell), had I been able to engage him in one of the long hallways, I could have had a 50 yard shot opportunity.

Locally, the walmart, Costco, Winco, and various local grocery stores parking lots are all well over 100 yards across.

We have school hallways longer than 50 yards.

We have grocery stores where a 50 yard shot INSIDE would be possible.


The punchline is that while the "average" shooting is up close and personal, what guarantee do you have that you will have an "average" shooting?

You get the fight you get, not the one you want.

Some fights start up close, and due to people running, ducking dodging, etc, the ranges get extended. It is very easy for a fight that started inside, to spill out onto the street, where ranges can greatly increase.


In all seriousness Whelennut, I would find a different instructor.

There are a TON of guys out there who really want to be somebody important. They attend a basic NRA school, which to pass really does not require much more than a pulse, and the ability to pay, and then they hang out a shingle as an "NRA Instructor"

All of the sudden these guys are subject matter experts on virtually everything, including gunfighting, which I find a bit amusing, since the very vast majority have NEVER even heard a shot fired in anger.

So, with absolutely NO experience, they feel qualified to teach all about the subject. Personally I think most are in it, not because they like to teach others to improve their skill set, but do it instead to validate their "manhood" and convince themselves that they are alpha males.

Back on the topic of yardage:

Practicing at 50 yards is a smart move. If you can make solid hits at 50 yards,on a square range, then hits at 10 yards, while under pressure should be much easier.

Purely my observation.

Methinks also, X2....

"There are a TON of guys out there who really want to be somebody important. They attend a basic NRA school, which to pass really does not require much more than a pulse, and the ability to pay, and then they hang out a shingle as an "NRA Instructor" "

As one NRA Training Councilor {instructor trainer} I unfortunately know said... "Pay your money nobody flunks my class" ..and he was not kidding. Pulse and money are the only requirements.

Bob

Exactly. I've never practiced to kill someone; I shoot because I love pulling a trigger. Exceptional marksmanship ability is its own reward; if you can shoot well at 50 yds, you'll have no problem defending yourself at 5.

I think the vast majority of handgunners should be working on basic marksmanship, instead of "scenarios". But exercising sight alignment and trigger control is boring stuff, kinda like weight training. Much more fun is shooting lots of rounds quickly into multiple Bin Laden targets while ducking left (or right) after a draw. So cool.

Learn to shoot, then learn to fight. Tactics change, fundamentals don't. Too easy.

Maybe you should find another instructor. Mackay's post is "spot on". My thoughts on this are probably counter to most, but in my limited experience it's a good plan.
Bob

Not sure I totally agree with you Bob...

I have seen a LOT of shooters who can run 100 on a qualifier and do just fine to the point of making head shots from the holster from 25 yards completely fall apart when hit with a blind scenario...to the point of completely missing a silhouette target at 7 yards.

You talk about "scenarios"...IDPA puts on a lot of them...but they are really nothing more than choreographed target shooting. Put these same guys in the same scenario blind and watch the Grand Masters fall apart..have seen this for 20+ years...almost universally they rush and get themselves killed because they can't get the clock out of their head.

One of the guys on here has a son-in-law who is with the CHP..and a real good shooter. He made a "small" tactical error on a car chase and almost got his butt run over. The car passes within FEET of him and even with the drivers window down didn't not just hit the driver BUT NEVER TOUCHED THE CAR either.

Then there is the Dallas sergeant who fails to qualify {again} and is going back to the substation to write himself up and stops for a coffee on the way. Stops at one of the Stop N' Robs and runs right into a robbery in progress..and kills the robber... So much for the quals having anything to do with reality.

Gun fighting is a mentality with a little bit of ability.

Bob

ps...the above said, I regularly train shooters to hit out to 100 yards with their handguns and have done scenarios out to probably 50.

Notice the "when I thought the threat was imminent" part.

Our daughter's first ex was giving her grief, violating his restraining order, and generally being a complete POS. She and her little girl spent a couple nights at our house, and I spent the nights on the recliner.

Usually all of my firearms and ammo are locked in the safe.

I did notice that and hope we know each other well enough to know I was joking... I figured there must have been some serious problem for you to do that...Bob

Roger that. On my old dept I had a sgt that was terrified of qualifying...he got a 2-day suspension after not being able to after 3 tries. I helped him get through the 9mm transition course, which he barely completed. A few months later, after 2 more quals that almost got him removed from street duty for poor marksmanship, he got into 2 different shootings in 3 weeks...3 shots, two dead suspects.

I had a partner in Hollywood when I was in uniform who'd been in 4 shootings...no hits. Good policeman, though; we had fun together in patrol.

On the other hand, there's SGT York, phenomenal marksman, who commented after the war that he found it easier to head-shoot Germans shooting Maxim machine guns at him than hitting turkeys back home. Classic coupling of ability and performance under pressure.

My thoughts are that some people handle pressure and fear better than others. It's up to the shooter to apply the training he's been given. Confidence in your ability goes a long way towards prevailing.

Sometimes the situation isn't what you've trained for. But if you live, you've won.
Bob