The New and Improved New Jersey Carry Permit Shooting Test (2023)

Back in August 2023 I shot the New Jersey carry permit shooting test (aka the “Civilian Carry Assessment and Range Evaluation”, or CCARE), and documented it with video and in this blog post. The test was complicated and poorly designed, including many skills that were essentially irrelevant to concealed carry, with time limits that were …

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1957 Robot Target Article

My historical research team (Craig, Gaston and Jay) recently sent me a scan of a 1957 Guns magazine article about a robot quick draw target that could shoot blank firing sixguns at the human opponent. Spell check tells me that “Dueller” should be “Dueler” but I have used the author’s original spelling and use of …

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1941 Pistol Combat Course

My historical research team sent me this article from a 1941 issue of American Rifleman magazine. It details a “pistol combat course” shot using a silhouette target w/ center bullseye and a scoring system that is a distant cousin to the Time Plus scoring using in IDPA and the Comstock scoring used in USPSA. The …

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IPSC World Shoot 1983 Match

Lloyd Harper, who was the assistant match director for the 1983 World Shoot, recently scanned the 1983 IPSC World Shoot match booklet and shared it with others. The match was held at the Lafayette Gun Club near Yorktown, Virginia. The scanned copy is missing a few pages. What I have posted here is what I …

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1918 Pistol Shooting Article

Fellow handgun historians Craig, Gaston and Jay have been going through old issues of “Arms and the Man” and American Rifleman looking for historically interesting articles to share. This one, from 1918, details the failures of pistol shooters using “point shooting” techniques to hit targets. The author of the article was the secretary of the …

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Texas Parks and Wildlife Youth Outdoors Day 2023

On October 11-12 I assisted Texas Parks and Wildlife with their mostly-annual Youth Outdoors program. It’s held at Nails Creek Park on Lake Somerville, and it provides high school students an opportunity to learn about shooting, hunting, archery and the outdoors. Day 1 had about 60 students from Lee County, and Day 2 had a …

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The Ed Head Modified Cooper Cup Gunsite Standards

One of my regular students, Randy W., is also a graduate of multiple classes from Gunsite, the legendary firearms training school in Arizona founded by Jeff Cooper. He took several private lessons from me to get tuned up for the Gunsite Alumni Shoot, being held on October 7, 2023. One stage of the match is …

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TCOLE Firearms Instructor Course

I recently hosted and attended a Texas Commission on Law Enforcement Firearms Instructor Course taught by Eric Wise of Cornerstone Performance. Eric is a full time law enforcement instructor with a major Texas city’s police department, and a competition shooter with Master and Grand Master ratings in IDPA, USPSA and Steel Challenge. Eric Lamberson from …

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Nebraska Training Classes Sept 2023

The nice folks that run Nebraska Shooters invited me to come teach three classes at their facility in September 2023. I taught my Force on Force Instructor course, a full day of Tactical Scenarios, and a full day of Advanced Handgun. Nebraska Shooters is run by Justin and Dorothy Grusing, supported by a large crew …

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Shooting the Stephenville PD Qualification Course

A KR Training student recently sent me the qualification course of fire used by the Stephenville, TX, police department. It uses the CSAT (Paul Howe) target, which is basically a USPSA target with a 6″x10″ A zone. Officers are not given a specific load out to force a reload during a specific string of fire. …

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Shooting the LAPD Combat Qualification

I recently read Claude Werner’s excellent book “Real Shootouts of the LAPD, Volume 1”, which is a collection and analysis of shooting incident reports released to the public by the Los Angeles Police Department. One section discusses OIS (Officer Involved Shootings) In and Around the Home, another section discusses animal shootings (in and around the …

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Shooting the New Jersey carry permit qual course

In response to the Bruen decision, the state of New Jersey has revised its carry permit program, including the training and qualification requirements. The official document, titled “Use of Force Interim Training for Concealed Carry” includes an outline of the topics to be covered in classroom lecture, and Appendix B has the details of the …

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Student Story #4

Fourth in a series of student-involved incident stories from his time in law enforcement in the 1970s. The Burglary 6PM to 2AM is a great shift if you don’t mind handling trouble. A lot of bad things happen after 9PM when most people are at home watching the news. I worked 6-2 for several years …

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Student Story #3

Another shooting We stored gasoline in an elevated tank behind the Station and used gravity to fill our cars. The Chief was always looking for a way to save a dollar, and bulk gasoline delivery did save the City some money. The evening shift conveniently forgot to fill my car and I noticed the gauge …

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1986 USPSA Match Video

In going through my archive of historical handgun material, I found an old, low quality VHS tape that had video footage of a local club match from 1986. It was shared with me by one of the club members. I didn’t start shooting USPSA until 1988. This was back in the day when everyone shot …

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Book Review: Shoot To Win (John Shaw & Bill Currie, 1985)

He is a self-taught shooter who recognized that the techniques and lessons he learned could be used to train our war fighters.  Accordingly, he founded Mid-South Institute for Self Defense Shooting (MISS), in 1981 just south of Memphis, TN where he developed the most comprehensive firearms training program in the country.  For over 41 years, …

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John Shaw Instructional Videos

I recently digitized, cleaned up, and posted John Shaw’s 1984 pistol training video split into 5 segments. Someone else had previously posted his shotgun training video (with Spanish subtitles). All those videos can be found at the links below. My review of John’s first book, You Can’t Miss, can be found here: A review of …

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