Mix It Up 3-Gun, Cowboy Action This Summer

With summertime, comes longer days and more opportunity for people to get outside and enjoy leisure activities. A top choice for millions of American’s is spending time with family and friends shooting.

Indeed, many range and shooting facility owners have busy schedules during the summer months, filled with classes, fun events and competitions. Shooting competitions are a great way to improve your shooting skills, ramp up the fun and meet like-minded firearms enthusiasts like yourself.

If you’re like a lot of people who enjoy shooting rifles, handguns and shotguns, maybe a competition that limits you to a single type of firearm isn’t the best option. Fortunately for the multi-gun fan, this is a great time to be a shooter. There are several great options.

One of the fastest growing target shooting games today is 3-Gun, which is an exciting, adrenaline-fueled timed shooting event where competitors fire on targets using shotguns, rifles and handguns.

“We’re adding more matches every year and not just in America, but all over the world.

We’re going global baby,” says an excited Chad Adams, vice president of 3-Gun Nation, the parent company of the National 3-Gun Association, which oversees and organizes the events. In just six months in 2013, the association’s 3-Gun Club series went from an idea with no clubs to 67 clubs and climbing.

Cowboy action shooting is another event that not only allows people to live out their Old West fantasies by competing with revolvers, lever-action rifles and side-by-sidescatterguns, but also allows them to dress the part as well and create personas as colorful as the legends from this fascinating time in our nation’s history. The Single Action Shooting Society (SASS) is an international association dedicated to promoting cowboy action shooting and the events page on their website boasts more than 70 scheduled shooting events across the country between Memorial Day and Labor Day this year.

Likewise, qualification shooting though programs such as the Winchester/NRA Marksmanship Qualification Program are a great way to improve proficiency in any type of firearm preferred including rifles, shotguns, handguns, muzzleloaders and even airguns. Shooters can participate at their own pace, while working their way through a prescribed set of drills that takes them through beginning skill levels all the way up to expert status.

No matter what kind of guns you prefer to shoot, or how competitive or noncompetitive you wish to be, there is a shooting sport that everyone in the family can enjoy. Check out a range or shooting facility near you or visit the NSSF’s WhereToShoot.org to find a nearby range and other resources for recreational shooters.

Then it’s just a matter of grabbing your gun, your eye and ear protection and your Winchester ammo and heading out for a whole lot of fun.