{"id":77865,"date":"2024-09-05T14:57:39","date_gmt":"2024-09-05T20:57:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/?p=77865"},"modified":"2024-09-05T14:57:39","modified_gmt":"2024-09-05T20:57:39","slug":"rifle-corner-retrieving-the-rifle-an-overlooked-skill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/2024\/09\/05\/rifle-corner-retrieving-the-rifle-an-overlooked-skill\/","title":{"rendered":"Rifle Corner: Retrieving the Rifle – an Overlooked Skill"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Retrieving the Rifle – an Overlooked Skill<\/a><\/h1>\n

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If you haven\u2019t taken my Perimeter Defense Rifle class (or read\u00a0Protecting Your Homestead<\/a>), you may not know that one of the things I teach is the idea that the rifle is the gun we are most\u00a0unlikely<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0to have on our person when we need it. It\u2019s the firearm that needs to be retrieved in order to use, and that affects how we train and practice.<\/h2>\n

The popularity contest<\/em><\/h2>\n

It\u2019s quite popular in rifle classes these days to shoot from a slung-in-front configuration \u2014 with the rifle hanging in the perfect position, hands pre-placed and, very often, with the buttstock already on the shoulder. This makes it fast and easy to simply swing the gun up and into a shooting position, decreasing the time it takes to fire a shot (and giving the guy holding the shot timer some reason for existing.)<\/h2>\n

Despite the ubiquity of the practice, I consider it so unrealistic as to be laughable, because it assumes you already have the gun with you, and slung just so, when the problem starts!<\/h2>\n

In reality, when an incident occurs for which you need the rifle it\u2019s very unlikely that you\u2019ll be \u201con patrol\u201d, with the gun conveniently slung where you can simply raise it and shoot. You\u2019re not going to be on a SWAT entry team with the butt of your rifle already planted on your shoulder.<\/h2>\n

The more likely scenario is that you\u2019ll suddenly become aware that you need a rifle. You\u2019ll run to the rifle\u2019s storage place, grab it (and a magazine, if necessary), get the gun into a condition to be used, make your way to the point where you can\/will employ it, then (if necessary) shoulder it and make the shot.<\/h2>\n

That\u2019s a very different set of skills.<\/h2>\n

Sling, slung, slang?<\/em><\/h2>\n

Because of the need to respond to a developing situation, and the urgency it causes in one\u2019s reactions, I don\u2019t believe most people will actually take the time to get \u201cslung up\u201d or don one of those chest harness\/magazine carrier contraptions.<\/h2>\n

I\u2019ve used a rifle as a defensive tool, and in none of my incidents did I even think about using the sling. (I\u2019ll admit to not owning any of those chest harnesses, but I\u2019m quite sure I would also have left it behind in my rush to get the rifle into play.)<\/h2>\n

This is quite consistent with what people I\u2019ve interviewed have told me about their defensive experience with the rifle. As one said: \u201cWhen someone is shooting at you, everything that\u2019s non-essential goes right out the window.\u201d<\/h2>\n

The sling, in my opinion, is usually non-essential to the job of putting rounds downrange. Someone once said that the sling is to the rifle what the holster is to the pistol, but I think even that analogy implies more importance than it should. Practicing from a slung position, I believe, is a waste of valuable resources because plausible incidents don\u2019t often happen that way.<\/h2>\n

I think it\u2019s far more valuable to practice a realistic skill set, those things that you\u2019ll actually need to do when it\u2019s time for the rifle.<\/h2>\n

What might that look like?<\/h2>\n

Grab and go<\/em><\/h2>\n

Since the rifle is the arm that you need to go and get, it seems to me that learning how to retrieve and move with it is important. Like drawing the handgun, retrieving the rifle is a skill that must be practiced. Oddly, though, it\u2019s one that gets little to no attention in most rifle curriculums. See the disconnect?<\/h2>\n

Being able to get to the storage area quickly, access the rifle, easily get it out of the storage device, and move rapidly and safely to the point where it will be employed are all tasks that need to be practiced if they\u2019re to be done efficiently. This is the time for \u201cgrab the gun and go\u201d, not \u201cget geared up to be all tactical and stuff\u201d.<\/h2>\n

Think about your rifle and how you train with it.<\/h2>\n

When was the last time you factored any realistic\u00a0 skills into your practice routine? I submit that you\u2019ll gain far more from paying attention to those than adjusting a sling to reduce your shot time by a tenth of a second.<\/h2>\n

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Retrieving the Rifle – an Overlooked Skill   If you haven\u2019t taken my Perimeter Defense Rifle class (or read\u00a0Protecting Your Homestead), you may not know that one of the things I teach is the idea that the rifle is the gun we are most\u00a0unlikely\u00a0to have on our person when we need it. It\u2019s the firearm…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[3786,5445,13890,5477,5479,398,399,401,10,404,405],"tags":[9380,658,5575,689,17925,8989,9057],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77865"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77865"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77865\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77875,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77865\/revisions\/77875"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}