I bought a lot of stuff back then because I was scared. When you're afraid, you buy things quickly but don't think things through. I don't regret having those things, but I do regret not using that money for training.
As a lifelong marksmanship instructor, I, for one, cannot overemphasize the importance of quality training. Please note that I said Quality Training! Training is expensive, no doubt about it. Between the cost of a firearm to train with, ammo, range or club fees and of course the most expensive part of the training scenario, the instructor, one must be careful about how and where you spend your hard-earned money. I am NRA certified to teach Rifle, Pistol and Muzzle Loading, but have seldom taught an NRA Course. It’s not that the NRA instruction, books and shooting techniques are bad, they are actually top of the line. The problem, however, is that the NRA, instead of emphasizing individual training, requires group training. To register a NRA course, there need to be at least 4 students per class. The registered class is to be of one-day duration with both classroom and range time included. That makes for a long day and, to be honest, very little actually retained from any training crammed into such a short time. It does not recognize that there are different learning curves and that the comprehension rate between students varies. Spending usually $150 and up for this training is not money well spent.
There are many nationally and regionally acclaimed training academies out there that claim to be the best available. In most cases, their training is much better than the local NRA course but is very similar in that they want your dollars, so their training comes at a very high price.
In all but a few cases, you are much better off finding a good local instructor who is more interested in making sure that you comprehend, understand and can perform the actual task at hand before moving on to the next.
All training, both rifle and pistol, needs to be started with the use of at least target grade pistols or rifles with quality ammunition that shoots well out of the individual firearm. This is really necessary for everyone starting any course of firearms training. It is necessary for the instructor to see how you are shooting, and any mistakes you made before moving on to anything new.
Those of you who shoot a lot know that a rifle or pistol will shoot better with ammunition that is in tune with the rifle barrel. The reason for starting with a .22 is so that the instructor can see and follow any errors made by the student and not have them covered by recoil. The reasoning behind the target grade firearms is so that the bullet goes where the student was shooting at the moment rather than wherever the barrel and ammo decided what it wanted to do at the moment.
This is already getting to be too long, so I am going to stop my lecture at this point. What I am trying to get across to you is that if you are going to spend your hard-earned money, spend it wisely. Learning who the best instructors are, or where to go for the best training in your area is usually spread by word of mouth. Ask others who they got their training , and how they liked it.
