usmc combat shooting team shooters like sgt. james...

USMC Combat Shooting Team shooters like Sgt. James Gill are regular participants. Average shooter is usually shocked at the level of performance on display by top third of competitors.

OCTOBER 2014 | www.SWATMAG.com62

ANY serious student of marksmanship knows about the impact of the Southwest Combat Pis-

tol League on modern shooting. !e techniques, equipment, and approach to training and practice that group of men pioneered had ripples that still lap ashore half a century later.

Much of what Je" Cooper presented as the Modern Technique was devel-oped and proven on that club’s Cali-fornia ranges. Today there is arguably an equally signi#cant phenomenon happening in the piney woods of North Carolina.

Not half an hour from the state capi-tol building in Raleigh are several rang-es that every few weeks see over 100 shooters roll in with trucks full of guns ready to take on the latest challenge at Tarheel 3-Gun. Rotating among several available ranges, the match sta" puts on one of the most challenging and cre-ative, yet well-grounded, matches in ex-istence today.

An indicator of the quality of the monthly match is that it routinely sells out and has upward of 40 shooters on standby to pounce on cancellations. And at any given match, 20 to 30% of the shooters are military and law enforce-ment—a not-insigni#cant number of whom routinely drive three to #ve hours to attend.

!ere is a kind of magic happen-ing, where shooters with long combat experience under a variety of condi-tions are rubbing elbows with spon-sored and professional shooters under challenging competition scenarios at the point in time when the equipment has increased the art of the possible. !e envelope is being pushed, and in-dustry, instructors, duty users, and pro competitors are all visibly part of the cycle at Tarheel.

3-GUN MATCH EXPLOSION!ree-gun matches, where shooters compete with pistol, shotgun and ri$es, are nothing new. Notable examples have been around for 20-plus years.

Tarheel 3-GunBy Ethan Johns

NEW ERA

COMPETITION SHOOTINGIN

Navy SEAL and Team Bushmaster shooter Aaron Reed on the pistol. Pistol work varies from !fth-gear doubles on paper to 4x10-inch steel at 10 to 20 yards and chest plates at 50 to 60 yards.

www.SWATMAG.com | OCTOBER 2014 63

However, for those who haven’t noticed, the sport is abso-lutely exploding nationwide, directly correlating to the mass interest in ARs and practical shooting. Cable TV shows such as 3-Gun Nation have fueled the excitement and drawn many new shooters to the sport at the same time that returning vets and contractors have taken up serious o"-duty practice, train-ing and competition.

Not all matches are equal. In fact, many are clearly put together by recreational shooters with no basis in real-world utilization and are best described as “fun with guns” events that simply push shooters to go fast and turn ammo into brass.

Some of the more noteworthy annual “outlaw” 3-gun matches have traditionally showcased di%cult shots, physi-cally demanding stages, the incorporation of terrain to move through or obscure targets, and other unique challenges. Oth-er 3-gun matches have been based heavily on IDPA or IPSC/USPSA rules and closely resemble their parent structure.

Tarheel 3-Gun is aligned with 3-Gun Nation as a club and bases their matches o" of that rule book, but retains a healthy dose of the “outlaw” approach. !is is a good thing.

!ere are three requirements for a great match: great stage design, great shooters and great administration. Two out of three are worth the drive, and the consistent achievement of all three is a shooter’s paradise.

NO EXCUSESTarheel gears its stages to the high-end shooter. No apologies given and no whining allowed. !e designers take the tough-est shots you normally see in training and ask you to do it on demand. Or they push the di%culty even a little farther and see what the #eld can do.

Shotgun slug hits at 90 yards on multiple chest plates? Yup ... after grounding a pistol that just took on a variety of

paper targets and 4x10-inch steel plates hiding at odd angles around a prop car. A shooter might take on a rack of eight-inch plates at 60 yards with the ri$e from standing and then immediately transition to a rooftop simulator for shots to a half-dozen eight-to ten-inch plates from 200 to 400 yards. At another stage there may be a jungle run that has the shoot-er penetrating down a narrow trail to engage targets to both sides at the fastest speed he can handle.

!e designers run the edge of what good equipment and shooters can do on demand to ensure that performance is earned, but within the reach of the gear and shooter. It is not uncommon for well-established shooters to “time out,” or use all the available 90 seconds for a stage, without getting hits on all targets on some of the more challenging stages.

RIFLE, SHOTGUN AND PISTOL STAGESRi$e shots tend to average 3 to 4 Minute-of-Angle on support-ed shots, with most falling in the “sweet spot” for 200-meter zeroes. All manner of props are incorporated for support, with straightforward prone positions a rare luxury. !is is decep-tively di%cult, and many a highly experienced shooter has arrived with a carbine zeroed at 50 yards and wound up #sh-ing for hits at distance from an unfamiliar support. !ere are regularly a few shots at 300+ yards that demand the shooter know the holdover for his bullet.

Shotgun is run at a high level, challenging many to learn more about their 12’s patterning and grouping with shot and slugs.

Inset: Rangemaster and nationally ranked shooter Steve Wall engages multiple targets with a Barnes Precision Machine stage gun, in this case a full-auto carbine that every shooter starts with before transitioning to their individual weapons.

NEW ERA IN COMPETITION SHOOTING


Shotgun stages present predomi-nantly steel at distances where the shooter must know his choke and pat-tern. !e shooter can often get it done with an Improved Cylinder or Light Modi#ed choke, but only if he knows the “throw” of the shot as it goes out.

Pistols get a workout as well. !e short gun alternates aggressively be-tween max speed paper hits at defen-sive distances to ten-inch plates on the move or demanding 4x10- or six-inch steel at 10 to 20+ yards. Overall, the healthy demand for skill with all three weapons sets the matches apart.

STAGE DESIGNA noteworthy grounded-ness in the design presents challenges that are achievable and have a connection with the practical use of each weapon. Tarheel 3-Gun doesn’t claim to be a tactical venue, but many of the stages and tasks translate extremely well. Junk vehicles are regularly implemented and shooters #nd themselves shooting in and around them in every possible manner in a way that resembles por-tions of a Viking Tactics class.

Occasional “house” style stages ex-pose shooters to working the three guns in that environment. It is not tactics driv-en, but is great exposure to the challeng-es of pushing the equipment aggressive-ly indoors. Many of the shooters would otherwise never get that opportunity.

!ere are no rules for the use of cov-er, but the fault lines and prop walls that control where a shooter can engage from often constrain the shooter into shoot-ing around cover to a useful degree.

FLEXIBILITY!e governing rules provide the shooter many choices. Paper targets can be en-gaged with either ri$e or pistol. Steel is typically shotgun or pistol, with long-range steel ri$e only and clay birds shot-gun only.

!e shooter can thus tailor his run to his perceived strengths. Not a strong pistol shooter and the stage has a bank of skinny steel at 15 yards? Go with the 12 gauge and reload for the clays. Not as strong with the shottie and hoping to avoid reloading it? Knuckle down to get the hits with the handgun.

A stage might allow a dozen ways to

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succeed, and the Tarheel crew seems to truly enjoy present-ing options that allow the shooter to choose. !e problem-solving aspect of the game, with the shooter having to man-age engagement plans for di"erent target types with di"erent weapons and react to any hiccups once the buzzer goes o", is one of the sport’s hooks.

Duty-type competitors see a direct correlation with this mental management while employing the guns at max capac-ity to other job tasks.

WORLD-CLASS CROWDLocation is everything and if you look at a map you will see that Tarheel 3-Gun’s stomping grounds are uniquely proxi-mate to Camp Lejeune and Fort Bragg while being an easy drive from Little Creek, Virginia. !e third or so of each match roster that are Military or LE represent some of our nation’s most skilled and experienced warriors. !ese tend to be the experienced leaders and instructors who are at the peak of their careers.

On any given squad of competitors, the resume is impres-sive. Current or former members of Army Special Forces; Marine FAST, Force Recon, and MARSOC; Navy SEALs; and a sprinkling of LE at local, state, and federal levels. !is crowd brings a wealth of operational experience and contextual backdrop to discussions behind the line and a ready check on which gear and techniques are transferable and which are sport speci#c. Military instructors borrow ideas from each other and from Tarheel’s stages, with bene#ts cycling right back into their specialized courses.

Tarheel matches consistently draw a wide group of spon-sored shooters, both pro and semi-pro. !ese shooters en-thusiastically state that Tarheel’s monthly matches are near

the challenge and complexity of many large-venue annual matches, and they take advantage of the match training.

Members of the Marine Corps Combat Shooting Team are often present, as are shooters from the Bushmaster, FNH, and other company teams. !ese are very serious shooters who are in the hunt for the annual 3 Gun Nation shoot o" and big money prize in Las Vegas and their presence is a welcome showcase of what the deep end of the talent pool looks like.

Many solid shooters attending Tarheel for the #rst time are a little stunned by the percentage of “big #sh” in attendance and the average performance level on the #eld. Any serious student can watch a squad of these shooters run through a stage and basically have a live seminar. At every match, shoot-ers can see the pros demonstrate the best possible way to support the gun for tough shots, ways to create e%ciencies to allow more aggressive engagement, and many creative shoot-ing approaches that might translate to other areas.

CLOCKWORK!e Tarheel sta" runs the program like a customer-oriented business. From simple online signups to wireless electronic scorekeeping, the show is exceptionally well run. !e sta" ac-commodates as many shooters as possible each month while still keeping the squads manageable and incorporating two or three more stages than a typical club-level match.

NEW ERA IN COMPETITION SHOOTING

Shooter engages head plate at 200 yards. Tarheel 3-Gun presents challenging matches tailored to the high-end shooter, with a third of every sold-out match being serious military or LE shooters. Shooters are pushed to perform at a high level at top speed with ri"e, pistol, and shotgun on every stage.


Many of their matches quickly tally a signi#cant waitlist of shooters hoping for a cancellation so they can come out to shoot. Over the past year, there were in excess of 2,100 shoot-ers who attended a Tarheel match, with more than 700 unique competitors.

!at’s a pretty strong testament to the quality of the op-eration. !ere is a real management art to processing 100 shooters through #ve to seven stages, each with its own mov-ing parts, without bottlenecks or backlogs. Tarheel does this very well and maintains a friendly feel to the operation, so the shooter never feels rushed.

INDUSTRY PARTNERS!e largest indicator that something remarkable is happening in Carolina is the amount of industry interest and support that Tarheel receives. Tarheel runs several series, each sponsored by a list of industry partners. Most matches have a pre-match ra&e where the shooters are hoping for the lucky number for some pretty signi#cant prizes.

Bushmaster and Remington have provided ARs and VersaMax shotguns to each match in their respective series, while companies like HiperFire triggers, Barnes Precision Machine, and a growing list of others support each match. !ere has probably never been a club-level monthly match with anything near the support that Tarheel 3-Gun enjoys.

Besides material support, companies are also closely watching trends in the matches and using the matches as a proving ground. When the duty shooters and the pros start to gravitate toward certain items, that is useful informa-tion. !e diverse pool of shooters at the high end is a market researcher’s dream.

GEARTarheel has several classes of equipment for shooters to com-pete within, but by far the most popular is Tactical Optics. In this class, shooters can have a magni#ed optic on their ri$e and o"set or back-up irons and a small compensator.

Irons and Red Dots are combined into their own class. It is not unheard of for a shooter to place pretty high in the overall standings using a “non-magni#ed” ri$e.

So with the arguable exception of the compensator, the ri$es that rule tend to look like a ri$e that would excel in most real-world situations. !e scenarios are so dynamic that even the weight of the ri$es tends to stay realistic, with light ri$es common.

Pistols have a handful of limitations to stay in Tac Optics, but again a duty-appropriate pistol can run in the class with-out a real handicap as long as it is accurate.

Shotguns are probably the most specialized compared to the notion of a “pump” 12 as a duty gun. Tactical semi-autos like the Benelli M2 and Remington VersaMax are the most common, and few are stock, since most shotguns need help out of the gate to reach their potential.

TRAINING VERSUS COMPETITIONWell-designed competitions like Tarheel are best viewed as complementary to training, not as a replacement. A duty or mission shooter needs a solid foundation, then the unique challenges of competition broaden perspective and demon-strate where a shooter’s gaps in his skillset are.

Better than perhaps any other mechanism, competition encourages self-study and dedicated, focused practice. If a shooter is practicing to excel at Tarheel, he is likely greatly exceeding his organizational standards.

Eight-inch targets standing at 50 yards are often the “tough” shot on a qual course. At Tarheel, they are a routine !xture that is shot under pressure.

Bushmaster patrolman’s carbine is raf"ed off to a competitor at most matches. Industry sponsor support for Tarheel is unprece-dented, with companies recognizing the unique assembly of talent at the regular matches. Other raf"e guns have included VersaMax shotguns, Bushmaster BA 50 .50 BMG ri"e, and a variety of parts and accessories.

TARHEEL 3-GUN(919) 201-7990www.tarheel3gun.com

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