Spent the day at the range yesterday with the SIL, grandson and one of my shooting buddies.
Second time we've taken my grandson shooting... all I've heard for the last week was, 'Nono, (Italian for grandfather), when are we going shooting again?' Little rugrat went so far as to hide my Viagra and hold 'em hostage until I took him again. Got 'em back last night... now I lock 'em in the gun safe. Rotten little kid.
Being a proud Nono I took pictures again, for sentimental reasons plus it helps to study them at home and analyze his stance, etc.
Along with the guns and ammo the 'big people' were going to shoot brought a brick of .22's for the young'un. Last week had him shoot a standard Browning Buckmark, this week brought him a Buckmark with a fluted Tactical Solutions barrel. Two inches longer but considerably lighter. Turns out he was able to hold it at eye level without a problem... all day long. All day... wish I had his energy... I was ready to leave two hours before I ended up dragging him off the range. The sun was going down and he didn't want to stop.
Last week we started him out at twelve yards and quickly had him back to fifteen. He kept knocking down all the steel and everyone got tired of setting it up again every couple of minutes.
Fixed his little wagon this week, we brought swinging steel instead of knockdowns and set him up at twenty yards. Was looking forward to a few hours of just gunshots, no clang, clang, clang. So much for well laid plans.
Kid is showing signs of having some natural ability, (shouldn't come as any surprise considering the superior genetic genes he comes from.
) He had steel constantly moving like a screen door swinging in a wind storm. Damn show off.
Didn't want him to get over confident so when he was about to run out of .22's I decided to let him learn some humility with my S&W's 586 and 686. I load what we would all consider fairly light to medium .38's. 162 grain SWC under 3.7 grains of Bullseye. My bones and rheumatoid arthritis won't let me shoot stuff much hotter than that... at least not a lot of 'em.
Loaded one shot at a time for him and showed him how to shoot single action. Consistently hit eight inch round steel and a 14x14 inch steel plate from twenty yards. (Maybe there is a glimmer of hope for the Navy Seal thing.)
While his father was keeping an eye on him my buddy, Deak, and I came up with a master plan. I'm going to load him up his very own loads... I'm thinking of 121 grain RN or TC, I have the moulds for both, over a fairy light charge of Clays, (I have ten pounds just sitting around.) Instead of the heavy 586 or 686 I'll bring him out either a Model 15 or a Model 65 to keep the weight down. I suppose he could even handle my Model 66 but that's my old duty gun with Jordan Trooper grips on it... they're way too big for his hands.
With the price of .22's it really won't cost much more to load .38's and with his energy it probably won't be much of a challenge for him to get three to five thousand rounds under his belt by fall.
If he gets to the point where he wants to learn to shoot semi's he's picking up the brass but I'd rather he spends a few years with revolvers... learn to shoot NRA style targets to develop his eye and control.
Okay, now what you've been dreading... the proud grandfather photos... sorry.
The Buckmark I had him shooting. Fun little gun.
Made him wear one of my old bullet proof vests. Hope he doesn't fall into a lake.
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