Running the Snub: Consistency Required

I just spent five days at my folks’ country place.  My father is an avid shooter.  In particular he is an exceptional revolver shooter.  His ability with the small-frame revolver and his extensive experience with it led me to see the merits of the platform in the first place.  Flying to his place for a change rather than driving I was limited in what I could bring concerning guns so I brought my Ruger SP101.  A revolver is typically my gun of choice when flying anywhere as it is a far simpler defensive weapon to transport this way as not needing to pack and then load magazines upon arrival is a benefit.  Also, considering the company I would be keeping, the revolver seemed appropriate.

I shot the SP101 for five days straight.  What I again concluded was simply this: you can’t truly reach your full abilities with a particular weapon unless you devote fairly exclusive training priority to it for a significant duration of time.  This can be seen in the approach of most serious competitors: they often use different guns for different divisions but they usually change seasonally, or in some sort of time frame.  They spend significant time maximizing their trigger time on a particular platform.  For myself the revolver is always a secondary weapon.  I train with it because I am stuck with it due to my requirements for a very concealable firearm when dressed in ways that do not accommodate my usual autoloader.  When I train with it I do so after doing my “standard” training with my auto.  The problem, however, is that a “secondary” weapon will typically be only “secondary” in performance.

I can see a substantial improvement in my general abilities with the snub just after the past five days of shooting it exclusively.  By the end of the week I was getting the gun deployed much faster.  The small and curved grip is significantly harder, or perhaps just different, to acquire for a fast draw.  Also, my follow-up shots were noticeably faster after running the double action weapon hard for those days.  This focused training on the specific weapon has already payed off significantly.  I find that I can resume a high standard of performance with an autoloader after working with a revolver for a period of time.  The opposite, however, does not seem the case.  The small-frame revolver demands dedicated attention if you wish to shoot it well.

What such experience leads me to debate is how I should approach my training with the snubby.  Even during the summer months I still carry my auto more often.  Therefore, should the snub remain secondary in training priority, or should I maximize my training with it and just carry it pretty much exclusively over the warm months?  This means not carrying a double-stack auto at all times possible as is my preference.  Perhaps as shooters we over-analyze and obsess about the wrong things but the quest to maximize our abilities with the weapons we rely on are part of the craft.  Maybe I will run the wheel gun hard this summer and see what happens.