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Randy Cain's Shotgun Class

Sat, 2009-12-12 14:42 — Pat Heyman
One of the best things about Randy's classes is his encyclopedic knowledge firearms equipment. Randy's philosophy is that the most important aspect of a defensive weapon is that it is reliable, and the goal of shooting is to hit the target. As a result his gear selection tends toward the tried and true, with availability of replacement parts weighing strongly in his selection. Hence, his choice of shotgun is the Remington 870 as much for its ubiquity and availability of parts as for its inherent reliability.

Moreover, you will get a chance to see other people with various options and how they work, giving you ideas for your own gear, both what works and what doesn't. And of course Randy will try to help you steer clear of transfer devices—gear whose main purpose is to transfer your money to the vendor.

This fall, I took Randy Cain's Shotgun class. In preparation for the class, I have already posted a couple articles on the shotgun in general and what to look for in a Remington 870. Now that I have taken the Shotgun class, I will be posting an article on recommended modifications to the Remington 870. But this article is dedicated to the class itself.

Videos from the class are available for friends and family. E-mail me.

Day 1

Shotgun I is the second class that I have attended with Randy, and it followed the same pattern as Tactical Handgun 101. The first thing is a discussion on safety. You will learn Jeff Cooper's safety rules for firearm safety word for word. Following safety is a general orientation to the shotgun as a whole and the Remington 870 in particular (everyone in our class had an 870) including how to load and how to unload the shotgun.

Then we were out on the firing line with buckshot to pattern the guns. Patterning consists of shooting buckshot at paper at varying distances to see what the pattern (or shot distribution looks like). You will need (at least) six rounds of two different types of buckshot (12 total) There are three reasons for this exercise:

  1. It helps you determine the best ammunition for your shotgun. Every barrel shoots every load differently.
  2. It helps you to understand your shotgun's capabilities with buckshot at various distances.
  3. It demonstrates the folly of the Hollywood school of shotguns. At 7 seven yards (across the room distance), the pattern on my shotgun was only 4 inches across—so much for the "just point and you can't miss" myth.

We exchanged our buckshot for birdshot and went to the steel plates and practiced various drills such as firing on the move, searching, and Rolling Thunder. Rolling thunder is a team exercise designed to put you under a bit of stress while manipulating the shotgun as quickly as possible just to keep it loaded. We would repeat Rolling Thunder with different variations several times over the next few days. This was followed by a competition to see who could knock down three steel plates the quickest.

Outside Reading: Review of Randy Cain's Practical Rifle

Sat, 2009-12-12 12:28 — Pat Heyman
This is an article from another website that I found interesting along with a link back to the original article.
From: 1911 Forum

Synopsis: BulldogSix gives an report of Randy Cain's Practical Rifle class. The class is meant for bolt action, hunting type rifles with either iron sights or low power scopes. Randy's recommendation on the ideal rifle to take the class with is a Winchester M70 in .308 (pre 64 or classic) with Leupold 1.75-6X VX3 or Leupold 1.5-5X VX3 scope.

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