Warrior Poet Life Hacks for Saving Time on the Range

Let's be honest. For most gun owners, it's a real challenge to get in a lot of hours at the range and in training classes mastering their weapons for tactical use. So my priority is not to chastise you for not shooting enough. Rather I want to be sure that every minute you spend at the range provides you with as much benefit as possible. So hopefully you'll get more out of it in less time and without spending unnecessary ammo. Here are some hacks to save you time and improve your skill at the firing range.

Firing Range Hack #1: Prep and Organize Your Equipment Beforehand

Before you even get on the road to come to the range, get your equipment prepped and organized. 

• Load and stack your magazines. While you're just chilling out watching, for example, some of our amazing content over at the WPS Network, get your magazines loaded and ready for the range. This way you can just focus on shooting when you're at the range. Load as many mags as you think you'll need and then maybe load a couple more so that you're not wasting time at the range getting prepped. PRO TIP: Do your dry firing practice at home or elsewhere so you're not spending range time on this. 

• Gather your range kit. Make sure you have your ear protection, shot timer, sunscreen, oil, staples and tools, etc. all together in your bag. I recommend using a large range duffel bag for all your gear. (You can check out our website to get a lot of the gear you need for the range.)

• PRO TIP: At the conclusion of each range session, make sure all of these items are placed back in your kit, organized and ready to go for the next time. This includes cleaning your guns when you get back home so they're ready to go.

Firing Range Hack #2: Have a Range Training Plan

Failure to plan is a plan to fail at the firing range. It seems really basic but it's absolutely essential—having a pre-established plan with some objectives, some criteria that you want to cover, and some goals that you want to meet. Is it a skills day, a stress day, or a maintenance day? Or maybe it's a combination of the three. 

• If you're still working basic skills, like your draw and presentation or reload, then you'll likely need to spend most of your time on skills at the range without adding tactical stress. Without the basics down, the other elements won't improve you as a shooter. 

• If you're zeroing in a new scope or breaking in a new gun, your objectives will center on skills and maintenance—perhaps including some drills with the weapon, etc. 

• Or maybe you'll want to run speed drills that tests fundamentals, accuracy, and speed. This can be a real soul crusher, but it really locks in your combined skills along with skills at reloads, recoil management, in a static (versus dynamic/tactical) setting. After running that drill multiple times, just watch your skill level rocket throughout the day. Once you're done with that, maybe you're ready for some stress. 

• So run some basic skills under stress. Running and shooting, shooting at different distances, multiple targets, etc. 

• If you're a defensive shooter, you're imagining all the different lines of attack where you may get lit up, and you're thinking about the battlefield in 360 degrees.

Whatever you're tackling at the Range, Be Purpose Driven

Right now, ammo is scarce, but the times are dangerous and seem to be getting worse, which means we've got to stay sharp. So hopefully this saves you some time and ammo while increasing your skill through purpose driven, skill-specific range time. So don't stop training. Train Harder. Train Smarter. And we have one important ask:

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