NRA Instructor

I grew up in a small rural town on the shores of Lake Travis, about 35 miles northeast of Austin, Texas. I AM NOT FROM AUSTIN! Often as a kid my friends and I would get off the school, grab our .22 rifles and head out in the woods in search of rabbits and squirrels, which led to a life long love of hunting and the outdoors. At age 17, I enlisted in@ the United States Navy for 3 years active service, attaining the rank of 3rd Class Petty Officer. I fired my first handgun in Boot Camp, a 1911 Government Model .45 ACP and qualified Expert my first time on the Firing Line. I have been an aficionado of that platform ever since. I was required to carry at least a side arm and sometimes a rifle when on watch and in Argentia, New Foundland when stationed there at a high security facility. I have enjoyed hunting, plinking and personal carry ever since.In about 1998, a friend introduced me to Service Rifle Competition.Service Rifle is the standard course of fire for the United States Military. It is a 4 position match where you fire 20 rounds in each of the positions. The positions are 100 yard standing slow fire, 200 yard kneeling slow fire, 300 yard prone rapid fire, and 600 yard prone slow fire. All firing in these positions was done with iron sights, no optics were allowed. The rifles had to be cosmetically identical to a GI issue M-16 A2 Rifle, but we were allowed changes internally such as match triggers, match barrels and match sights. In 2005, I was fortunate enough to attend the National Matches at Camp Perry, Ohio and compete with over 3000 of the finest rifle men and women in the world. A prerequisite to competing the first time you attend the Nationals is to attend the Small Arms Marksmanship course that is put on each year by the United States Army Marksmanship Unit and the U.S. Marine Corp Marksmanship Team. There we learned breathing, sight picture for competition shooting, stable stances, and immediate action drills in case of rifle stoppages during competition. We also were taught safe rifle handling loading and unloading procedures. I enjoyed shooting this competition for 15 years.I spent 5 years assisting the Texas State Junior Rifle Team coach when my son was competing on the Junior Team, and enjoy teaching young people safe gun handling and marksmanship very much, as I believe the youth are the key to keeping the Second Amendment and the shooting sports alive.In 2014, I attended the NRA Basic Pistol Instructors Course and became certified to teach basic pistol classes. These classes are very rudimentary but are excellent to introduce a novice into the world of shooting. I look forward to offering Basic Pistol Classes in the near future at Locked and Loaded Training Center! It is fulfilling to me to start someone on the path to shooting, and helping to give them confidence that if necessary they can take care of themselves through the responsible use of firearms.I still hunt using a variety of rifles and pistols, still like to target shoot, and just plink tin cans. I hope I can continue to do so for many years to come!