women at the range

More and more women are starting to carry firearms for personal protection. Many of the Trade Associations said there’s been a 7% rise in female gun ownership from 2005-2020. Constantly we are seeing women come into the store looking for their first handgun. Many of the times they are with their significant other who is there to help guide them in their buying process. Most of the time they are very excited to announce they are here to help their wife or girlfriend get their first handgun. And the second thing they say is .. “I think she might be best with ____ or _____.”

Most of the time the recommendations typically come from the males opinion of what they shoot best or what they think is appropriate for what they can handle. I remember when my wife started shooting with her father on Tuesdays. After several visits with her dad and the boys at the club she came home and said “My father thinks I should get a revolver because it only holds 6 rounds and requires a longer trigger pull.”

So you might be asking yourself why is a revolver a bad choice? Lets start with a couple of key points before I answer this question.  We all get involved in shooting and firearms for a variety of reasons, from hunting, to target shooting, to personal protection, to my significant other wants me to.  No matter the reason why they decided to buy a firearm, the key here is to maximize their enjoyment in the shooting sport industry, and secondly they are successful at improving their shooting skills.

Revolvers present several problems for new shooters. First of all they are very light now and typically are designed using a lighter alloy. This combined with the fact that when you hold the handgun the barrel sits higher over the hand. Combine both of these issues and you have a firearm that will bull whip more making it harder for women to control the firearm potentially diminishing accuracy.

Of course the other option that women tend to be steered to are small handguns such as the Ruger LCP, Smith & Wesson Bodyguard, or Keltec P3AT or something similar to these. Though the 380 caliber is effective for self defense the small compact firearms typically are not easy to control when firing and in most cases do not have good quality sights. These issues make these guns hard to shoot accurately of distances or 10ft. They are commonly referred to as “belly guns”. And your hand is typically sore from shooting.

So what is the best firearm for women you may be asking. Like any other person when you come in the gun store it is about fitting the handgun to the woman’s hand, interest, and use. Obviously the ideal is to find them the best fitting handgun that fits their hand, will give them accurate trigger pull improving accuracy. Is the right size that she will enjoy shooting it at the range. And lastly is compact enough that if it is for concealed carry it can easily be concealed.

Other consideration may be weight of the handgun and does she wear a belt that will not only help to conceal the handgun but also carry the weight of the gun and ammunition. Even now though there are options even for ammunition to lighten the weight of the loaded handgun. Liberty Ammunition makes a product called Civil Defense that is probably one of the lightest ammunitions on the market. With ammo like this you can decrease the weight of the firearm and make it more comfortable to carry and even easier to shoot with less recoil.