Ever get an urge totry out something really on the fringes? Consider Front Sight’s submachine guncourse!
by GARRETT JACKSON
Gun Games
For most of us, getting the chance to shoot machine gunsis something that we all would love to try, but will most likely never have thechance. For those of us who are fortunate enough to live in a state that allowsthe private ownership of machine guns, there is still the headache of all thebureaucratic red tape that we have to wade through in order to get one. So whenI heard about the chance to take a submachine gun class from one of thenation's premier firearm training schools, I sat up and paid attention. When Iheard the course was completely free, including guns and ammo, my first thoughtwas, Right, what's the catch?
We all know that nothing is offered free of chargewithout some kind of string attached, but I checked around and the offer seemedlegitimate. So I hesitantly sent in my application for the free one-daysubmachine gun class at Front Sight Firearms Training Institute. I receivedconfirmation a couple of weeks later and started making plans for a weekend inLas Vegas — poor me!
When I arrived, I was expecting to be forced to sitthrough some long, boring time-share presentation for several hours beforehearing a thing about shooting. When I got there, however, I found this was notto be the case. I was directed to an enormous tent that serves as the classroomand pro-shop while the new facility is being constructed. They had coffee,juice, muffins and other breakfast food waiting for us to eat while we signedin and waited for the other students to arrive. When we were all there, we werewelcomed and given a short overview of the class and then introduced to thefound of Front Sight, Dr. Ignatius Piazza. He briefly told us about the FrontSight facility, his background and why he had started in the venture. When itis finished, Front Sight will be a premier shooting resort
modeledafter exclusive golf-type resorts — only here, you play with bulletsinstead of golf balls. The facility is being built on 550 acres of land thatwill eventually include an airstrip and hangar, rifle ranges out to 1,000yards, a martial arts training gym and a pro shop and armory. Ultimately, thiswill become the town of Front Sight, Nevada. It will be a planned communitydevelopment that contains housing plots, a commercial center, a private schooland a community center.
Front Sight should be the safest town in the world. Afterall, who would try anything in a town where everyone is armed and trained touse their weapons?
After being given this short bit of backgroundinformation, we quickly moved into what we were all here for: instruction inshooting submachine guns! Last year, this class was taught using the M-11submachine gun. This year, Front Sight upgraded to the Uzi. We were first givensome historical background on the Uzi, which was initially developed in the1950s for a general issue weapon of the Israeli military. In spite of therebeing some more modern
sub-guns out there now in the hands ofpolice and military, the Uzi fills that tactical niche as well or better thanits competitors. Dr. Piazza feels that the H&K and Colt sub-guns are morepopular with police units not because they are superior weapons, but because ofthe aggressive marketing strategies employed by these companies.
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| Front Sight advertises andguarantees one instructor for every 4-5 students on the firing line, clearlythe industry's best. In practice, however, Front Sight generally has oneinstructor for every 2-3 students. |
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| Front Sight’s founder anddirector, Dr. Ignatius Piazza, lectures about the history and tacticalapplcation of the Uzi 9mm Submachine Gun. |
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| Fun on the firing line atFront Sight Submachine Gun Course! |
The Uzi has a slightly different manual of arms than somesemi- and full-auto guns, due to its open-bolt design. We were shown the properprocedure for clearing the weapon, and then the lesson went on to the propergrip and stance. Then we were split up into two groups and each group was givena chance to do some dry-fire exercises to become familiar with the gun andpractice what we had been taught. There were plenty of instructors to critiqueus on our form. Front Sight keeps an instructor to student ratio of at leastone instructor to every four or five students.
Firing stance with a sub-gun is a little different thanwith a rifle or shotgun. The two things that I kept hearing from theinstructors was to keep my elbows in and bend forward more at the waist. I feltlike I was leaning way to far forward already, but this helps control recoil infull-auto, as I came to understand later, out on the range.
After we had become familiar with the guns, we were giveninstruction on the proper sight picture and sight alignment. The Uzi uses astandard rear peep sight and front post. These make the gun effective out to200 yards. We followed this instruction up with some sighting drills. Theentire class was taught this way: we would learn one fundamental, then get achance to practice it. Then we would learn something else that would build onwhat we had already been taught. This teaching method made it very easy to forthe most rank novice to learn quickly, but there were enough instructorshelping everyone that the more experienced shooters could improve theirtechnique without feeling like the class was moving too slow.
Next came trigger control. While the Uzi doesn't have a bad
trigger, it will never be accused of belonging on a finelytuned target rifle. The reason for this was that the trigger engagement had tobe a strong enough to catch the heavy bolt to stop it from cycling when thetrigger is released. A light, crisp trigger would be battered until it broke,which would result in a run-away gun.
In this situation, the gunwould not stop shooting until the magazine was empty. The trigger wasn't reallyall that bad, and once I became used to it, it worked very nicely.
All this classroom work was fun and informative, but Iwas there to shoot! After a short break, we moved out to the range. There wereplenty of snack foods and beverages waiting for us, but by this time, everyonewas grinning and greedily eyeing the Uzis laid out in front of a row oftargets.
Dr. Piazza was there to give us a live-firedemonstration. He quickly dispelled the popular Hollywood notion that you cansimply spray bullets with a sub-gun and anything in your way will be blownaway. Holding the weapon at hip level, he dumped an entire magazine, sweepingback and forth at four targets. When the gun ran dry, the targets had only oneor two random hits each. Less than half the bullets had hit anywhere on thetargets at a mere seven yards. He then reloaded, shouldered the weapon, andfired a controlled burst into the center of each target. He had a perfectcenter-of-mass hits and used less ammo and did it in less time.
Finally, it was our turn. Under the direction of therange officers, we retrieved and loaded our guns. we started out shootingsingle shots in semi-auto mode to get a feel for firing the guns. Then we werefinally allowed to push the selector all the way over to auto
andreally start rocking and rolling.
The thing that noticed right off was just how easy theUzi is to shoot. Most of my full-auto experience has been with the M-11 and MAC10 type of sub-gun. Although these are fun guns to shoot, their high cyclicrate makes them more difficult to master. The Uzi has a slower rate of about600 rounds-per-minute. I was amazed at just how easy it was to shoot singlesand doubles simply by manipulating the trigger. Shooting a double on a standardM-11 is difficult, and singles are just about impossible.
Looking around, I remembered just why one friend of mine refers to the full-autos as giggle guns.
Everyone around me had a huge grin on his or her face, and several were trying to hold in laughter. Nowthis is fun!
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We continued learning in the same way, by having shortlectures and demonstrations, then we would have a chance to try out what we hadbeen taught. After everyone was comfortable shooting burst on full-auto, westarted in on failure-to-stop drills. In real life, if you give an attacker aburst in the chest, and he doesn't stop, a second burst is rarely effective.The attacker may be wearing body armor, or be high on drugs and not feelanything. In this instance, a short burst is followed by a single shot to thehead. The rest of the day, we would have random failures-to-stop during our other drills when a range officer would yell head,
or a target would turn away after being shot, just to turn back again, as ifattacking.
Next up, we started working on our speed. We had been shooting from the ready position, both high ready and field ready. Previously, we had had plenty of time to shoulder the gun, get a perfect sight picture, andsqueeze the trigger. Now we were trying to get the weapon up and on target, geta snap
sight picture and shoot in as little time as possible. Allthis and still get good hits, too.
Just to give us a little incentive, one of the instructors stepped up on the line with us and when the command was given tofire, he would draw his handgun from a holster and try to get a hit on histarget before the rest of us. Now how hard could this be? After all, we werestarting with the gun already in hand. Some of us were surprised when we wereeasily beaten. After several tries, we finally started catching up. Okay, so Ididn't really expect to become a master sub-gun shooter after one day of instruction. But I most definitely did improve in the course of the day.
Lest you think the course consists of boring, short, controlled bursts, at the end of the day we were allowed to open up and dump anentire magazine into a target. Once to get a feel for the gun at a sustained burst, and again on a new target for us to take home and proudlydisplay.
After a full day of instruction, lunch was provided. Like everything else, this was free.
How can Front Sight afford to do these free classes andstay in business, you might ask? They are looking at it as a long-term investment. I've gone home and told everyone I know about what a great time I had and what a great facility they had. I'm sure everyone else at the class did the same. And I'm sure several of those people who shot with me are planning ongoing back to take some of the other great classes offered by FrontSight.
I can't wait until I have a chance to go backagain.
NOTE: All free submachine gun courses in the year 2000 feature Front Sight’sbrand new Uzi submachine guns. Click HEREto complete an application.
