by Gila Hayes

Reprinted with permission of American Handgunner Magazine and Gila Hayes

Her stomach discontentedly churns the early breakfast bolted-down in place of her usual coffee. Delays for road construction and a wrong turn have stolen her extra driving time and the dashboard clock counts only minutes before the early morning class starts.

Parking her Volvo at the range, she vacillates momentarily wondering if she should don her holster and gun before entering the classroom. Should the pistol be loaded or unloaded? The clock makes the decision: there is no time to put on a belt, holster and gun and only seconds remain to scoop up her notebook, lock the car and race for the range clubhouse.

Rushing down a hallway she hears a burble of conversation and an occasional male guffaw, but as she enters the room utter silence descends. Simultaneously, the instructor calls the class to order. "Grab a seat," he booms, and a dozen sets of eyes focus on her, alone. Through anxiety-clouded vision she spots a chair in the back row. A rivulet of perspiration meanders down her spine and her stomach lurches as she slides into the seat. As the defensive handgun class gets underway, this student wonders what possessed her to tackle this.

If Only I Had Known
Going to an unfamiliar location to learn a new physical skill induces anxiety in anyone - male or female. For women entering the male-dominated shooting discipline, the stress is amplified by feeling like an outsider. Some of these pressures are unlikely to disappear completely, even if taking an all-women's class. However, women in defensive handgun classes unanimously report that better preparation would have relieved their first-day anxiety, had they only nown how to prepare. Make a checklist of everything required for the class, to avoid arriving without a vital piece of gear. If a workbook or textbook is part of the course, obtain it in advance and read it well. If none is offered, ask the school what they recommend as preparatory reading. That's the easy part.

I asked women what they wish they had known before going to shooting school. The women sharing their experiences fit no single mold. Some are in their 30s, others are twenty or thirty years older. Their professions range from the timber industry, real estate, banking, the law, trucking, nursing and alternative health care. Several hold positions with large corporations, and many are mothers. Despite their professional accomplishments, these capable women confess to fears ranging from low-level anxiety to being "worried silly" before their initial handgun classes.

"I was nervous about being around guns," explain Megan Brown, who learned to shoot after a friend was abducted and raped. A surprising number of female shooters have backgrounds that are not pro-gun. 'I had all the anti-gun ideas one absorbs without awareness," remember Lyn Bates, a founder of AWARE (Arming Women Against Rape and Endangerment), the premier women's armed defense training organization in the Northeastern U.S. While in her 30s, Lyn grew curious about firearms through a gun- owning colleague. Though her interest was strong, a lifetime's worth of anti-gun propaganda followed her to the range. "My hands were sweating and shaking when I first picked up a gun to shoot," she related.

Where to Begin
Women enrolled in classes appropriate to their level of experience are usually pleasantly surprised at how much they enjoy shooting. In Lyn's first class, the NRA instructor provided guns for the beginning students to use, and she loved the activity immediately. One of my own students, midwife Joanne Blanton, enthused, "I love to shoot! I love shooting well even better!" The skills she is learning make. the experience all the better.
Unfortunately, that contagious gusto is squashed when a novice starts at a class that is too advanced. I had just gotten my gun a few weeks before the class and had only shot it a couple of times," recalls Chris Cunningham. "I didn't really understand the basics, and the only one I could talk to about it was my husband. He wasn't real sure I would be able to survive the class, so my confidence level was pretty low," she admits. Pulled out of the class for a little one-on-one coaching. Chris quickly caught up and has gone on to become a leader at her shooting range.

If unsure about her basic shooting skills, a woman can't go wrong with an introductory class. Luckily we decided to start with the basic class: it would have been a mistake to start with the level two class," remem-bered Helen King, a new shooter who I taught. With good safety habits established and a clear understanding of the fundamen-tals, she will excel at the interme-diate skills of the next level of [raining, including use of cover, low light shooting and more.

Heidi Smith of Thunder Ranch, however, appreciates the 'clean slate" beginning women bring to the famous Texas school. Since they have no bad habits to unlearn, these. women are sponges for self-defense skills and mindset. Her husband, Clint Smith agrees. "I wish all the students were women!" he grinned. He gets his wish 10 to 15 percent of the time, with three or four women attending the average Thunder Ranch pistol class. "At the beginning of class, I ask them 'Do you have butterflies in your stomach?' Then I tell them Don't worry I do too.'" He smiled.

For better or for worse, women are intensely social beings. As a distinct minority in the class, anxiety aboLit being Continued on po~'e 112 one to talk with, is very real at shooting school.

Most women wish they were just one of the guys during class. That has been the experience of Lethal Force Institute graduate Mary Fleury, who works as a nurse. "Mostly, being treated as one of the guys is a good thing, but every once in a while, I feel like I'm in some cross-cultural experience and I really have to pay attention to the unwritten rules."

Lyn Bates, who has trained at most of the nation's top shooting schools, knows about unwritten rules. At classes, "The guys used to gather behind me and cheer me on whenever I was competing head-to-head against one of their friends, but they never bothered to talk to me other-wise. They didn't particularly like me, and they loved to tease any member of their group who lost to me," she declared.

Taken too far, trying to be one of the guys begets its own anxiety. "I was extremely anxious before my first class," Leaha Wirth of USA Shooting, confessed. "When I went into the class, it was important to me that I appear competitive, calm and not like a 'chick.' Most of the anxiety I felt walking through those doors was self-inflicted," she acknowledged. "I would have been much more comfortable taking a women's-only course or one taught by a woman. I would not have felt so sensitive about my ability to gel with the other students."

For years, Thunder Ranch offered all co-ed classes. Under Heidi Smith's influence, the school now is in its third year of offering a women's-only week-long defensive handgun class. Acknowl-edging that beginners often feel unfa-miliar and uncomfortable, Clint agreed to "Give 'em a gender-like environ-ment." Heidi reported this once-a-year class is a great starting point for women, including the "Wives of guys who've been coming to Thunder Ranch for years." She is excited about the attitude changes that result as these women realize self-defense is all about "What's in your head and your heart, as you learn to care about yourself."

The Peril of Fashion
If an all-women's class isn't available, women may choose to minimize charac-teristics that make them stand out. Accommodating clothing, accessories and grooming makes range days easier. Long fingernails are the most common shooting impediment. When too long, the trigger finger's nail catches on the trigger guard, instead of allowing a smooth move from the index position to the proper place on the trigger when it's time to shoot. Long nails gouge and scrape the support hand, and make it difficult, if not impossible, to operate the slide lock, magazine release and other pistol controls.

It's best to trim the nails before showing up at the range, avoiding awk-wardness when told to do so by an instructor. Leaha was asked to trim her long, synthetic nails in front of an entire class. "I am a ferocious nail biter and nails hide that," she explained. "The instructor suggested shorter nails. I'm sure he was right, but having that pointed out to me in a class of mostly men made me feel badly when I really just wanted to fit in."

Shown how to succeed, women students are often among the most focused and determined shooters on the line. With advance knowledge of how to dress and how to prepare, a lot of the discomfort and concem about "being different" disappears.

Get in the Right Gear
Shooting school problems further stem from the trouble women have finding guns and holsters that fit properly. The women I interviewed learned that intro-ductory training often helps them identify a good gun and sometimes helps them with carry options. Lyn Bates praises her first NRA instructor for providing the class guns. "I never would have pur-chased a gun in order to take the class! That would have been like buying a horse before signing up for an introductory riding lesson," she exclaimed.

Choosing the right gun could command an entire article alone. Poor gun fit hampered Lisa Wilson during her first class at Front Sight. "The Glock 19's grip is too large for my hand, greatly affecting my accuracy. My first class was too fast-paced and I was too green to be aware of some-thing that subtle," she explained. Lisa has ordered a Glock grip reduction, like the work of Robar and Bums Custom Pistol.

Vicki Peladut knows her first class with Defense Training International, "Would have been better if I could have had an advance class on picking out my own gun. We didn't know about the grip and the proper way to hold the gun, so how could we have known?" she asks. As a solution, Tracy Delawie and Marybeth Berney, a couple defending against a stalker, participated in a handgun selec-tion seminar at their local range before attempting to learn more about shooting. It was time well spent.

Kenna Hoyser, who runs a dog kennel, selected a revolver as her first gun. Visiting a large gun store let her handle a variety of pistols. "I finally picked the Colt Detective Special and called my husband from the shop to ask if it was a good gun. He gulped because he didn't even know I was shopping for a gun," Kenna relayed. Though she's had other guns since, the Detective's Special remains one of her primary "working guns." Unfortunately, her second gun purchase wasn't so propitious. After paying big bucks for a heavily cus-tomized Officers ACP .45 semi-auto, Kenna found she couldn't compress the recoil spring enough to lock the action open - a problem students also often encounter with the ultra compact 1911s.

A snub-nosed revolver or .380 semi-automatic isn't always the best women's gun choice, either. "My hand was so bruised after an hour, the instructors helped me devise padding for it so I could finish," Lark Davis remembered. Enrolled in the Firearms Academy of Seattle's intermediate handgun class, Lark's tiny hands could not reach the SIG Sauer 230's trigger without the grip tang striking the base of her thumb. "I didn't know what a problem this would become in a SOO-plus round weekend," she says, adding that a .380 doesn't recoil as mildly as expected.

An older woman in Florida asked the clerk in her gun shop to show her how to lock open the Kahr P9 she bought there. Short on time and patience, he taught her to insert an empty magazine in the gun and rack the slide. Imagine our senior citizen's distress to discover she needed to engage the slide lock to lock the action open to clear a double-feed malfunction Arthritic hands struggle with small levers such as these.

There is little doubt that repeated gun malfunctions disrupt learning in an often fast-paced class. Hand strength and proper technique are critical when shooting most seminuto pistols, a factor that is hard to predict without actually shooting the gun in question. "My gun kept jamming during my first class," petite, athletic Susan Beamer remembered. "The instructor shot my gun and told me there was nothing wrong it. He told me that if it wasn't the gun then it must be something I was doing. He didn't look at how I was holding the gun, but expected me to know what I didn't know."

Many of my students have taken full advantage of the gun rentals found at most indoor ranges. Here they can narrow their choices before spending hundreds of dollars on a gun they may not be able to keep running.

Worse Than A Corset
If Susan felt misunderstood over her gun malfunctions, she's lucky she didn't ask her instructor for advice on buying a holster. Nearly every woman I've inter-viewed says finding a suitable holster falls somewhere between challenging and impossible. Jackie Marlow, who works in the timber industry, can't understand why few instructors offer holster advice for either men or women. At Massad Ayoob's LFI 1 lecture she learned how to relieve holster discomfort as well as ease the draw from an IWB holster. "The first useful suggestion I ever got on my gear was in LFI 1. I wound up passing that advice on later to a man in another class who was having problems. Why didn't somebody look at us earlier?" she wondered. "How many people who decide 'carrying' is not for them are simply badly advised?"

In desperation, Chris Cunningham turned to sewing her own leather holsters when she found nothing that fit her curves and her gun, a Heckler & Koch P7M8, for which little off-the-rack gear is made. Chris' home sewing has turned into a basement enterprise where she now stitches holsters for women who face similar problems. Though someone else did the actual leatherwork, Joanne Blanton also designed her own custom holster. Always clad in dresses and skirts, this grandmother and midwife spec'd out a wide, silver concho-decorated belt with a built-in holster. Cummerbund-like, it buckles in the back, hiding her Glock 26 completely beneath a light jacket or vest.

Kathy Jackson, a mid-30s mother of five sons who enrolled in the Firearms Academy of Seattle, received a copy of my book Effective Defense as the course textbook. In it, she discovered alternatives to the behind-the-hip holster position favored by her male shooting buddies. Moving her Blade-Tech IWB holster to an appendix carry, she finally was comfort-able carrying her concealed Glock 26.

Like a lot of women, banker Brady Gunns benefits from an offset, drop holster. "My husband called Blade-Tech and asked the owner to make something spe-cial for his wife. He knew I'd need some-thing that would work with my 'curves.' He didn't know they would have it off the shelf," she relates. "The dropped-offset holster worked wonderfully. For a change, I didn't feel like I had to move parts of my body to draw from a holster."

In leather, the top ladies' alternative is Kramer Handgun Leather's drop holster. Both rigs lower the gun considerably, are fast on the draw and are excellent per-formers on the range, though neither is best for concealment.

A cheap belt can spoil the function of even an expensive holster, since it must support the gun's weight with minimal movement, especially during drawing. Women have particular trouble finding sturdy belts that are comfortable, yet suf-ficiently rigid. The curve of a contour-cut belt is easier for most women to wear. I've used Galco's "Concealable" for years, and appreciate the slimmer front sections, since its reduced width means less material poking the abdomen.

Women shooters find great relief in lower-slung "boy-cut" blue jeans and casual trousers. Women's fashion trousers often ride high on the midriff. "In my first class, the jeans I was wearing were a problem, and it took an embarrassing rip to figure it out!" Brady recalls. "I discov-ered the snug-fitting women's cut jean, which might have been the most fashion-able, just didn't work with the action on the range." She found the lower, boy's-cut waistband, accommodated an IWB holster with greater comfort, as well as making it easier to draw her gun. "The wardrobe change has been vital in my ability to succeed in the competitions I've entered," she enthused.

Sweet Success
Initially, many women are resistant to changing their style to accommodate the demands of defensive shooting. Once they taste the success of shooting skill-fully, most are willing to make changes that increase their ability to perform head-to-head with the men on the range.

Joanne, who has never come to a gun class without a daughter or daughter-in-law in tow, has developed a well-founded self-confidence through her pursuit of defensive shooting skills. Savoring her successes on the range and in tactical shooting exercises, she wishes she could sit and ponder the exercises for a day after class is over. After class, "We debrief all the way home, before having to re-enter our real worlds," she related.

"I was tired afterward and my thumb was bleeding and my hand bruised," remembers attorney Debbe Stein, of her first handgun class. "When I went to work on the following Monday others said 'and you enjoyed that?' Yep!" she enthused.

Nursing cuts and bruises, weary feet and sore muscles, these and the other women like them who go to shooting school find the hard work, fatigue and demanding exercises overshadowed by the pride and accomplishment of a chal-lenge met and overcome. Megan Brown reports though at times she felt training required more strength than she thought she possessed. "I surprised myself with the fighting spirit that was inside of me," she said. She wishes that before attending classes she could have known, "That being a handgunning student is extremely good for self-esteem. I felt great about myself afterwards!"

Try it. It's empowering, exciting and just plain fun. I might also save you or your family's life some day. And you don't get that from going to the mall.

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