Over the past couple of decades revolver shooting has basically fallen out of favor with most in the mainstream self-preservation-oriented gun community. Since the mid-90s the polymer Striker Fired 9mm pistol has reigned supreme and most everyone who have started shooting after that has most likely had little to no experience with revolvers.

The problem arises when people newer to the community begin to comment on things they don’t have much firsthand experience with. Just as if someone who has only driven automatic transmission cars would be at a great loss if they suddenly were confronted with the manual transmission vehicle, so too is someone who only understands semi-auto pistols trying to wrap their head around the handling and operations of a wheel gun.

Too often people try to talk about the pros and cons of revolvers without really knowing what those pros and cons actually are, and the nuanced understanding that only comes from a depth and breadth of experience and knowledge.

One criticism thrown towards revolvers by people who don’t have a deep wellspring of experience with them tends to be that they are harder to shoot than a typical polymer Wondernine. That is actually not completely the case. There are ways to make revolvers easy to shoot with very little time, effort or money. Quite possibly the single biggest advantage to making a revolver easier to shoot, and one in which it is totally superior to all semi-auto pistols, is that in the grips.

Many modern pistols have minor tweaks that can be made to the grip. For example, a lot of them come with interchangeable back straps and a very few number of them come with interchangeable grip panels. However even with that there is a very, very finite level of adjustability that the end user can do. Any more that’s needed to really fit the hand requires major work at the level of an experienced gunsmith which then requires a lot of time away from the owner, a great deal of money, and hassle in sending it off.

Revolvers on the other hand can be easily adjusted to fit anyone’s hand, and that adjustment can be done by the end user essentially using a screwdriver and a few minutes worth of work. The revolver never has to be sent away, nor do they require a long period of time for the gunsmith to do the work.Most major revolvers have a huge aftermarket with an incredible number of options in which nearly any revolver can be made to fit anyone’s hand or for their particular context. Grip manufacturers like Hogue, Pachymar, Altamont, Badger, Etc. offer wood, G10, or rubber grips and almost any possible configuration that an end user could want. And all of them can be installed with a screwdriver and less than 5 minutes worth of work. Furthermore, unless you desire a particularly rare wood almost all grips are under $100 with most of them being under $50. There were up to very recent times some grip makers where you could send a tracing of your hands, and they would make a grip totally tailored to your precise fit. How many wondernines can say that?

None of that is true for any semi-auto pistol on the market today. I as the end user can configure my revolver to fit me exactly how I need in nearly the blink of an eye. So the next time you hear someone comment online or in an article how revolvers are tough to shoot, understand that they most likely have a limited knowledge base, probably don’t know the nuances of running or carrying a revolver, and are probably not the people to talk to about wheel guns. Instead take an extra minute or two to find the true subject matter experts like Wayne Dobbs, Chuck Haggard, Tom Givens and a small handful of others. Get their thoughts on running a revolver and follow their suggestions.

Take a look at the picture of my LCR. I have Rogers grips on it because for me that is the perfect compromise stock that fits my hand well, gives good shooting control, and still is very concealable. Next to it is a laser grip that’s good, as well as a Hogue G10 that fills the hand and makes shooting even 327 mags reasonably okay to do, BUT is not a good stick for ankle or pocket carry. Not pictured are Hogue Bantam grips which are super concealable but are too small for hands to control the gun. But it is an option. ANy of these can be popped on in a couple of minutes, and the total cost of ALL the stocks put together is under $200. Quite a bargain consisted to a typical grip job on a polymer pistol.

I literally have multiple hundreds of these situations on either video or other documented media. Normally, I like to write up detailed analysis and then post them, but that takes a lot of time that I often don’t have. And unfortunately, there are still a lot of people out there who try to insist these things absolutely never happen. So rather than concede the field to them and let good guys get bad info, I am just going to start posting these things, even without the analysis. And here is the first.

A bus driver in Oakland is attacked out of nowhere by a woman with a hammer, and then a gun.

Dr. George Sheehan was a medical doctor and author, and was a high level runner. He once said this:

“We need all three activities. Exercise is a science. Play is an art. Sport is both. Exercise is mechanical. Play is free-flowing. Sport is exercise with rules and a reckoning at the finish. Sport is exercise with consequences.”

This is an important distinction for training. We need all three of these components to maximize “training”. Don’t get bogged down in semantics and arguing about what is practice vs training or similar nonsense. We need them all to achieve our best performance.

And for those who are focused solely on self-defense, yes, you need all three just the same. If you like, you can substitute well run Force-on-Force scenarios for competition in this context. But remember even that is only one part of the trifecta.

To me, this is a fascinating video. 

It is incredibly fascinating for multiple reasons. 

1) People on the internet LOVE to say grappling never happens in the real world, especially for private citizens, 2) the same people will also say that you will get killed if you do go to the ground, and, 3) in a key point pertinent to the context of this video,  “just shoot the bad guy”.

Let’s look at these points in a bit of detail to help illustrate why you should not necessarily listen to many internet comments. 

On #3 – Sure, IF we can get a gun out without interference, and IF we can get effective hits on target, then this could be a good plan. Except that here that is completely off the table. Why? Because the victim was a flight attendant just getting off work (i.e. she just got off a plane) and was still inside the airport, meaning she had zero chance of having access to a gun! Does that mean she does not deserve to defend herself? Should she just accept her fate? That is a repellant thought, and anyone thinking that should be ashamed of themselves. But unfortunately, that is a mantra that keeps getting spouted by some elements in the gun community. It’s a crazy idea but there are other eminently practical ways to effectively defend yourself that does not involve firearms. 

There is a trite idea that floats around the gun community and that is something along the lines of “I don’t go anywhere without a gun!” First of all, that is a lie. There are a number of places in the world , even in a pro-carry state like AZ where you cannot, under possible penalty of law, carry, even if you are LE or military. If you choose to live your life where you go to very few places and live like a hermit so you can always have a gun on you, then cool. What you do does not impact me so go for it bro, but like 98% of the people in the country, I prefer to enjoy my life and will go to many places where I cannot have a firearm. And as an instructor of self-preservation skills, I believe that every single person anywhere in the world has the right to defend themselves no matter what the circumstances, and I don’t want anyone to suffer pain, violence, or death merely because they don’t have a gun as a crutch. 

As to point 1) if you still continue to bleat about grappling does not happen, then you are either willfully lying (probably to rationalize your own lack of skill in that area and you do not have the moral fiber to admit it), or willfully ignorant, in which case you should not be listened to at all because you are wrong about this, so you are most likely wrong about most everything else. We have thousands of real world DOCUMENTED cases where grappling happened, and addressing point #2, grappling worked great! Is it always a good thing to entangle or go to the ground? Of course not! This is the real world we are discussing, and in the real world there is nuance and context to always consider.

But, we have a monumental amount of empirical data where it does work, and is a good idea. As in this case with this woman. Do you really think she could have stayed on her feet and fought off a substantially bigger, stronger committed attacker? By going to the ground and using good techniques and good strategy, she took minimal damage, and came out of this violent encounter pretty well. I will wait for someone to come up with a “better answer” that makes sense and would be a real world possibility. 

While many people prefer to focus only on lethal force level incidents where guns are primary, I will continue to be a generalist in my self-preservation outlook, both as an instructor, as well as an individual.