There are many different types of shooting sports competitions. This page is intended to provide a basic point for people interested to begin looking into options.
Where there are some commonalities between them, Shooting competitions can be grouped into different categories to reduce the complexity required to identify possible interests.
Common Categories:
Traditional Marksmanship is often referred to as bull"s-eye shooting is where the competitor is in a static position and aims at a bull"s-eye or circle anywhere from 25 yards away with to 1000 yards depending on the discipline (pistol or rifle).
Examples of Traditional Marksmanship include:
- Practical Precision
- Currently, the discipline of Practical Precision long-range shooting is growing immensely. The idea behind this is to engage far steel targets with each target being a certain amount of points.
- Precision Rifle Series
- A long-range and precision rifle-based shooting sport derived from practical shooting.
- Small Bore Competitions
- Small bore competition shooting is a popular sport that involves shooting at targets with small caliber rifles. The Civilian Marksmanship Program (CMP) has been dedicated to the expansion of its rising Smallbore Rifle program since 2018. The CMP Smallbore events include both three-position (3P), prone, and team competitions. The National Rifle Association (NRA) has established uniform standards for NRA Sanctioned Smallbore Rifle competition.
- Center-fire Rifle
- An example of Center-fire Rifle competition would be High-Power competition. The predominant American-style High-Power match is a multi-position, multi-distance event. It"s important to understand the distinctive meaning of High-Power as that term is applied to rifle matches under American NRA Rules. Most typically, American-style High Power competition means iron sights, three positions (standing, prone, and sitting OR kneeling), with both rapid-fire and slow-fire stages.
- Benchrest
- A shooting sport discipline in which high-precision rifles are rested on a table or bench, while shooting at paper or steel targets, hence the name "benchrest". Both the forearm and buttstock of such a rifle are usually fully supported by bean bags, a bipod/monopod (front/rear) combination, and/or a specially designed fixture device called shooting rest (which may be one- or two-piece depending on competition rules), so that the gun can remain stably pointing at the target without needing to be held by someone.
- Silhouette Competitions
- At its most basic, Silhouette Competitions have competitors shoot at animal-shaped steel targets, generally from a standing position. The number of targets and the distances they are set at differ based on the exact type of silhouette shooting that you do, but they will either be 10 or 15 targets at each of four distances. From closest to furthest, they will always be chickens, pigs, turkeys, and rams.
Practical or Action Shooting A set of shooting sports in which the competitors try to unite the three principles of precision, power, and speed, by using a firearm of a certain minimum power factor to score as many points as possible during the shortest time.
Examples of Practical or Action Shooting include:
- Practical/Action Shooting
- Also known as dynamic shooting or action shooting, is a set of shooting sports in which the competitors try to unite the three principles of precision, power, and speed, by using a firearm of a certain minimum power factor to score as many points as possible during the shortest time.
- Multi-Gun or Three-Gun
- 3-gun (pistol, rifle, and shotgun)
- 2-gun
- 3-Gun Nation and USPSA Multi-gun
- Steel Challenge
- The Steel Challenge is a speed shooting competition that consists of eight standardized stages with steel targets in three sizes; small circular, large circular and rectangular targets. Competitors are scored solely by the time it takes them to complete each stage, and the match winner is the competitor with the lowest overall time.
- Cowboy Action Shooting
- Cowboy Action Shooting™ is a type of multigun match utilizing a combination of handguns, rifles, and shotguns in a variety of 'Old West-themed' courses of fire for time and accuracy. Participants must dress in appropriate theme or era costumes, as well as use gear and accessories as mandated by the respective sanctioning group rules.
Shotgun Shotgun competitions are a popular form of shooting sports. Most of them are designed to simulate taking a 'bird on the wing'. These include Trap, Skeet, and Sporting Clays.
Examples of Specialty Matches include:
- Trap
- Trapshooting is the oldest shotgun shooting sport in America. Participants shoot at clay targets thrown from a trap house located in front of the shooter. The trap rotates in a random sequence, presenting the shooter with a variety of going away shots, angling to the right, left and flying straightaway. A round of trap consists of 25 targets per shooter.
- Skeet
- Skeet uses the same clay targets as trap. Two trap houses are required in skeet, a 'high house' at the left of the field and a 'low house' at the right. Both traps throw targets at fixed angles. High-house targets start at a point about 10 feet above the ground, moving to the shooter’s right. Low-house targets move in the opposite direction starting from a point about three feet off the ground. A round of skeet consists of 25 targets.
- Sporting Clays
- Sporting clays is a challenging clay target game designed to simulate a variety of field-shooting situations. On a sporting clays course, shooters are presented with a wide variety of targets that duplicate the flight path of game birds, such as flushing, crossing, incoming and other angling shots. Courses are laid out in natural surroundings and typically include five or more shooting stations.
- Tactical/Action Shotgun
- These types of competitions are about running and gunning. Targets can include steel plates to be knocked over, stationary clay targets, flying clay targets, and sometimes even cardboard targets. That’s because these types of competitions don’t just use birdshot, but also buckshot and slug ammunition.
Specialty Matches Each match type in this category is specialized for the specific purpose or scenario they are designed around.
Examples of Specialty Matches include:
- Sniper Challenges
- These challenges go in line with practical precision matches but are more geared toward the sniper craft. Many of the engagements will be far distances with a rifle, with some stages being pistol-only due to snipers needing to shoot handguns effectively as well as rifles.
- NRL Hunter
- NRL Hunter is a totally different type of match. This match is made for hunters to use the firearms and gear that they would bring on a hunt and put them to the test competitively and without a match book. Each stage is a blind stage, meaning that you have no idea where the targets are, their distance, or what you have to shoot off of until the clock starts and you are running onto the stage. The rifles have to be under 16 lbs and all equipment needs to be stored on your back throughout the match.
- Extreme Long Range
- Extreme Long Range (ELR) matches are mostly belly shooting and engaging steel at very very far distances. Practical shooting can push out to 1600 yards, ELR-type matches will push out much further, such as two miles
- Fitness Shooting Challenges
- Fitness shooting takes the natural benefit of being fit in a competition to the next level by adding different physical activities into the competition activities. The Tactical Games organization takes fitness shooting challenges another step further, holding CrossFit-type matches with pistol and rifle thrown in.
Competitive Shooting Organizations
Ideas on how to Get Started
- Try to start small, don't jump in and get expensive gear until you are sure you like the specific competition type.
- If you have a friend in that sport, ask them. They might even be willing to loan you some gear.
- Look up one of the related Organizations and see if they have a local group to contact.
- Search for local gun ranges and see if any have a calendar with scheduled matches.
- Get onto internet boards for that sport and ask questions.
- Search for YouTube videos or other articles to learn about the specific competitions and gear required.
Common competition terms (links to glossary)