I was talking to a friend who is interested in shooting the other day, and he asked me to put the things I enjoy about shooting into terms he could understand. He’s big into other sports, so I picked one and went with it.
Shooting is like golf.
When you go to the driving range, you take a large amount of inexpensive balls and try to hit them for distance and accuracy. To me, that is going to the range and putting lots of inexpensive ammunition down range. You strive to increase both your accuracy and the range at which you can hit.
Guns are like clubs. You can buy ones that are inexpensive but serviceable and be completely happy. Even a small investment can bring years of enjoyment.
When you want to go to the next level of equipment, you can spend as much as you want to and get pretty much whatever you want. You can spend 5 dollars apiece on a golf ball or on a match grade round of ammunition. You can buy sets of custom-made clubs forged out of virgin unobtanium, just as you can buy a custom-made rifle or pistol.
As for the actual shooting, the many ways you can go shooting count for all the different ways you can play golf. Like I said before, you can go to the range and practice either driving or shooting. IDPA, IPSC, or Cowboy Action are analogous to playing a few rounds of golf on the weekend. There are even professional ranks among shooters, with our own Tiger Woods and Jack Nicklaus.
Heck, we even have our own debate clubs that argue ad nauseam about tactics, gear, personalities, and the like. When we’re not arguing, there’s nothing we like better than sitting down with our friends, enjoying an adult beverage or two, and arguing. If that doesn’t sound like the 19th Hole, I don’t know what does.
So, what do y’all think?
DaddyBear’s Den 
julie
/ July 31, 2012Good analogy … “shooting is like golf without the walking and the silly pants”
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daddybear71
/ July 31, 2012Obviously you’ve never seen how I dress to go to the range.
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Shepherd K
/ July 31, 2012It’s a good analogy. There’s pros and hacks. There’s spray and pray. Hole in one = 1000 yard cold bore bullseye. Both are mental sports
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Joel C
/ August 1, 2012I had a conversation along these lines with a coworker some years ago. He a golfer, I a shooter, we both intuitively recognized the obvious comparisons, and for some reason our talk turned to a simple economic comparison; whose sport was more expensive?
It was a while ago, but I think we agreed that start up costs could be pretty similar. The price of playground was generally higher for the golfer, which makes sense to me. Golf needs lots of ground- so that costs more.
Beyond that it stops being simple, and I shifted from believing I played the cheaper sport to owning that a fellow can invest as much capital into either game as he pleases. That’s all that came of it. Nothing groundbreaking, just a brief exchange you’ve caused me to recall!
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Trooper Lefty
/ August 1, 2012Another way guns are like golf clubs is in their usage: just as you wouldn’t use a putter to tee off or a wood on the green, I use the .22 for racoons or possums in the barn, the Ar-15 for coyotes in the yard and the pistol for carrying.
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thornharp
/ August 1, 2012Golf, like shooting, can also serve for pest control. For an example, see Uncle Buck.
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