Training at Thunder Ranch: Defensive Handgun to HART
- Posted on
- By Unknowner
- Posted in handgun, handguntraining, precision, precision training, precisiontraining, rifle, rifletraining, Thunder Ranch, Thunderranch, training
- 0
The first part of my journey of training at Thunder Ranch.
My Experiences Training at Thunder Ranch
A couple decades ago, in a county far far away………… a much younger and agile Unknowner started shooting IDPA and 3-gun matches. A friend of mine invited me to an IDPA match and that’s when I realized that I knew significantly less about shooting than I previously believed.
I was quickly humbled and that's what led to my obsession with matches. It seemed like I was getting “real world” experience and partaking in the matches helped assess areas in my shooting skills that I needed to improve on. I began traveling to compete in matches and soaked up as much knowledge as I could.
Again, I was mistaken about my understanding of what the matches were doing for me, but that’s not the focus of this article.
One of the guys I shot with at one of the matches, Jack, who is a retired peace officer, frequented the big firearms training schools regularly and taught a local class in the evenings at a local indoor range. These classes were great and more importantly, were affordable.
I partook in several of Jack’s classes and while doing so realized I didn’t know jack-shit. Again, it was hard, I sucked, it was fun, and I wanted more.
A chance call with an old buddy
A friend of mine who I went to college with reached out and asked if I would be interested in training with him and a group of his NorCal buddies at Frontsight. My first question was whether he had been to Frontsight, because to me, their marketing sure seemed like a scam. He assured me that it was a legitimate business and I committed to going.
I had a blast! In the end, I ended up taking a total of sixteen courses at Frontsight before they shut down. The courses I took ranged from - Pistol, Rifle, Uzi sub-machine gun (full auto), Shotgun, Long Range Precision and a host of combo courses. I participated in almost every course they offered. My last training course was in the year 2020.
2020 – Covid, amongst other things, seems to have killed off Frontsight, and with it closing, all my shooting buddies who lived far away started training at schools closer to them. I was focused on other things, as well.
At the end of 2022, I realized I needed to get off my rear and start taking a couple courses a year even if it meant doing it without my buddies.
Remembering Jack and his love for Gunsite and Thunder Ranch, I decided to take a course at Gunsite - 250 handgun course. I shot well, but not as well as I’d hoped. The course was solid and from what I could tell, was the basis of which all the Frontsight pistol courses were based off.
In speaking to guys at Gunsite, I was reminded of Thunder Ranch. Jack always spoke highly of Thunder Ranch, but to me it seemed like a place rich guys go to train. However, I was newly inspired by my recent trip to Gunsite and decided to check out the Thunder Ranch website. After visiting the website, I realized they were not as expensive as I thought, and the courses sounded fun and for most of the courses, they are three days long.
Thunder Ranch (TR)
After reviewing the Thunder Ranch website for about a month, I decided to enroll in their Defensive Handgun course in April 2023.
Thunder Ranch is located outside a little town in Southern Oregon – Lakeview, to be exact. Lakeview is a small town and there are maybe two hotels to stay at, and they don’t look all that appealing. I’m a whiny, picky baby when it comes to my sleep, so instead of rolling the dice on an unknown motel I decided to drive the mutant to Lakeview.
The mutant is a 1982 K3500 Check Military ambulance that I rigged up to be a makeshift camper truck. The idea seemed cool when I started the project but there is something about driving 45mph on the highway that will make the romantic notion of having a 4x4 camper fly right out the window.
I rolled into Lakeview the night before my class and slept behind a Safeway grocery store. The mutant was good to me and I slept well.
As I rolled up to the main gate for Thunder Ranch, I immediately noticed that it has a cool factor of 11, that’s right, 11! As you enter, there is a covered wooden bridge that crosses a creek once you pass the gate, right off the highway (as of June 2026 the covered portion of the bridge is gone).
The first 4 hours of Day 1 were occupied by a lecture from Clint Smith. It was good, informative and colorful. After lunch, we went up to the range and started the course.
Day 1 wasn’t too crazy, but it seemed more like a feeler for the staff to gauge the students’ levels.
Also, on Day 1 another student told me about the campsite he was staying at down the road. It was only $20/night, and had a restroom and a shower. I decided to stay there for the rest of my course and for any future courses. The name of the campsite is the Wild Goose Meadows RV Park, in case you want to check it out.
Days 2 & 3
It’s been a few years now since I took this course, and I can’t remember the specific drills we ran, but what I do remember is the staff worked us harder than I had ever worked in a basic pistol class before. The drills were all awesome and the days were full of Clint-isms, such as “shoot him in the dick,” and “you need to lose some weight.” I loved it.
While Clint and Heidi (Clint’s wife) were present at the drills, I noticed the instructors would trade off running the line. The one guy who stood out was - Jack Daniel. It turns out that Jack was a long-time TR instructor who would later become more of a prominent figure at the ranch.
The class ammunition recommendation was a 1000 rounds, and I shot more than 1000 rounds.
The things that resonate with me from these three days to this day, years later, are as follows.
- Safety was of the utmost priority.
- They ran the class hard because all the guys in the class could run it hard. At the end of the Class, Jack Daniel stated it was the hardest they’d ever run a defensive handgun course which was full of first-time students.
- They ran a “Stop the Bleed” course as part of the curriculum. When all the dudes were waiting to go through the Terminator (3) (their shoot house), they had us applying tourniquets to ourselves and others.
- All the staff members were helpful and attentive. There were a total of five instructors rotating on and off the range and at times all five would be on the range giving tips and advice, with only 12-14 students.
- The class was fun, and more importantly it was honest. Sometimes honesty comes with a dash of shock because most people are not direct enough to tell you when you are messing up or need to lose some weight.
To me, this course was important because it got the ball rolling for me. To this day I can’t think of a handgun course I’ve enjoyed more. For me, this course established that Thunder Ranch had a culture and curriculum I could get behind.
Ironically, it is the only handgun course I’ve taken at TR despite my desire to partake in the Defensive Handgun 2 course.
Here’s why.
Urban Rifle
During the DH course I asked Clint which rifle course he would suggest, and he suggested the Urban Rifle course. I took the DH course in April and decided to take the Urban Rifle course in October of the same year.
Fast-forward to October –
It was chilly on the Ranch at that time of year, but I would say despite the weather being 10at noon, the weather was nice. Suns out, guns out!
This course was awesome, nothing like I had previously taken, and again, an eye-opener! I loved the course so much that anytime I can, I retake it! I’ve now taken the standard Urban Rifle course twice and will continue to take it in the future.
The course focuses on engaging a target with a rifle at pistol ranges – within 100 yards. Again, they are flexible with the drills and curriculum is based on the students' skill sets. This has led to all the courses being slightly different. From what I could tell, the differences in the drills were based on the students’ ability to move with their rifle safely.
I am not sure what their secret sauce is and if I knew it, I wouldn’t disclose it, but students' ability to handle their rifle safety seemed to be an indicator that may cause the staff to run more advanced drills.
After taking this course, it became a goal of mine to take the Thunder Ranch long-range courses – namely HART and another course which is no longer being offered. I set out to take some of their mid-range courses and lose some weight before forcing myself to hike up a mountain.
During an Urban Rifle course Clint Smith announced that he had sold Thunder Ranch but planned on staying on as an instructor which he did, for a bit, but soon after moved to Wyoming and currently seems disconnected from Thunder Ranch.
I was fortunate to take courses with Clint which allowed me to meet all the other staff members at Thunder Ranch.
Clint was one of the reasons I went to Thunder Ranch in the first place. He is highly regarded and respected as an instructor and was the basis for my trek up to Southern Oregon.
However, since his departure, I have taken several courses at Thunder Ranch, and I have truly enjoyed every one of them.
Mid-Range Rifle - Collaboration Course
In the summer of 2024, I took a mid-range rifle course, out to 700 yards, that was a collaboration course between Thunder Ranch and Steve Fischer from Sentinel Concepts. Clint was still at TR at this time but outside of the initial lecture he wasn’t on the range much.
Honestly, I’d wanted to take the Defensive Handgun 2 course that summer, but the mid-range rifle course was offered as a back-to-back course with Urban Rifle, which was run in the subsequent days after the mid-range rifle course.
Did I take the Urban Rifle course after the mid-range rifle course? I wish! My wife took part in it instead while I explored southern Oregon with my daughter. This was my wife’s second time taking the urban rifle course.
The mid-range rifle course was fun, awesome, and was a mash-up of the Thunder Ranch and Sentinel Concepts curriculum.
For the course I shot my 20” FU rifle, a swashbuckler I believe, with a Trijicon 1-8 Credo on it. This was the first time I was able to consistently and repeatedly take an AR in 5.56 out to 700 yards.
Rapid engagements at varying distances were a part of the course. Again, this was a new and fun experience for me.
Steve from Sentinel Concepts showcased a methodology for malfunction clearing that was new to me and pretty awesome. However, I took notes and accidentally lost/deleted them and I have not able to practice what was taught.
This course taught me a lot. Most importantly, it showed that the AR platform was not as limited as I’d thought and introduced me to positional shooting, I had limited exposure to.
Moreover, my wife had a great time in her second Urban Rifle course, and our family trip was very much enjoyed by all three of us (my daughter was bummed she didn’t get to take a class).
Urban Precision Rifle (UPR)
What is UPR? It is the Thunder Ranch Urban Rifle course at longer ranges with an expectation of a higher standard of accuracy than what is standard in the Urban Rifle course.
This is the first course I took where Jack Daniel wasn’t present. It was run by Clint and Heidi but Colton Miller conducted most of the instruction.
Let’s talk about Colton. I met Colton on my first trip to the ranch in 2023 and he has been an important fixture in every class I have taken. He is young, in his 30’s, I’m guessing. He is surely younger than I am.
His disposition is that of someone who was born to be a teacher. He is great at his job and very clearly loves it.
He hiked with us up a steep mountain for hours. Well, it was a hill that only took minutes to hike, but to my fat ass it felt like a mountain that took hours to traverse.
We shot at varying distances at downward angles I had never shot from before. We also shot from varying shooting positions, for example - off rocks, while wedged in between rocks, from seated, kneeling, prone, etc. Shooting off a tripod was required, both clipped in and off a table. All of this was new to me.
The targets, well, they sucked. They didn’t call me names or anything, but they all appeared to be painted green and were in the shade, which made it very difficult to identify. They were placed on a wooded hillside. With that said, I found all of them and thunder fucked all of them!
We went into the Terminator (shoot house) and shot from multiple rooms via a loophole. Again, a first for me; and again, an eye opener.
During this course I met two dudes, Jason and Dave, who I’m still friends with today. I didn’t immediately keep in touch with Dave but we both took the UPR class the following year in Phoenix. We were stoked to take another course together. Dave is an attorney from Texas who traveled to Phoenix to take the same class he had previously taken. I did the same. Let that sink in – We independently had such a great experience that we decided to re-take the course the following year, in a different state.
Now back at the ranch during the UPR course, Jason was staying at the same campsite, and I went over and allowed him to benefit from my company. Keep Jason’s name in mind, because I will talk more about Jason later.
Back at the UPR course, there were a ton of firsts for me, and they assured me that I was getting closer to being ready for the HART course.
Personally, it was a great experience. I can’t recommend this course (and other courses), enough. What was noticeable during this trip was Colton’s leadership skills in running a class as a head instructor. To be honest, I was a little jealous because he has one of the coolest jobs in the country.
Up until this course, Colton acted as an assistant instructor (so it seemed) and seeing him as a lead instructor was very impressive. It was very remarkable to see a young guy who seemed like a cool assistant instructor in the background, was now running a class and doing so with great professionalism and quality. When I’m around Colton, Jack and other guys, I put my thief hat on, because I’m trying to steal as much information from these guys as I can.
This course was awesome!
Changing of the guard
Clint Smith was the founder, owner and operator of Thunder Ranch for decades. In the last decade his name has become synonymous with hilariously honest viral video clips from his classroom lectures.
He is a United States Marine and served as a police officer for a decade. I can’t say I know him well enough to say that this defines who he is but Clint is widely regarded by many high level firearms instructors as one of the most proficient and capable firearms instructors in the country and as I understand it he developed the TR curriculum.
As I stated above it was always a pleasure to take courses with Clint and Heidi, they are both tremendous instructors. All but one of the courses I took at the ranch had Jack Daniel as an instructor. For most of the courses, Jack ran the courses for a majority of the time we were on the range.
Jack is a quiet and reserved guy who is approachable and kind. I don’t feel like I really got to know him until after my first course but he was always running the show.
Jack has been on the staff with Thunder Ranch for over a decade; he became lead instructor in 2022 and director of training in 2024. He is also a retired peace officer who, while active with his agency, taught as an instructor at Thunder Ranch in his free time before he retired.
His teaching style adheres to the Thunder Ranch curriculum but remains fluid and adaptable. I had had numerous conversations with him about his plans to improve training experience at the ranch. Everything from new courses to how he plans on expanding the ranch sizes and capabilities.
His teaching style is different from Clint’s but equally effective. His leadership of Thunder Ranch has really indicated to me that the business and customer experience at Thunder Ranch will only improve.
I began my training at Thunder Ranch while Clint and Heidi owned it but have and will continue to train there because Clint and Heidi left the business & ranch in Jack’s capable hands.
UPR Phoenix
As previously mentioned, the year after I took UPR at the ranch, I took UPR with Jack in Phoenix. Running into Dave again forced us to become buddies and now he is a guy I regularly keep in contact with.
The class was great and very different from UPR on the ranch, why? The course was run at Ben Avery shooting facility in Phoenix, which is a wonderful facility but not really ideal for running courses like the UPR course. We were operating on a static rectangle range that went to 300 yards. We routinely engaged targets from within 50 yards out to 300 yards. We ran drills and the course was blast.
Despite the course being great the topography difference between Ben Avery and Thunder Ranch really affected the ability to execute certain drills, shooting at angles and we didn’t shoot out of a shoot house.
However, would this difference be something that causes me to tell you not to take one of their classes at Ben Avery, no. I went up to Phoenix again a couple months ago and took the Urban rifle class for a second time with Jack. Again, I had a great experience despite having gear difficulties.
High Angle Rifle Training (HART)
HART was my goal but given that I am fat I didn’t want to waste a trip because I was concerned about hiking up the mountains that are part of the course. Moreover, I was looking to put it off.
My buddy Jason who I met years before at Thunder Ranch (mentioned above) had other plans.
You see it was also Jason’s goal to take the HART course, and it was something we regularly conversed about.
He kept trying to brow beat me into taking the course as he wanted to do in that year (2025). I threw every excuse at him. First, it was that I was too fat, then it was the cost of the trip.
He was vacillating on whether or not to take the course and I think using me as a reason to take the course, that is, if I would have been all in from the get-go that would have made it easier for him to have signed up for it.
However, he manned up and decided to take the class, with or without me. Then came the guilt trips. Again, the money excuse seemed to be my best most relatable excuse which I kept tossing at him. He finally had enough and said, “look dude, I got an air bnb, it has two rooms and if the cost of the trip is the issue, you can stay in the extra room, I’m paying for it anyway”.
At this point, I felt like a dickhead, yes, the money was one of the biggest considerations for me in not going to the course, but there were others, primarily I didn’t want to wimp out on the hikes or hurt myself and worst of all, not learn due to exhaustion.
I told him I would think about it. A few days later, I asked him if he was serious about staying with him, and he was, he genuinely seemed like he wanted me to go and he was making it hard for me to say no.
After this conversation I decided to go.
HART Day 1
As life goes the weather sucked, cold, a little bit of snow mixed with rain and where would he have been without wind. Thus, it was great shooting weather.
However, the rough nature of the weather caused Jack to call an audible and combine the second day lecture with the day 1 lecture (so it seemed).
This was my first trip without Clint and Heidi being on the property and I will say not much was different. The big difference I noticed was the classroom portion was hosted in the main houses’ garage instead of the classroom down the hill. I actually enjoyed this adjustment because it made lunch overall logistics a bit easier on the students.
We then migrated out to the Brown range which is where they do their mid-range and long-range courses.
As described above it goes out to 700 yards. We confirmed our zero’s and got to banging on steel.
Here is some context, I shoot a .308. It is accurate, very accurate, but I hadn’t shot it in a while, so it was fun diving back into it. Yet, .308’s are old news in the long-range shooting world now. As Colton stated, “we asked .308 to do a lot of things it wasn’t good at for a long time, there are better cartridges now”. Shooting next to guys with twenty plus thousand-dollar 6mm set ups was a bit intimidating.
While on the range the first day the weather was constantly changing and it was super fun to shoot in. I had never shot in weather that bad and when it was raining the rain was coming down in such a way that it really helped me understand what the wind was doing as I could visibly see the rain falling at an angle which helped determine the wind angle and speed. Moreover, I think I had only shot that rifle previously out to 400 yards (consistently) so taking it out to 700 yards was very fun.
I was very impressed with myself and how I was shooting but expected it out of my rifle. Again, on day one I was doing things I had never previously done and performing in environments I was not sure if I could perform in. It was a good first day.
HART Day 2
Day two was straight to the range. Many drills were run and we went over dialing for elevation vs. holdovers and when both may be applicable based on the shooter's given scenario. They briefly went over range finding “milling” targets at unknown distances and ran us up and down their range from 100 yards to 700 and back. It got to the point where shooting at 100 and 200 yards was annoying because it was too easy.
The Brown range is unique not because they have targets at varying ranges but because the placement of some of the targets are fun. Such as half torsos peaking at the shoot from behind a pick-up truck. Fortunately, the trucks on the range taking rounds are Fords and are right where they are supposed to be.
The first and second days introduced the shooter to professional spotters. Colton did most of the spotting and he was stellar at it. I found that his calls allowed me to get first round impacts and follow up impacts in a manner I was not previously used to.
HART Day 3
We met at the garage and started our day with a quick meeting about where we were going and what we were doing.
We hiked the Mt. Everest style mountain just behind the house. They said it is about a mile up, who knows, maybe it’s less, maybe it’s more, but it wasn’t easy for me. Regardless of this I pushed and managed to be in front of the pack on the hike. It was chilly and I was able to channel a reasonable amount of hate and anger to keep pushing and I got up the hill without stopping for breaks. That made me feel good.
At the top of the hill, we were introduced to a series of stations that when considered together were together were a total of roughly 180-270 degrees. I think the closest target was past 800 yards and went out well past 1000 yards. We were shooting at steep and gradual downward angles that introduced me to Mr. Cosine and the fact of holding low when shooting at angles is essential. I wish I had some more time on a couple of the stations, but the last station was the biggest and has targets at all sorts of angles and distances.
During the first course of fire my very expensive bipod broke, and I was forced to shoot every station off of a front bag. This wasn’t ideal but I made it work. The wind was a bit of a puzzle shooting across valleys, so I was having all sorts of problems at some of the stages. As a result, I didn’t shoot that well at 1000 plus yards until I was able to get to the later stations that allowed me to utilize the tripods or other stabilizing tools.
A couple of the young whipper snappers hiked tripods up the hill, so we did some positional shooting off of tripods both clipped in and off a bag and tac table. They have modified positions at varying stations which caused me to shoot from weird uncomfortable spots like standing with an unstable tree limb as a rest or off funky rocks that don’t allow the shooter to get into naturally uncomfortable positions.
For instance, I had to shoot off a rock, this rock looked like it would be great to shoot off of, but it wasn’t. Jason saw me struggling and gave me his backpack which had his nice fluffy jacket in it. From the seated position I was able to wedge Jason’s backpack in between my gut and the rock, and it gave me amazing stability shooting off of the front bag.
This kind of problem solving is what this kind of training is about.
After a day of fun shooting, it was now time to hike back down the hill.
HART Day 4
The day started out pretty much the same as day 3 but at the lower house. This is because on day-4 we got to hike another Mt. Everest style mountain/hill/mount/slightly elevated pile of dirt on the opposite side of the property.
At this point I realized I goofed up. If you recall, on this trip I was a bit of a freeloader. I was staying at Jason’s Air Bnb on Jason’s dime. I simply assumed Jason was staying the night at the end of Day 4 and he wasn’t. Thus, I was homeless. As a result, I began to over think things a bit and decided to leave early on Day 4 if the end of the day was going to be an easy day. Primarily because it’s a 15-hour drive back to Yuma. I spoke to Jack and he said we were only going to be up on the hill for the first half of the day and the latter half of the day was going to be fun fiddling around on the Brown range. At that point I let him know I would be leaving when we got down to the bottom of the hill.
We hiked and at the top of the hill we had stations. In all honesty, there was virtually no wind, and it was slightly chilly with a nice bright sun. Not good but easy shooting conditions.
My first station was at 680 yards off of a rock across the valley. Colton was my spotter and gave me a hold left edge wind call. Send it, bang, impact. Send it again, impact and it went on for another five or six rounds until he started laughing and asked me to leave.
Not so bad for that slow fat .308, huh Colton?
After a short sunbathing session, I moved to a new station where Spencer was my spotter. These targets were, well, far away. I am not sure if I shot at distances less than 1000 yards and my memory is foggy on this day for a few reasons. (1) starting the day with cold and repeated hits at 680 yards was pretty exciting and (2) Spencer took me on a trip out to 1400 yards. Say what! That’s right son, 1400 yards with my $650 .308.
My memory of that is a bit foggy but shooting with Spencer will live with me for the rest of my life. I was working off of an old internet DOPE card I found years ago and that thing had the nerve to only go to 1100 yards.
Spencer also has a love for .308 and him and I worked out the elevation at 1300 yards together. He called; I shot and missed. I missed four times, then on the fifth shot “Impact” and repeated it another three times before he told me to take a stab at 1400 yards.
At this point I had maxed out the elevation in my turret (which I learned later is bad for your scope as it can damage the scope) and was holding in the reticle. At 1300 yards I was only holding at .5 mils but at 1400 yards I needed to hold 4.5 mils plus what I dialed. That hold is at the bottom of my reticle, and we were starting to see some wind. Regardless I hit twice out of eight shots, the shots were not in succession and probably driven by luck, but I’ll take it.
It was rad to hit at 1400 yards with a .308. Well rad is an understatement. As you can see my memory from this day is vivid on the truly awesome events. A couple days prior I hadn’t successfully shot past 500 yards with this rifle and now I am impacting at 1400 yards with the same rifle.
Initially, I felt like I achieved a lot and to a degree, I did. However, I had 15 hours of driving home to think about it and ponder what I had just went through and I concluded the spotters at Thunder Ranch, Jack, Eric, Colton and Spencer were professional level spotters and I am not sure I would have had the success I had without them spotting for me. They told me what to do and I followed their direction and had success. I was a monkey behind a rifle following directions.
At the end of the day, I would suggest the HART course to anyone who will listen. I will take the course again if I fit it into my schedule as they only offer it once a year and life can be a challenge in that way.
HART re-invigorated my love for long range shooting. I have become obsessed with it much like I was decades ago when I first took a crack at it. However, the future is here, old man.
Technology in projectiles, cartridges and accessories has really changed the game. Nonetheless, I am reading all of the books, going to long range courses every chance I can get and have been shooting weekly with the high-power club in Yuma.
The type of long-range shooting offered at HART is my cup of tea. You need to know or be willing to learn your rifle’s capabilities, and it’s vertical and horizontal DOPE.
I achieved my goal of taking the HART class but that has not kept me from continuing my training with Thunder Ranch. As mentioned above I took Urban Rifle in Phoenix with TR and will continue to take more courses moving forward.
A little birdie told me that TR may soon be offering a long-range night course, say what!? Count me in!
I am grateful for the experiences I have had at TR but feel that the friendships I have made with both staff and students will be lifelong and something I cherish for the rest of my life.
Oh, and if you know Dave, remember, the lawyer from Texas, tell him to stop pushing paper and come train with us!
Comments
Be the first to comment...