Familiarity breeds … skill. Mas shot this 60-shot timed group in front of students in Michigan in 2023 with a Springfield Range Officer and Winchester .45 hardball. Mas’ first .45 — a 1918 production Colt 1911, subsequently modified.
The second quarter of the year has become my 1911 period, because my all-time favorite shooting contest, the Pin Match (www.pinshoot.com) takes place every June.
These days I do my best in that type of tournament with a hot-loaded 1911 .45, and I’ve found that carrying and teaching with the gun you compete with gets you better acquainted with it.
A Beautiful Friendship
I started live-fire handgunning with a double-action revolver, but as a boy reading the work of Jeff Cooper, I desperately wanted a .45 auto. This was back when the 1911 was the only game in town.
My best Christmas present ever was at age 12 when my dad bought me a mil-surp 1918 production Colt 1911 we’d picked out for $37.50. I bonded with it immediately and still have it, modified from its original configuration.
Those classic .45 autos have been good to me over the years. I’ve shot them in the bulls-eye matches now known as Precision Pistol, Bianchi Cup, the old Wyoming Shoot for Loot, PPC and countless qualifications.
1911s won state and regional championships for me and tied a then-national record for pin shooting. I carried 1911 .45s at times both off- and on-duty on all three police departments I worked for over 43 years and was wearing a Springfield Armory Range Officer the day I retired from law enforcement in 2017.
Late April of 2025 found me switching back to the 1911 after several months of teaching with — and daily wearing — an out-of-the-box 9mm GLOCK 19 Gen5. I had no complaints with the 19. It was easy to carry; 15+1 rounds of Speer Gold Dot 124-grain +P or Winchester Ranger-T 127-grain +P+ are reassuring.
It never once jammed in thousands of rounds, including two Rangemaster classes with Tom Givens that included winning a challenge coin for a Casino Drill and several live-fire classes at the Tactical Conference in Dallas and a clean score in the match there.
Nonetheless, going back to the 1911 was like the proverbial handshake of an old friend.
The “going back to your first love” thing isn’t just about romance or 1911s. It’s about long-developed habituation and long-earned confidence.
Our editor, Brent Wheat, is a retired career cop who finished his police career with a GLOCK 22 and is highly competent in the most modern handguns but finds himself carrying a little Smith & Wesson .38 Special revolver more than anything else these days. He and our editorial director Roy Huntington, retired from San Diego PD, discuss some of that on the FMG YouTube channel.
Familiarity breeds … skill. Mas shot this 60-shot timed group in ,br> front of students in Michigan in 2023 with a Springfield Range Officer and Winchester .45 hardball. Mas’ first .45 — a 1918 production Colt 1911, subsequently modified.
Habituation Factor
The more we perform certain skill sets with certain tools, the more we groove in the myelinization of neural pathways, creating what we colloquially call “long-term muscle memory.” Lots of trigger time with a favorite pistol creates automaticity, “unconscious competence,” a bond between user and machine.
The ability to perform a physical skill without thinking about it leaves your mind free for more critical decisions like “Do I have to shoot in this potentially life-or-death situation?”
Habituation gets a vote. It also leads into another element: confidence. Decades of training and research have taught me confidence and competence intertwine, like a yin-yang symbol. Competence proven to yourself (and others) gives you confidence; confidence gives you the reassurance to deliver the competence that you have developed when it counts. True in a pistol match, true in a fight — true in life, when you think about it.
Trusted carry. Here’s Capt. Ayoob’s last day on the department with then-Chief Walt Madore. Walt’s .45 is an S&W M&P; Mas is wearing a Springfield Range Officer.
Features Support Competence and Create Confidence
John Moses Browning’s genius was on full display when he designed the 1911. Its grip angle points well for most people. From my first day to now, when I point, the sights are right where I want them, immediately.
The 1911’s short, sweet, sliding trigger remains the standard by which other defensive pistols are judged. Its mandatory cocked-and-locked carry requires a manual safety that creates a proprietary nature to the user.
A handgun retention instructor since 1980, I’ve documented many cases where a Bad Guy got the Good Guy’s gun but failed in his attempt to shoot him because he couldn’t find the safety. A properly habituated lawful user, by contrast, always swipes the ergonomic thumb safety into the fire position before pressing the trigger.
Advantages
The 1911’s slide/frame profile is the slimmest you will find in a powerful .45 or 10mm pistol, helping to make it concealable and comfortable to carry, particularly in the waistband. Today in my old age, with severe back issues and sciatica, my body still gives a relieved “Aahh … good message when I strap on a 1911.
If the sciatica gets bad, there are always my several lightweight aluminum frame Colt and Springfield 1911s, my Wilson Combat SFT9, or my 12-shot Walther PPK-size Smith & Wesson cocked and locked CSX 9mm.
Need a Ferrari instead of a Chevy? I love shooting my Wilson Combat, Ed Brown, and Nighthawk 1911s, and my custom Colts by (in alphabetical order) Dave Lauck, D.R. Middlebrooks, Mark Morris, and the late Jim Clark, John Lawson and Mike Plaxco. The 1911 I teach with is a box-stock Springfield because students need to know it’s the technique the instructor is teaching, not the gun, that delivers the performance demonstrated.
And when you have to demonstrate performance, does it not make sense to do so with something you’ve been shooting for a very long time?