By:
Shane Reynolds, Outdoor Recreation Director and Outfitter
The Gun Club at Cordillera Ranch provides a fun and safe venue for outdoor enthusiasts! The Gun Club provides a fantastic Hill Country venue with a beautiful Sporting Clay course, shotgun range, rifle range and handgun range, as well as instruction and competitions. We recently completed our AR range and new 50-yard range for small bore and tactical training. We are in the process of improving access to our 200-yard rifle range, and we installed sun shades at all our ranges at the Gun Club. We have also added new traps to our shotgun range and Sporting Clays course and a new custom-built two-sided shooting table at our 100-yard rifle range.
Jake Panknin, who was previously an Outfitter with the Club, has transitioned to our full-time Gun Club Manager, and he enjoys shooting and instruction with our members and their guests. Jake recently received his Range Master certificate from the National Rifle Association and he looks forward to spending more time at the Gun Club with members.
The Gun Club is no stranger to activity. On any given week, the secluded creek canyon on 200 beautiful acres hosts members and their guests for fun shotgun shooting, zeroing in rifles, target practice on the handgun range or some fun steel target shooting on our rifle range. Our new Texas star steel targets at the tactical range are a lot of fun to shoot!
On average, the Gun Club has activity four to five days per week. A lot of our members start their day out with some ballistic therapy by throwing some lead downrange. What is ballistic therapy? Shooting at things to relieve stress. This mostly includes handguns, shotguns and rifles. The bigger the bang or the boom, the more the stress will be relieved. Targets may include clay pigeons, steel plates or whatever you bring out that causes you stress and can be safely shot downrange.
Our shotgun range now has a total of 25 traps that present different targets for our shotgun enthusiasts. The clay target game of Five Stand is very similar to Sporting Clays in that a wide variety of targets are thrown in an effort to simulate situations commonly encountered when hunting upland game and waterfowl. Five Stand is a great way to get a Sporting Clays-like experience in a small amount of space, with very little walking. No two Five Stand ranges are exactly alike, but they have one thing in common: There are five “stands” or stations from which you shoot. You can shoot our Five Stand course with one to five shooters. The Five Stand is also a great group activity.
The Five Stand has fifteen traps, each of which throws a different target. Participants shoot in turn at each of the five stands and various combinations of targets are thrown from the traps. Our Outfitter staff will advise the shooter of the sequence of targets so you know what to expect. Our Outfitter staff will also have the ability to change the menu set so shooters can experience a wide variety of scenarios.
In the game of Five Stand, you shoot at five targets from each of the five stations, for a total of 25 shots per round. It is a great range to get “tuned up” for your hunting endeavors.
The Gun Club also hosts myriad educational courses throughout the year. For the past eighteen years we have trained over 550 members and their guests in the Texas License to Carry program. We also offer many different types of handgun training classes that focus on self-defense, home defense and situational awareness. Be on the lookout for all the Club offerings at the Gun Club in our weekly Outdoor Recreation email to members.
Shane Reynolds is the Outdoor Recreation Director & Outfitter at The Clubs of Cordillera Ranch. He can be reached at 210.616.6051 and outfitter@cordilleraranch.com, or at the Cordillera Ranch Outfitter Center at 830.336.4823.
