South African Piet Skiet is a new, and quickly rising, long-range competitor. A former cyclist, the young shooter jumped into PRS only a few seasons ago, and made a rapid climb. With no formal training, Skiet is a self-taught competitor, a city-dweller who went some 20 years without firing a shot before finding competition shooting.

[in_content post=”201622″ alignment=”align-left” /]

As an up-and-coming competitor, Skiet posts videos. That’s what shooters do. This promotes their own brands, and that of the companies that sponsor them. However, you don’t see a lot of videos like this one. Here, Skiet blows off a few safety rules, pops a negligent discharge, and gets disqualified from the match.

But you gotta love that the guy has the stones to post the video as a teachable moment for other aspiring competitors, and really just anyone shooting out on the range.

Lessons Learned From Piet Skiet

The first lesson here in one in complacency. The more folks shoot, the more comfortable we get on the range, the more automatic everything gets, the easier it is to let complacency rob us of our best safety practices. High-level competitors spend so many hours dry-firing and sending rounds downrange, they are often the pinnacles of safety. But this shows it can literally happen to anyone.

Lesson two, know your gun. Skiet explains how the ND occurred, and there were a few factors. But one is he didn’t realize the extractor hadn’t grabbed the case when he worked the bolt. He expected the case to be gone. At least that’s what he said. At the very least, the RO stopped him, spoke to him, and interrupted his rhythm. And that interrupted his normal cycle of operations. He possibly just lost train of thought that he had a live round in the chamber.

And that’s lesson three. No matter what occurs, you have to know what’s going on in your chamber. Drop the mag, work the bolt, inspect the chamber. It’s your responsibility, and yours alone.

Kudos to Skiet for sharing his teachable moment. Check him out on YouTube.