Developed by a couple of Massachusetts grouse hunters to improve their skills in the woods, the game of skeet today has thousands of followers. Picture a half a pie, with a high house on the left side of the center line and a low house on the right side. You’ll start by standing right under the high house, taking a high bird, a low bird and then a pair. Once your squadmates have had their turns, you’ll each shoot seven more stations around the half-pie, with No. 7 right next to the low house door. Your final two shots—coming at you fast and hard—are taken from the middle of the center line. Skeet is about mastering the angles and making perfect scorecards of 25 Xs, and if you’re very, very good, you might just find yourself heading to the Olympics.

If you appreciate a new challenge every time you go shooting, then sporting clays is for you. This game takes place over a course—just like golf—with multiple shooting stations along the way and targets launched at all conceivable angles, heights and distances.

This is where modern-day firearms enthusiasts meet their inner Old West. Not only does Cowboy Action Shooting—sanctioned by the Single Action Shooting Societ, or SASS—celebrate the single-action revolver, lever-action rifles and short-barreled coach shotguns of Billy the Kid and Buffalo Bill’s era, you can actually be Billy the Kid or Buffalo Bill. Each SASS competitor picks a character name reminiscent of the times of shoot-’em-up saloons, rye whiskey, and train robbers, then pick an outfit to match your new Old West personality while you shoot a variety of challenging stages. Did we mention you can also do this on horseback? The Cowboy Mounted Shooting Association doubles the fun when you take along your four-legged steed.