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IDPA matches are focus on self-defense skills, with challengers using factory-stock firearms and gear. This format allows each person to work at perfecting skills with the firearms, holsters and gear they use in everyday life. It is an especially welcoming sport for new firearms owners and those trying competition for the first time.

Long-range rifle shooting has been on a hot trajectory (pardon the pun) for several years now, and its popularity shows no sign of slowing down. Enter the F-Class competition. These matches are fired entirely from the prone position (you’ll need a comfortable shooting mat, for sure), with targets set at 1,000 yards.

This sport takes the best of USPSA/IPSC and NRA Action Pistol and High Power, then adds a pound of crazy creativity and a truckload of Wow! to offer shooting excitement unlike any other sport. You’ll need a pistol, a rifle and a shotgun, custom or stock—oh, and lots of ammunition.

The U.S. Practical Shooting Assn. is the national governing body for the sport of practical shooting in the U.S. and a member of the International Practical Shooting Confederation and the Steel Challenge. USPSA has more than 34,000 members and over 700 affiliated USPSA and Steel Challenge clubs. Each week USPSA members around the country compete in local and regional shooting competitions that test and refine their shooting skills in a safe, competitive environment.

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.

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.