How trapshooting is teaching Colorado high schoolers gun safety

Students and adults take aim at an unseen hat belonging to an athlete on the Sterling High School Trapshooting Team who shot a “25 straight” — 25 clay pigeons in a row. The tradition is a rite of passage for young shooters, who say the sport gives them a sense of belonging. (Cheney Orr, Special to The Colorado Sun)

The following is an excerpt of an article by Tracy Ross of The Colorado Sun.  the article appeared in the July 5 edition.  the article has been edited for length

Schools in mostly rural counties are building high school shooting teams that teach kids discipline, focus, camaraderie — and most important, how to handle a gun safely

He stands at the ready, shotgun in hands, cheek resting against the stock. His finger on the trigger, the 18-year-old yells “pull!” and a clay pigeon arcs across the sky in front of him.  Blinding sunlight washes out texture and objects lose definition.  But no matter how many clays cross his path, he always hits his target.  Caleb Schneider loves football, heavy metal, his Bible and trapshooting. He’s soft spoken, polite and the pride of the Caliche High School trapshooting team. And on May 31, he’s at the Logan County Shooting Sports Complex for an end-of-season fun day with his teammates from nine schools who compete under Sterling High School in the Colorado High School Clay Target League. Schneider was a top contender in every competition he entered this year, and high school championships — what kids call “states” — are right around the corner.

Caleb Schneider, 18, and his mom Nikki Myrick pose for a picture at the Sterling High School Trapshooting Team “fun day,” an end-of-season party celebrating both athletes and their parents.. (Cheney Orr, Special to The Colorado Sun)

For months, Schneider has been chasing a lofty goal: Hit 50 of 50 clays launched from the trap house at the shooting complex near Sterling. Today will be his day. And some of his teammates will also nab their big goal — hitting 25 of 25 clays in a row.  A “25 straight” is a major milestone for any trapshooter and it comes with a bang of its own.  Tradition dictates that the shooter’s teammates shoot his or her hat as a rite of passage. So midmorning, several kids take their places on the firing line at the range. When someone throws junior Michael Liñam’s hat in the air,  they all blast it together. Later, Liñam might hang his newly ventilated hat on his bedroom wall, next to his first varsity letter — for trapshooting.

If you’re one of the majority of Coloradans who live in metropolitan areas, you might not know about high school trapshooting, because most of the 37 schools participating in the sport are in rural counties. Many are in conservative communities. And some are lacking in extracurricular activities.

Trapshooting can be a place to belong, an activity outside of traditional sports and a path toward college. But Schneider, Liñam and hundreds of other kids who trapshoot on high school or 4-H teams across Colorado are in the middle of a debate that hits on politics, mental health, personal freedom and conflicting ideologies surrounding parenting, gun ownership, gun safety and gun access.

On one side are people who say the best way to teach a kid about guns is to give them a gun; on the other are people who say no matter how much gun training a kid gets, access increases their chances of them or someone else becoming a victim of gun violence.   The kids have their own reasons for why they love shooting and why they think everyone should have a chance at annihilating their teammate’s hat.

Schneider and Meroni High School senior Aloni Gress are headed to the USA High School Clay Target League nationals after states. Both could qualify for an in-state shooting scholarship to Northeastern Junior College, Colorado State University, Colorado Mesa University, or Trinidad Community College (or an out-of-state one at several other universities and colleges). If they’re good enough they could go to the Olympics, or score a lucrative sponsorship deal or big bucks on the Amateur Trapshooting Association circuit.

Their coaches say trapshooting develops useful skills, concentration, dedication and team spirit in the sixth through 12th graders who train and compete. And their parents say shooting links them to a heritage that is uniquely American, teaches them the value of the Second Amendment and encourages self reliance.

Aloni Gress is the top female shooter in the Colorado High School Clay Target League and is headed to the USA High School Clay Target League Championships in July. (Cheney Orr, Special to The Colorado Sun)

Education’s role in gun violence 

A chestnut of the firearms community is that guns don’t kill people; people kill people. But that’s not the whole story either, said Jake Farber, director of the Chaffee County Young Guns Shooting League and head coach of the Chaffee County Young Guns Trap Team.   Farber knows about the alarming statistics on gun violence and kids. But he blames Hollywood’s portrayal of guns, virtue signaling by politicians and a general lack of education about guns.

“All the do-gooders try to do is eliminate every threat,” he said. “Why are we not educating kids on (the reality of guns) instead?”  What Farber alludes to when he says “trying to eliminate every threat” are the successful efforts of people like Democratic state Sen. Tom Sullivan, whose 27-year-old son was murdered while watching a movie in Aurora in 2012, to pass laws like Senate Bill 169 and House Bill 1106.  Senate Bill 169 raised the minimum age to buy a firearm in Colorado to 21 from 18 in 2024, and House Bill 1106 requires gun owners to lock up firearms to prevent unauthorized access by juveniles or individuals legally prohibited from possessing them.  Many argue that if a person is old enough to vote, they should be old enough to purchase a gun. And Farber says if you own a gun for self-defense then you should be able to have it at your fingertips. “I run a 2011 (pistol), hammer (cocked), safety on, next to my bed,” he said. “Now, have you ever heard the term ‘give a man a fish and you’re feeding him for a day, but teach him to fish and you’re feeding him for the rest of his life?’ It’s the very same scenario with a gun. If I can teach you the correct handling of a firearm instead of teaching you fear of the firearm, you’re going to be way better off.”

At the fun day, the shooters’ families squinted into the sun, sipped ice-cold sodas, cheered as Michael’s hat was peppered and competed as teams — families against families. Meanwhile two of the team’s three coaches, Tammy Trahern and Kim Krier, collected scoresheets, refilled coolers, catalogued items for the end-of-day raffle and hovered over their athletes.   “I do the organizing and the paperwork and that kind of stuff,” said Trahern, whose son is attending college on a trapshooting scholarship.  “I (was asked to) keep this thing going,” said Krier, who started trapshooting as a girl (she’s 58).    “We have kids that started with us in sixth grade and have gone all the way to graduation,” Trahern added.  “It’s something they can do beyond high school,” Krier said.

Safety is paramount in high school trapshooting, and all kids must learn the five rules of gun safety before shooting: treat every firearm as if it were loaded; ​​never point a firearm at anything you are not willing to destroy; keep your finger off the trigger until you are ready to fire; be sure of your target and what lies beyond it; and never attempt to catch a dropped firearm.

Emi Johnson, 12, participates in the trapshooting event at Logan County Shooting Sports Complex. (Cheney Orr, Special to The Colorado Sun)

Sterling High School headed to nationals 

Schneider and Gress are in the midst of training for high school trapshooting nationals, during which 3,000 of the best youth clay target student athletes will compete in Mason, Michigan, from July 8 – 12.They should be in good hands when it comes to safety: The league says its priorities are safety, fun and marksmanship — “in that order.”

Gress said she didn’t feel like she was very good when she started shooting, but that’s not what people said when they watched her. And Schneider said he’s as good as he is on account of how many clays he shoots during every practice (100; most people shoot 50). “Trapshooting has helped me realize how important it is to focus on myself. Because how you do is all dependent on you.”

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EDITOR’S NOTE:  In Southeast Colorado, Holly High School, Springfield High School and Eads High School all currently have trapshooting teams