LADIES FLOURISH AT THE NRA CONVENTION 2010

The New York Daily News

Meet the 'hot' shots of the NRA convention
by Joanna Molloy

Originally Published:Saturday, May 15th 2010, 11:18 PM
Updated: Sunday, May 16th 2010, 2:03 AM


Tasha Hanish with a semiautomatic on her belt and a rifle in her hands,
looks as if she leapt out of a video game onto the NRA gun show floor.

If FNH USA thought the athletic brunette would be good fishbait to lure
male gunbuyers away from the Remington and Smith & Wesson booths,
they were right: men were rapt as she showed off the features of FNH guns.

She knows what she's talking about.
"I'm 30, and I've been shooting for 17 years," Hanish told the Daily News.
"My dad took us out hunting in Oregon. He taught me."

Now, she's ladies national champion in "three gun," the shooting sport
where competitors hit targets as far away as 600 yards with a pistol,
a shotgun and a rifle while running an obstacle course.

More women are buying their own guns than before, according to
a 2009 survey by the National Shooting Sports Foundation, which
found that gun shop owners reported a 70% increase in female buyers last year.


Some women, like Hanish, are into the skill of target practice,
while others bought their weapons for hunting. But the study
found that most women are buying handguns for self-protection.

Laura Opalka is one example, "I learned how to shoot when I was 5 years old,
but I didn't really decide to buy a gun until two years ago," said the stylish CPA
inside the Charlotte convention center. "I grew up here, and I've seen it change.
We have a large problem with illegal immigrants, and there has been an uptick in break-ins
and violent crimes while at the same time the local government doesn't seem to be putting
enough police on the street.

"I'm arming up," she said. "And when my 21-year-old daughter comes home
from college, I want her to learn as well."

Kelly Underwood, a voluptuous blond who got into target shooting
with her boyfriend, a lifelong hunter who works in law enforcement,
said, "I actually hit the target. I was pretty proud of myself."
But her reason to learn shooting is also one of self-defense:
"I have a stalker," she explained.

American gun manufacturers, like Utah's Cobra company, have tried
to "target" the female market with colorful small guns that shoot as few
as two bullets. "We have pink, purple, fuschia," said Kimberley Wallace
at the Cobra booth. "They're Derringers, just like the ones from
the 1800s that ladies tucked in their garter belts."

But their most popular model with female customers is The Shadow,
a pink .38 Special that weighs only 15 ounces. "It weighs about as
much as a cell phone, and it fits in your purse," Wallace explained.

"Ladies Only" shooting camps have begun sprouting up, including the
Babes With Bullets camp, which trains everyone from the more
advanced to "ladies who have never held a gun before."


The National Rifle Association itself scheduled nine women-only excursions
this year to hunt coyote, bobcat, elk, deer, and in Alaska, wolf and black bear.

Still, says Hanish, women are in the minority, with only four women
competing with 250 men in the next "three-gun" match.

"A lot of women are afraid," she says. "It's fear of the unknown."

[All emfasis has been added by David.]