Gun-rights activist and YouTuber Colion Noir says he’s heard a lot of wild opinions about shooting.
But one piece of advice from retired Delta Force Sergeant Major John “Shrek” McPhee hit him so hard he joked it “tightened his soul.”
According to Noir, McPhee claims that if you shoot more than 20 rounds at the range, you’re wasting your time – and that training past 10 yards with a handgun is basically pointless.
Noir spends his entire video wrestling with those claims.
He respects McPhee’s resume.
But he’s not ready to throw out long-range handgun work or high-round-count training sessions just yet.
Delta Force Legend Says 20 Rounds Is All You Need
Colion Noir opens by quoting McPhee directly.
“If you’re going to the range and shooting more than 20 rounds, you are wasting your time,” McPhee says in the clip Noir plays.
Noir explains that McPhee – also known as the “Sheriff of Baghdad” – is a retired Delta Force Sergeant Major with more real-world combat experience than most shooters will ever come close to.
When a man like that talks, Noir says, most people “shut up and listen.”
McPhee’s logic, as Noir describes it, is that a human being cannot truly focus at their highest level for 100, 200, or 300 rounds.
McPhee claims he can tell whether a shooter should pass or fail in just three rounds, and says he even runs a “placement test” like that in his classes.
From McPhee’s perspective, according to Noir, more rounds often just means more sloppy reps.
And sloppy reps build bad habits.
There’s a real kernel of truth there. If someone is mindlessly dumping ammo with no specific goal, they really are wasting time and money.
“Most Gunfights Are Close” – The Case Against Distance Practice
Noir says McPhee doesn’t stop at limiting round count. He also argues that most distance training with a handgun is a waste.
In the interview Noir is reacting to, McPhee is asked what he thinks about shooting pistols at distance.
According to Noir, McPhee answers bluntly:
- 25 yards? “Complete waste of time.”
- 15 yards? “Complete waste of time.”
- 10 yards? “Start doing it.”
- Seven yards and in? “Get after it.”
McPhee backs that up, Noir explains, by pointing to average gunfight distances.
He says the average gunfight in the United States happens at about three yards – roughly nine feet – and that this covers “90% of everything.”
From that viewpoint, McPhee sees little reason to train beyond what is most likely.
Noir admits McPhee is not wrong about one big piece of the puzzle. Close-range encounters are fast, chaotic, and ugly, especially in the civilian concealed-carry world.
Noir reminds viewers that in real gunfights, your brain is not calmly “playing optical gymnastics” trying to line up crystal-clear front sights.
Your brain is screaming, “Focus on the person trying to kill me.”
So for pure self-defense realism, Noir agrees that 3–10 yards should be where most concealed carriers live on the range. At that distance, you’re working fast draws, quick shots, one-handed work, movement, and ugly “oh crap” moments.
Those skills matter far more than bragging about hitting a 10-ring at 25 yards on a static lane.
Noir Pushes Back: Real Gunfights Don’t Send Distance Warnings
Where Noir diverges from McPhee is on the idea that training past 10 yards is “completely pointless.”
As Noir tells it, danger doesn’t send you a memo. You don’t get a text saying, “Hey, tomorrow’s threat will be at 9 feet, prepare accordingly.”
To make that point, Noir brings up real incidents involving ordinary armed citizens.
He talks about Elisjsha (Elijah) Dicken, the 22-year-old who engaged a mall shooter from around 40 yards away with a Glock 19 and reportedly hit 8 out of 10 shots.
According to Noir, Dickens’ performance likely saved countless lives in that mall.
Noir also mentions Jack Wilson, the volunteer security team member who stopped a church shooter in White Settlement, Texas. Wilson used a .357 SIG Sig P229 to make a precise 15-yard headshot under extreme pressure, ending the attack in seconds.
Noir notes that writer and trainer Massad Ayoob has cataloged similar longer-distance handgun stops in a detailed article.
In those cases, civilians or officers took shots well past 10 yards and were later praised, not prosecuted, for their actions.
From Noir’s perspective, those are not “wasted” training scenarios. Those are examples where distance practice directly translated into lives saved in the real world.
That’s his main pushback against McPhee’s “waste of time” label.
Maybe those events are statistical outliers. But when the outliers represent mass-casualty attacks, ignoring them feels reckless.
Are High Round Counts Really Useless?
Noir then circles back to McPhee’s 20-round rule. He says he actually understands the logic.
If you show up at the range, dump 300 rounds into the berm with no clear goal, and leave, you didn’t train – you just made noise.
But Noir points out that not everyone learns the same way. He describes himself as a “repetition learner.”
In his experience, he doesn’t hit his groove until after about 20 rounds. He says some of his best shooting has come in multi-day classes after running “tons of reps” under structured drills.
For shooters like him, 20 rounds is just a warm-up, not the finish line.
Noir’s take is that McPhee’s warning about focus is more about mindless repetition than raw number of rounds.
High round count isn’t automatically bad.
High round count without intention is bad.
That’s a huge distinction.
In my view, this is where the two perspectives actually overlap more than they clash. McPhee is telling people to think about every shot. Noir is saying you can think about a lot of shots, as long as your training is purposeful.
The real enemy here isn’t 21 rounds. It’s autopilot.
Building A Balanced Training Plan: Close Work First, Distance As “Accessory”
By the end of the video, Noir is not trying to “beat” McPhee in an argument.
He keeps coming back to the idea that two things can be true at the same time.
He says he agrees with McPhee “almost 90%.” Most of your training, Noir argues, should be done from 3–10 yards.
That’s where most real fights happen. That’s where concealment draws, multiple-shot strings, one-handed shooting, movement, and pressure drills all live.
But Noir believes you should still sprinkle in distance work.
He compares it to lifting weights. Close-range shooting is like your compound lifts – squats, deadlifts, bench. That’s where the real strength is built.
Distance handgun work is like accessory work – curls, shoulder raises, smaller exercises that support the big movements. Nobody builds a whole fitness plan around biceps curls, Noir jokes.
But nobody sane skips them forever either.
In the same way, he thinks you shouldn’t build your entire range session around 25-yard bullseye shooting.
But you also shouldn’t ignore it completely, because you don’t get to pick where the threat shows up.
Noir’s core point is simple:
You train close because that’s where most fights happen.
You train far because sometimes, the fight isn’t close.
And you train both with intention because the day you need a skill is not the day you want to learn it.
Why This Debate Matters For Everyday Concealed Carriers
Colion Noir ends the video by admitting he still feels that little internal “twinge” at McPhee’s claim that anything past 10 yards is pointless and more than 20 rounds is a waste.
He openly says McPhee might be 100% right and he might be 100% wrong.
But Noir believes the honest answer for most civilians lives in the middle.
Take McPhee’s advice seriously.
Focus your training.
Don’t just burn ammo.
Build the majority of your skills inside 10 yards, where violence is most likely and quickest.
Then, layer in occasional distance work so your brain doesn’t melt down the first time a threat is across a store, down a church aisle, or at the far end of a hallway.
From a training standpoint, the debate Noir reports on is actually healthy.
When someone with McPhee’s background tells shooters they’re wasting most of their range time, it forces everyone to rethink their habits.
When someone like Noir pushes back with real-world examples and his own experience, it keeps the conversation grounded in reality instead of dogma.
For the armed citizen, that’s a good thing.
Because at the end of the day, as Noir reminds his viewers, you won’t rise to the level of your fantasy.
You’ll fall to the level of your training – whether that’s 20 rounds or 200.
Raised in a small Arizona town, Kevin grew up surrounded by rugged desert landscapes and a family of hunters. His background in competitive shooting and firearms training has made him an authority on self-defense and gun safety. A certified firearms instructor, Kevin teaches others how to properly handle and maintain their weapons, whether for hunting, home defense, or survival situations. His writing focuses on responsible gun ownership, marksmanship, and the role of firearms in personal preparedness.
