Learning accuracy and speed with a defensive firearm requires the same sort of practice that learning an unarmed martial art requires. Rather than call it “kata” or “shadow boxing,” we call it dry practice. Dry practice in a safer environment teaches your body to perform critical firearms functions such as pressing the trigger without disturbing your sights or fast, efficient reloads so that those skills will be there when you need them the most.
But, let’s face facts. Only vegans like to eat vegetables, and nobody likes to do dry fire because, well, because it’s boring. Lining up the sights and pressing the trigger or swapping out magazines, over and over and over again, is really repetitive and very tedious. Yes, it has a tremendous impact on your shooting skills, but we want immediate gratification, and that just doesn’t happen with dry practice.
Unless you use something like the Mantis X10 Elite, that is.
The Mantis X10 is a small electronic gadget that retails for $249 and tracks the movement of your gun during dry practice. It fits on a Picatinny rail and connects to your smartphone via Bluetooth. However, describing the Mantis X10 Elite in this manner is roughly equivalent to saying that a computer is a device with a keyboard that sorts and displays information: It doesn’t begin to describe the effect it will have on your life.
The Guts That Give You The Glory
The heart of the Mantis system is the electronic sensor that attaches to your gun, which is sensitive enough to track the movement of your gun as you press the trigger to the rear or perform other firearm manipulations. The smartphone app then interprets those movements and displays and records the data so you can learn from your mistakes.
The information it can record and track is nothing short of breathtaking. From motion during draw to movement of the muzzle during a trigger press to how quickly you are getting your sights on target, the Mantis X10 helps you improve all the essential marksmanship skills.
Setting up the Mantis X10 Elite is as easy as setting up any other smartphone accessory. The Mantis app is available for free for either Android or Apple, and connects to your phone like any other Bluetooth device.
I mentioned earlier that it connects to your gun via a Picatinny rail, which means it can attach to a wide variety of rifles, pistols and even tactical shotguns. This can interfere with important drills such as drawing from a holster, as the sensor can interfere with putting your gun in the holster. In addition to this, not every gun has Picatinny rails, which is why Mantis also makes a short section of Picatinny rail that can attach to the bottom of a spare magazine or butt of a firearm or the side of your bow.
Become A Top Shot Without Going To The Range
That’s right, I said “bow,” because the X10 Elite works with more than just firearms. It can also track the movement of a bow or an airsoft gun or shotgun, allowing you to improve your ability to hit the target using anything short of a slingshot. The Mantis X10 Elite will also track and record the movement of your gun during live fire, allowing you to see how your dry practice performance compares to when you are actually sending rounds downrange.
Tracking and recording your movements as your practice is one thing, but where Mantis X10 Elite really shines, however, is how it makes dry practice fun. The X10 Elite shows you how you’re improving your skills as you practice giving you a reason to do even more practice. It also tracks common firearms manipulation skills such as reloads and one-handed shooting and has built-in training courses to help teach you a variety of marksmanship skills. If that wasn’t enough to get you to practice regularly, the Mantis app also lets you compare your progress to your friends, giving all you “Type A personality” people out there one more reason to (safely) press the trigger.
The electronics inside of the X10 Elite are set up so that there will always be room for improvement, meaning you’ll never run out of ways that it can help you improve your skill without the time and expense of sending hundreds (if not thousands) of rounds downrange. The trifecta of better marksmanship skills, fun and effective dry practice and reduced ammo costs and fewer range trips make the Mantis X10 Elite a “must-have” for anyone who is serious about making every shot count.
