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Draw fast Gunslinger loves blowing away competition with faster moves
Web posted June 9, 1997
By Chad Bray
The Beech Island man is quick with a revolver, shoots straight and doesn't have a bad singing voice for a gunslinger.
The 63-year-old's even has a great nickname - ``The Tracker.''
His only problem is he doesn't ride horses.
Quick draw is fun, he said. ``It charges you up with the competition. You'll be amazed how good it feels when you step up to the line and beat the guy next to you.''
Quick-draw competitions can be won and lost in 100ths of a second. Some gunslingers are so fast their pistols are back in their hostlers before the average spectator knows they've fired, Mr. McKinnon said.
Two gunfighters line up side-by-side in front of 300 or 400 spectators. They quickly and cleanly draw their weapons and fire at one or two targets, usually balloons.
In some events, winning and losing is based on head-to-head shootouts, while other competitions are based upon cumulative scores. Missing the target costs competitors 1 second.
Mr. McKinnon is an above-average shooter. He can draw and fire most times in 0.42 second, while the national champion's time is about 0.35 second.
Mr. McKinnon finished 42nd at a national competition in Nevada in April that drew more than 300 entrants. He finished 16th at the Georgia state championships Memorial Day weekend in Macon.10 in the upcoming Georgia state championships in Macon.}
He's only been back in the game about two years after practicing regularly for the sport, which was popular in the 1950s.
The revived event, which pays winners as much as $50,000 a competition, requires three basic body moves, Mr. McKinnon said.
The shooter leans back and draws his weapon, raises it and uses his thumb to pull back the hammer while simultaneously pulling the trigger.
``You've got to be limber,'' Mr. McKinnon said. ``That's where I've lost a little as I've gotten older - the stiffness.''
Quick-draw artists typically use two types of ammunition: hollowed out .45 caliber long Colt round with a shotgun primer and wax bullets, or mixed black powder blanks.
Mr. McKinnon prefers the wax rounds, which move about 800 feet a second.
However, the black powder load remains popular because it moves about 1,500 feet a second, he said.
His weapon of choice is an aluminum three-screw Ruger revolver manufactured in the 1960s as a .357 caliber single-action weapon that's been converted to fire .45 caliber loads.
However, Mr. McKinnon may be better known for his music than his shooting.
In the late '50s and early '60s, he gained fame writing songs at Nashville's Pamper Music Co. and later on his own while working part time for Columbia Nitrogen.
He crafted hits for Tex Williams, Johnny Cash and Hank Snow, including Mr. Snow's Grand Ole Opry standard Laredo.
In the late 1980s, Mr. McKinnon cut five albums on his own, first under his name and later under the name ``The Tracker.'' In 1989, the video for his single Crippled Cowboy, about a Vietnam veteran confined to a wheelchair, was named The Nashville Network's favorite video.
But he gave up the music business because of the traveling it would have required to tour and promote his albums.
In 1993, he retired from Columbia Nitrogen, now known as Austin Industries, and started a part-time leather holster business.
The business has grown so fast that he works at it full time and has two employees. Many weekends are spent at gun shows showing his wares and demonstrating his shooting skills.
However, that doesn't always help his skills.
``I got in trouble at my last competition,'' he said as he twirled his revolver and put it in his holster. ``I did this (twirled the pistol) before putting it away. That's a big no-no in quick draw. The barrel was pointed to the crowd.
``I got penalized. That pretty much took me out of it.''
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