By David Howard
Over a century ago, the National Rifle Association was founded not just to promote firearm ownership, but to restore and elevate the American marksman. In an age when urbanization was eroding the country’s rural traditions, and young men were arriving in military service without the skills to shoot effectively, the NRA’s charter made a clear call: to encourage rifle shooting on a scientific basis, both recreationally and practically.
But as the decades passed, something was lost. While traditional NRA bullseye targets have offered consistency and a system for awards, they’ve often left shooters without a clear sense of what their scores mean in the real world. A hit in the “seven ring” may earn a score, but what does that really tell a hunter, or a citizen looking to build meaningful proficiency? Can that shot ethically harvest a deer? Could it hit a vital zone from a seated position at 200 yards?
Enter Determinator Targets — a patented innovation that brings precision shooting into the real world. These targets feature reducing concentric ring bullseyes designed to mimic the vital/target zones of actual game animals. Instead of simply returning a numeric score, each shot tells the shooter something far more valuable: their ethical effective range, based on animal species and shooting position.
Rather than practicing marksmanship in a vacuum, Determinator Targets help shooters understand how far they can reliably and ethically shoot in realistic conditions. Each ring correlates to effective distances—if you’re shooting from prone and hit within the designated ring, you know your maximum effective range for a deer-sized animal, not just your target shooting score.
This fulfills the very spirit of the NRA’s founding mission: bridging the gap between recreational shooting and practical application. It encourages discipline and scientific self-assessment over guesswork. It also answers the call to bring meaning to marksmanship in a time when most Americans no longer grow up in environments where shooting is second nature.
Traditional targets may have their place in certain competitions. But for those who seek competence, confidence, and ethical responsibility at the range and in the field, Determinator Targets reconnect today’s shooter with the NRA’s original purpose in a way that is relevant, measurable, and deeply meaningful.