California CCW Requirements, Malfunction Drills & Revolver vs. Semi-Auto

Estimated reading time: 5 min

Firearms Training Associates and the Raahauge’s Range

[00:00]

Bill Murphy runs Firearms Training Associates out of Mike Raahauge Shooting Enterprises in Eastvale, California. The facility includes dedicated classrooms and a training site, and the curriculum covers the full spectrum from pistol fundamentals all the way up to carbine, rifle, and building clearing and searching. Students work through a ladder of courses matched to their ability level and goals, so a first-time permit applicant and a seasoned shooter working on advanced skills can both find something useful there. Long-time cowboy shooters from the area may recognize Raahauge’s as the former home of the Cotto Cowboys, and the training facility is set back where the old shoot house used to stand.

California CCW: 16 Hours In, 8 Hours to Renew

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California’s initial CCW course currently requires 16 hours of instruction, up from the original 8-hour requirement. The renewal course runs 8 hours, also up from the previous 4. For most permit holders in Riverside County, renewal comes due every two years. Judges renew every three years and reserve deputies every four. Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco has publicly stated that if elected governor, he would push to extend CCW permits to a 10-year cycle.

The renewal course is not a formality. California firearms law changes frequently, and the 8-hour renewal is structured to cover legal updates alongside a live-fire qualification. Permit holders who let their skills slide between renewals are the ones who show up undershooting and underprepared. The law requires the hours. The competence has to be built on top of that.

What Most CCW Instructors Get Wrong

[02:42]

Bill Murphy’s critique of the industry is pointed and specific: too many CCW instructors run their students through a qualification course, demonstrate malfunction clearing themselves, and then send everyone home without ever putting those drills in the students’ hands. If a shooter has never personally cleared a failure to feed or a stovepipe under time pressure, they will not clear it in a real situation under duress. Watching an instructor do it is not training. Doing it yourself, repeatedly, under a clock, is training.

At some seminars, Murphy has heard instructors report running students through only 18 rounds for the entire course. Riverside County’s qualification standard alone requires more than that. Instructors who cut corners on round count and skip live malfunction drills eventually get decertified, but the process takes time, and students lose money and walk away with a permit and a false sense of preparation before the system catches up.

The liability piece matters too. Students need to understand what happens legally when they draw and fire. Reload, clear, and malfunction drills are not just tactical. They are part of building the judgment and muscle memory that keeps a lawful carrier out of a situation they cannot talk their way out of afterward.

The Three-Second Gunfight Standard

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Murphy’s working definition of a gunfight is three yards, three shots, three seconds. That is the industry standard for self-defense encounters, and it shapes how he structures every course he teaches. A criminal is trying to close distance to take what you have. A defender is trying to create distance and stop the threat. If a carrier cannot draw and get rounds on target in under a second and a half, they are behind the curve before the encounter has fairly started.

The benchmark drills at Firearms Training Associates reflect this: draw, fire two rounds, execute a speed reload, fire two more, all completed under five seconds at five yards. The draw-to-first-hit standard for three, five, and seven yards is 1.5 seconds or less. Those numbers are not arbitrary. They come from the data on how quickly real encounters develop and end. Meeting them requires regular practice, not a biennial refresher.

Choosing the Right Carry Gun

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With Glock’s compliance situation in California making that platform increasingly hard to put into students’ hands, Murphy’s current recommendation for new carry students leans toward the SIG P365 with California-compliant safeties. The manual safety configuration makes the gun operate more like a 1911 in terms of the conscious step required before firing, which Murphy considers a genuine safety advantage in a defensive gun that rides in a pocket or waistband all day. He calls it a strong choice both for women new to carry and for experienced shooters looking for a compact daily carry option.

The broader point Murphy drives home is that the gun has to fit the person carrying it. He tells female students directly: do not let anyone else choose your firearm. A gun that is too large, too heavy, or poorly fitted will cause a new shooter to struggle and lose confidence early. Murphy has seen it happen when a well-meaning spouse picks a full-size all-steel pistol and hands over the wrong magazines to go with it. A shooter who is crying twenty minutes into their first lesson because the gun does not fit their hand is not going to build good habits. The solution is always to start them on something manageable, build the fundamentals, and bring them back to the intended gun once they have a foundation.

Anyone looking to get properly fitted for a carry firearm or work through a CCW course with instructors who actually put the drills in your hands can reach Firearms Training Associates at Raahauge’s in Eastvale. And when you are ready to add to your collection, Gunslinger Auctions is the place to find quality firearms at transparent, market-driven prices.

Revolver vs. Semi-Auto for Concealed Carry

[08:56]

Murphy has carried revolvers his entire career and makes no apologies for it. His logic tracks directly back to the three-second gunfight standard: most defensive encounters are resolved in three shots or fewer. A five- or six-shot revolver covers that math with rounds to spare. Murphy has never fired more than three rounds at anyone in his law enforcement career, and he considers his track record a reasonable argument for the platform.

The revolver’s advantages are simplicity and reliability. There is no slide to rack, no magazine to seat, no external safety to disengage under stress. For shooters with limited hand strength, arthritis, or other physical limitations, that matters. The drawback is that the double-action trigger pull on most carry revolvers is heavier than a semi-auto striker, and the reload is slower. Murphy runs a dedicated revolver-only class once a year and draws students who are already proficient with semi-automatics and want to learn to run a wheel gun correctly. The fact that accomplished shooters seek out that class is its own argument for how much technique the platform demands.

His bottom line: a revolver works, it will work every time, and an old-timer with a five-shot .38 Special in his front pocket is not to be dismissed. But for most carry students, a semi-auto is the more practical choice, and that is where he guides them unless circumstances point otherwise.