The crossover of firearm accessories from competition to combat is an interesting phenomenon.

Over the last twenty years of U.S. involvement in active combat operations around the world, the setup of a rifle has significantly evolved. Jeff Gurwitch, a former U.S. Army Special Forces soldier has written a very informative four-part series on how a Special Forces rifle has changed since 2009 with the influx of accessories previously only seen in competition.

But the crossover is also occurring with pistols as well. While the average competition pistols still significantly diverge from those used in combat, the advent of concept guns like the “Roland Special” developed by the Primary & Secondary community have opened discussions about the validity of many competitive accessories for duty use.

The most obvious “competition” feature that has been widely accepted in duty firearms is the pistol red dot. While modern “duty” red dots are often different from their competition predecessors, the benefits of a dot on a pistol have been proven to be numerous. A four-year study by Aaron Cowan of Sage Dynamics is the most detailed explanation of the benefits, but in short red dots significantly increase the speed and accuracy of most pistol shooters, once they learn to use the dot.

Usually, “duty” red dots like the Trijicon RMR, Aimpoint ACRO, Sig Romeo series, and Leupold DeltaPoint are directly mounted on optics plates or in custom-milled cuts on the slide of the pistol. This allows them to work with slightly modified versions of regular holsters and remain lightweight. In contrast, pure competition red dots found on “open-class” race guns tend to be mounted to the frame of the pistol itself, as it is a more stable mounting platform and eliminates the movement of the dot itself when the slide cycles.

However, one American counter-terrorism unit was known to use a frame-mounted red dot in ALG Defense’s “6-second mount”, a specialty mount that allows an Aimpoint T-1 mini-dot to be attached directly to the frame of a pistol.

The other major upgrades seen on duty handguns taken from competition tend to focus on magazine capacity and reloads. Extended baseplates, while seen as “competition-only” gear in the past, have seen significant improvement, and many companies make models seen as duty ready. Also, in handguns such as Glocks that have standardized magazines, use of larger capacity magazines than those issued with the pistol are common.

Flared magwells are also popular, additions that attach to the bottom of a pistol that “funnel” magazines straight into the gun and allow for faster reloads. Originally made only by companies focusing on parts for competition, nowadays mainstream “tactical” companies like ALG Defense and Magpul make flared magwells for handguns. Glock has even flared the magwell of fifth-generation Glocks from the factory, although their approach has received a mixed reception.

Flat triggers are another major competition feature that is seeing wide adoption for real-world purposes. Sig Sauer has largely pioneered equipping pistols with flat triggers from the factory in their “X-Carry” series of P320s, which have seen adoption by the Danish military and Norwegian police.

However, flat triggers are unlikely to come to Glocks, the most common duty handgun, unless Glock makes one themselves. There are plenty of flat competition Glock triggers, but changing out the trigger on the Glock can be risky business if the user is not familiar with how a Glock’s internal safeties work. Thus, most military and police users will likely be wary of the aftermarket Glock triggers on the market.

However, there are some features of competition guns that likely will never cross over to duty guns. Features like skeletonized slides for reduced weight, reduced weight recoil springs, very light triggers, and slide charging handles make competition guns too specialized for duty use. Often times, competitors reload ammo to exact specifications and clean their guns religiously, allowing them to tune their gun to a specific load for minimal recoil, luxuries militaries and police do not have the time nor resources to do.

Charlie Gao studied political and computer science at Grinnell College and is a frequent commentator on defense and national security issues.

Image: Reuters.