The really answer to your question lies in the answer to this question; how proficient are you at shooting handguns?
If you are a beginner, shooting at 25 yards is going to do nothing to to help you become a better shooter in the beginning. Start at between 5 to 10 yards and work on your skills. As you improve you can add distance / speed. You will also have an easier time assessing and diagnosing issues at a closer range.
When my best friend and I were approaching the correct age, our first desire was to join the Brandon Rifle and Pistol Club and get ourselves some handguns. I had a K-38 Model 14 all lined up to buy off of a local RCMP Officer who was upgrading his PPC gun to a Model 19 6-inch. My best friend had a brand new 6-inch Colt Python already on layaway, although at twice the price, at Curly McKay Sporting Goods in Brandon. I was still 17 just coming up on 18, and he was coming up on 19, and things were a bit more lax back then.
Winter in Brandon sucks, and as December rolled around and I turned 18, we started going to the Club practices which were held weekly at the underground range in the Brandon RCMP building (now long closed down due to ventilation concerns). To be able to join the club -- a Bullseye Club chock full of Bullseye shooters -- we had to be able to fire 10-shots one-handed Bullseye style from 20 yards and keep them all into the black of the standard NRA 25-yard Bullseye target. To this day, I don't know if that was a real rule or one that was just put out there to keep a couple of obvious cowboys and hell-raisers from joining the club. Anyway, one of the bullseye shooters took pity on us and told us that we didn't have to do "the test" using our .38 Caliber guns that we were hoping to buy. We could use his S&W Model 41, and if we bought the bullets we could practice with it and he would teach us how to shoot the 10 shots into the black at 25 yards.
To this day, I say: "Thank you, Mike Doig! My friend and I were and are really good shots and we owe that all to you." Learn to shoot. Learn to make rested headshots at 50 and guaranteed bodyshots (using two hands, of course) at 50 from standing. Once you can do that, make it faster. It's trigger control and front sight, front sight, front sight. (Oh, and bang the rocks together, but that's another story....). And do the close range and mid-range practices as well. It's all shooting. They sell reduced size PPC targets so you can shoot the 50-yard stage on a 25-yard indoor range. It's no real big difference. A bit further away is still just a bit further away, learn to shoot groups and then work up to it. Aim small, miss small. When we got into IPSC (actually, we started it in Manitoba) we found that the guys who could shoot the Bullseye stuff only had to speed up and they were deadly. The fast rip-roarin' run-'n-gun guys who were instantly attracted to the new sport but who had no Bullseye experience were deadly close-up but often easier to defeat by just throwing in a few more distant targets. Since a deadly threat from 50 yards can happen, although it is not common -- 50 remains a good distance to master.
One of the stages at IPSC Ontario Provincials 2023 offered 35 yards of distance to the plates and poppers. It was very stressful. This is probably the first time I shot a handgun that far.
Stan Levine, a Marine survivor of Tarawa, Iwo Jima and Okinawa told Phil Maher, myself and Phil Roettinger a story at Levine's own 80th birthday party in the Olé Olé Restaurant in San Miguel around 1997 or so. He told us that wading in the lagoon at Tarawa, marines were being cut down by a pillbox as they struggled in chestdeep water. A marine officer stood up, wrapped his sling and proceeded to shoot at the slit with his M1. He killed the gunner, reloaded, and then killed the assistant gunner who took over firing. With another reload, he killed the loader who took over from the first two. Then he and the rest around him continued their long slow watery walk towards the coconut log sea-wall. I remember Stan's comment was something like "When the management can shoot like that, it sort of inspires you to greater things."
I have read several very good books about Tarawa including the one by Robert Sherrod who was actually there himself and not been able to find anything out about such an incident. Whether the story was apocryphal for something Stan actually saw I do not know. I did not know enough about Tarawa at the time to ask specific questions and perhaps it's just as well. It was a good evening amongst real heroes and I was more than half their age and delighted to have been invited. It was not the place to shoot off my smart mouth over details, but the story stayed with me and I often repeat it in my Mexican training clinics.
One of the reasons I adore my Model 49 Bodyguard down in Mexico is that it can be cocked if need-be, for that rare but certainly possible head-shot from a distance and hopefully from a rest. The gun can do it, and I like to constantly make sure that I can do it by practicing at least a few rounds every practice out at 50. For the last 7 years, I only got to shoot it like once or twice a year on visits so I really had to rest those long shots as there is no way for me to practice with a snubby here in Canada.
My Model 49 was out of my direct possession for 7 years, in the care of a friend. I just got it back into my fulltime custody this past winter and keep it safely at my sister-in-law's in Irapuato. I took this shot of the 49 and some of it's accoutrements just before heading out for breakie with my wife in Salamanca. One of Mexico's rougher towns. Since I carry it without updated paperwork, I leave the speedloaders behind and just use the speedstrip and heavy loads (a Lee 160 SWC and 4.5 grains of bullseye powder). Anyway, hollowpoints are illegal in Mexico, except for use inside your home where the rules change a bit in one's favor.
I observed when I got the gun back that my friend had obviously lost the Tyler T-grip I had always had mounted on the little devil, and he sadly told me he lost it while moving and still hoped to find it. I told him not to worry so much as I had every intention of installing Pachmyar Compac Pros onto the gun as they do not cover the backstrap and should not affect trigger reach or concealment all that much. I tried out such a set-up on friend Fabian's Model 49 in Queretero this past March and with the stout loads it hurts my little girly hand a lot less.
