Zia Rifle and Pistol Club Range

Home, home on the range. Where the deer and the antelope play.... Oops, wrong song. Member's only club with perks. Can get very crowded on weekends (and not open on Wednesday mornings) , some shady but pretty sandy/ dusty. A great way to kill a couple of hours. Oh, and the stress relief

This is a no frills range with 24 hour gate access. It is a private shooting club with many activities for varied shooting disciplines. While not posh there are a variety of ranges from youth indoor air rifle, bench rest small bore, tactical rifle, f class/national match and a variety of pistol pits. The shotgun and trap ranges are also well set up. Certain parts of the range are only available for club events such as the trap and tactical ranges. There's also a 100 yard tube with a target trap on one end and a ventilated shed and rest on the other. The tube is the only part available for use 24/7 with the exception of Wednesday morning. Very handy for pre hunt sight in. New members must complete and pass a range safety course as part of the sign up process. The course is designed to make sure all members know what's expected of them to use the range safely. The material in the course was easy to complete and understand. It's not perfect but pretty close to it. You can be fairly anonymous or as involved as you want with all of the groups and clubs. It can get crowded on weekend mornings with various ranges closed to club events but the afternoons usually open up. The club has a very easy to interpret calendar which usually makes use of the range for individual purposes simple. Some of the long time members can be a little salty at times bending rules claiming that they always have special permission. It did not happen that often but when actions were mentioned to the appropriate parties nothing ever came of it because the repeat offenders were influential in the club. Everywhere has its politics, special people, and 1%. I have since found more joy exploring the millions of acres of BLM and state trust land in our state. If you check with the agencies who manage the lands there are actually many places not too far away where one can shoot for free.

Members-Only range, located south of the airport, but accessible only from the access road to the Montessa Park Convenience Center (City Dump). Easy landmarks are the ABQ Dragway and the APD Tactical Range; follow the signs from Bobby Foster and Broadway.Closed Wednesday mornings for clean-up; otherwise members have daylight access 7 days a week. This place is packed on weekends, so unless you're attending a scheduled shoot, you might not find an open lane.Membership is currently $140/year and requires NRA membership; new members must take an orientation class (and there may be a waiting list to get in these days).

I don't have many regrets in my life (a couple to be sure) but one of the most significant is that, after being a member of this club several times over the past 20 years, I no long have the physical fitness to get around on 2 sound legs and feet so that I can continue to enjoy using this range. I love the plinking range with my pistol and now I have a high power rifle that I can't make use of that range with. The Zia range is the only range I want to go to because in my opinion it's the best in the Albuquerque area.

This is a very no-frills range. No clubhouse, no range shop, nothing terrifically fancy. That said, it is otherwise a great range. The range features several action berms, standard practice berms, a shotgun/skeet range and a 600 yard rifle range. You can also draw/holster in some berms, and there are competitions frequently. Good group of people as well.