TX Rancher wrote:ske1eter wrote:Two friends and I attended both the Fighting Pistol and the Advanced Fighting Pistol classes. This was our first training class and it was quite an experience. All total we shot about 1800 rounds over the four days. As this was my first class, I have nothing to compare it to but it was well worth it to me.
If you're willing, please post some more information about the class. What techniques did you learn? How were the instructors? Problems encountered by yourself or other students? All those would be helpful insights to others that may be thinking of taken similar training.
Don’t let the fact it’s your first training class bother you. Your opinion does mater
Also, welcome to the board
It may be easiest to start with copy from the Tactical Response web page....
Live fire drills include both one- and two-handed shooting, shooting on the move, use of cover and concealment, tactical-emergency-and speed loading, using both eye level and retention techniques, at a variety of ranges and from a variety of tactical body positions.
There was one instructor and an assistant instructor. He was hard-core, cocky, and loved giving us a hard time. You had to leave you ego at home for sure but after the first day you knew what was coming and started to enjoy the banter and razzing. The class consisted of 8 students.
The class started with DEA dots. The instructor would call out various dots to shoot with the number of shots per dot. Also, we were told somethings more confusing like shooting the dots that start with 't'. The instructor's theory on this was to keep you thinking and not so focused as to exclude everything else going on around you should you find yourself in a shootout.
Upon drawing the weapon, emphasis was made on moving with the idea than anything that makes the attacker think will buy you some small amount of time while he has to readjust his attack. This was based on the OODA loop theory, which stand for
Observe,
Orient,
Decide,
Act, if I recall. We were provided dummy rounds the first day and a half that we used to put somewhere in each mag. This caused us to get used to clearing jams, with the tap, rack technique. During the clearing of each "jam" and reload we were told to move. His acronym for that was
Motionless
Operators
Ventilate
Easily. The sequence that we used when firing was based on
Fight,
Assess,
Scan,
Tac reload spelling FAST. You can see there were many acronym but it helped us remember the instruction
The one handed drills included shooting, clearing jams, and reloading with each hand individually. Shooting on the move included cycling around 4 barrels, and each cycle, shooting with different styles, first rotation was both hands till empty and reload, then shoot strong hand 'til empty and reload, then shoot with weak hand 'til empty. Nearly all of the shooting was done at close combat distances not exceeding about 7 yrds.
Other shooting involved different positions from supine, fetal, sitting, kneeling and standing. Live fire was conducted while transitioning through these positions as well. The we went through various stress drills that included physical "exercises". Nothing was painful but it was pretty stressful. The command to fight was given and we were to put the rounds on the target.
The first class ended with us doing some accuracy drills. Some of these drills were considered voluntary should the participants not feel comfortable with the drill. The final test of the day was something called the box drill and we are sworn to secrecy not to say what it was. This is only because it'd take the fun/challenge out of it for anyone else who may take the class. We ended up shooting about 850-900 rounds for those two days but some shot many more than that as they were using hi-cap pistols like the Glock 17 & 19's.
The advanced class on days 3-4 started out with some warm up with the DEA dots again. The timeframe of some of these drills are a blur in my mind and are not all in the proper order that they were presented.
Since all students had taken the initial class the previous two days, we were accelerated through the program somewhat. We reran the one handed drills. Once everyone was more comfortable we did some classroom time that included legal implications in shooting.
We practiced some retention exercises and did some shooting from the retention position. We also shot from shooting with the gun close to the chest.
This time we were on the "giving end" of the physical exercises. These included hand to hand contact using the hands and elbows then given the command to fight, engaging the target. This simulates you taking on an attacker with less than lethal force but his "buddy" then came into the fight and you had to defend yourself with the gun. There were several of these various physical drills.
We did some shooting that was just for fun to let us relax a bit after the strenuous day.
Shooting drills were performed to show if the "21 foot" rule really applied. Almost everyone from draw to shot had his attacker covering at least 30 feet. That was an eye-opener to all.
On the second day of the advanced class, we got some information on cursory medical information regarding the application of tourniquets and bandages should they be required along with some other info. We then proceeded to engage in some team tactics where one would engage the target until empty then call out 'cover' whence the other shooter would engage the target till empty. When the "empty" shooter was reloaded he called out 'clear' to let his partner know he was ready.
These drills were then repeated where the initial shooter was indicating he was injured and needed to apply a tourniquet then a bandage on the subsequent volley. This emphasized communication between the partners and timing of shooting so as not to go empty too soon.
Another team drill involved following one behind the other. The lead shooter engaged the target until empty then placed his weapon in a safe position, cycled out to behind his partner and reloaded while the partner engaged the target.
The day ended with another accuracy/trust drill that was optional. I won't go into any detail as taken out of context it would appear dangerous but was safe in every way. No safety rules were broken. That was one thing that was not tolerated on the range at any point.
Finally, the last drill included some team shooting around a four barrels with rotating partners. Again, I won't go into detail.
I learned a ton in this class and gained a lot of confidence in my gun handling and abilities. An added plus is that the instructor is a certified expert witness and since we'd taken his class, we'd get his services for free is they should ever be needed. The instructor is a cop and has worked in Iraq so it's hard to challenge what he said.
Anyway, I hope that helps.
Just kidding. I think you meant to say James Yeager. 