So, Julie, Ardi, and I went down to the Advanced Defensive Shooting class a couple of weeks ago. "This course teaches advanced defensive shooting skills designed for students who have successfully completed the Introduction To Defensive Shooting Class, applying those skills in a vastly more complicated environment."
The "more complicated environment" was defined as shooting moving targets, multiple targets, shooting while moving, and a few other things.
It started with some classroom discussion, mostly reviewing material from the Intro class to make sure people hadn't forgotten anything. Our class only had four people--which was good, as we ended up running many more drills than normal. The fourth gentleman had taken the intro course almost a year prior, so he was a little rusty on some things.
Specifics we started with:
- use of verbal commands
- scanning for threats
- carrying at low ready, not high ready
- don't crowd cover
- gun moves with you when you move past cover (don't look without the gun)
Also, there was some discussion about how to react when accosted on the street by someone whose intent is to get you to stop and interact. I thought the response taught was useful, but not in the form in which I would handle it. Ardi's response was that she though the reaction was too loud and confrontative, and likely to escalate the (currently non-violent) situation.
One mildly
arg! point in the beginning of the class--the fourth student didn't remember what "reset point" on his trigger meant, so the teacher had him pull his gun out of the holster (facing the wall) and pull the trigger so she could show him. Now, this was before we had started the class, and we hadn't checked our guns, the teacher hadn't seen us clear/load/holster them---she had no idea what his gun's condition was. And she never checked, and just had him pull the trigger! I know that all students are supposed to be responsible for themselves, but *I* would have checked the gun first as the instructor.
It was also interesting--when he pulled the trigger on his Ruger P89, and then let it out for the reset, she (the teacher) was very surprised at how long the reset was. My comment was that it was a DA/SA, so since the slide didn't re-cock the hammer, the second pull was going to be DA again, so it wouldn't really be as long as the actual SA would be. She didn't seem to understand. (It is possible I didn't explain it well, but nonetheless, she should have known, I think.)
Again, there was an emphasis on the double-tap--the first shot aimed, but the second one let go as fast as possible just as soon as the reset could be engaged, and the trigger pressed again. And I still don't like that sort of thinking, even for defensive pistol shooting. I'm not saying doing double-taps for defensive shooting is bad, I just disagree with how it was taught, and whether it should be automatic in all cases of defensive shooting.
After discussing these things in the classroom, we went out to the range for a succession of drills. As before, we started with the stepback drill to warm up (measured it this time---started at 7 yards, only went back to 11 yards).
After that, we did some strong-hand-only drills, some transitioning-to-weakhand-only drills, and then worked some movement. (Simple draw-and-shoot-2 drills for the SHO/WHO ones.)
For the movement, we did a "box drill" where we moved in a square pattern around some barrels while shooting, then a "snake drill" where we moved around barrels placed in a line.
For the Box Drill, the barrels were simply marker points--not people, not cover, merely placeholders to tell us where to move. This drill is for people who have never shot on the move before--it isn't a "move to the barrel then shoot, then move to the next barrel and shoot" drill, the student is supposed to shoot while moving throughout.
After that, we started on the snake drill. The first time we ran the snake drill the barrels were merely markers for movement. However, in later drills they were
people, and that made movement a little different. (There was also an assumption that they were
innocent people, which might be a stretch, but we acted that way anyway.)
You shouldn't point guns at people you aren't planning on shooting. As such, we worked on the "sole position," which is a handgun position used for movement through crowded areas. The point is to have the handgun safely pointed downward (and not outward) but in such a manner as to make it instantly accessible and ready to shoot. We practiced with rubber guns for awhile, then went back to the snake drill, and practiced movement and firing through the barrels using the sole position.
One of the things that was very difficult about this was the tendency to treat the barrels as "cover" as opposed to "people". You don't edge around a person and shoot past their ear. Chances are they will be moving, screaming, flailing, and in general doing all the things that will get them (and you!) killed. The one thing they probably WON'T be doing is staying out of the way. I'm thinking that in the future, putting pictures of people on the barrels will help somewhat--students would move further away from the barrels to shoot, as opposed to snaking their way around the edges.
People are not cover. (Technically, they might be, but they certainly aren't
reliable cover.) The instructors only started commenting about this after I mentioned it once after a drill--and even after that, didn't really seem to get the idea about
why you have to give people room if you are planning on shooting past them.
One of the things that I noticed for this part was a remarkable silence on proper target acquisition. After you, if you are pie-ing your way around a corner (I'll note that "slicing the pie" wasn't taught in this class at all) you should shoot the BadGuy who is a threat. You shouldn't move around, come face-to-face with two BadGuys, then shoot at them both in a random order. You should: as you pie-slice the cover, one BG comes into view--shoot him. Either duck back into cover and move to a different spot before sticking your head out, or
immediately continue your pie-slicing, and as soon as you see another BG, drop him also.
For the entirety of the class, however, there wasn't any discussion of tactical thinking with respect to danger levels--which guy should be shot first?
How should someone come out from behind cover? Even the "graduation exercise" had multiple BadGuys directly in sight from the beginning, and no movement was allowed on the part of the student--and there was no cover available!
Just like last time, I think a major point of effective self-defense with a handgun was missed---in the intro class, what was missed was the idea that if you are shooting, you should be moving to cover. Always! In this second class, it was the concept of target selection and acquisition--who should be engaged first? Those two things are incredibly important, and yet they weren't discussed at all.
We'll come back to those concepts, by the way.
Okay---so, students worked on the sole position which was taught pretty well, and I was able to differentiate between the way I did it, and the way they taught it--the method I know is about keeping the gun secure close to the body, but available for firing--their method was for keeping the gun pointed down and away from bystanders. It made a slight difference, and after some rather heavy-handed instruction from one of the assistant instructors (and after I fixed what I was doing to match their version) I realized why the difference. Mine was for quick movement and firearms retention, and theirs was for crowded-area movement. Good to know the difference, and their "sole position" was good.
More on the instruction method later, by the way.
Next up: car shooting. They had a mockup of a car (not really---but enough with the steering wheel and the seat-with-seatbelt to make it good) that we practicing drawing/shooting/moving out of the vehicle. Some good food for thought there. I didn't necessarily agree with everything they said, but my disagreements were mostly dealing with how *I* specifically would move out of my car and my wife's car, not with their general instruction. A good section, and very thought-provoking. Both Ardi and Julie said this really made them think. (Me too.)
After that, the instructors pulled out a number of moving targets, and just kept running drills of increasing complexity for us to practice. I'm thinking that here is where they ran out of actual drills, and just kept adding more targets because they didn't know what else to do. With only 4 of us in the class, it didn't take long for us to do each drill---so it went quickly. The moving targets included swingers, sliders (moving from left-to-right and right-to-left), a drop-turner, and a clamshell target.
The more they added, the more it seemed like a typical IPSC stage---so much so that it was hard not to attempt to "game" the stage. That, combined with the fact that there was no emphasis on being behind cover, no emphasis on moving to cover, and no emphasis on tactical target selection, made this last part merely an exercise in shooting, as opposed to an exercise in
defensive shooting. It was a lot of fun, and probably helpful for Ardi and Julie (particularly since Julie doesn't do any IPSC shooting, so doesn't work with moving targets much), but for me, it was just another IPSC stage. Fun, but not what I was hoping for. The part that would have made it a
defensive tactics situation was missing.
We then had a "graduation exercise" which I promised to not talk about. Suffice it to say that it was more of the same with a twist. (Part of the twist being that everyone else ran a different stage, but they made it worse for me. Humph!)
So, overall:New Things We Learned/Drilled:- Strong-hand only
- Weak-hand only
- Transition to weak hand from strong hand
- Shooting while moving
- Sole Position and movement
- Shooting from car
- Shooting moving targets
Things That Didn't Happen:- Target Selection Instruction (shoot the threat, not just random order!)
- Movement to cover
- People are Not Cover! (and shooting right past their ear isn't going to end well)
While the "did happen" list looks nicely larger than the "didn't happen" list, I think that the first two things on the "didn't happen" list are perhaps some of the most important concepts that should be taught in a defensive pistol class. You should
NOT be standing there shooting---the minute you start your draw you should be moving to safety/cover (this is under the assumption that for some reason you could not have started moving
sooner) and your target selection should be based on who is the most immediate danger to you, and then the next dangerous, etc. Standing in one place and shooting is much more likely to end badly. And shooting at targets randomly generally means that someone is going to get to you before you stop them.
Instruction methods: Again, the instructors seemed to be shooters who had taken classes in gun-handling, and therefore taught gunhandling for self-defense, as opposed to people who taught defensive tactics using a handgun. It seemed to me that while the drills were good (even the later ones, though the priorities weren't taught well) they didn't understand the reason for the drills--they thought it was to get better at shooting, as opposed to being better at self-defense. I know I said that last time, and these were the same instructors---yet I had hoped that the first time things were omitted simply because it was an introductory class.
Apparently not.
At two points during the course, the two assistant instructors demonstrated how to handle a particular skill/drill. (One demonstration each.) In one "demonstration" case, the instructor had a number of misses, and in the other case the instructor mostly had "stopping" hits, but was extremely slow, and took the time to get into a classic shooting stance, square to the target, out in full view of multiple targets, and took his time aiming at each while in full view. (The reason for his occasional non-stopping hit was the fact that he double-tapped each target, and the second shot was not nearly as accurate as the first.)
In other words, the instructors were not high level shooters. Now, I certainly don't require that in a defensive tactics class. For example, I've shot in a competition with Ben Stoeger (an IPSC Production division Grandmaster) a couple of times, and while he could teach me a LOT about shooting, I'm pretty sure I could teach him a lot about defensive pistol tactics. The
knowledge the teacher has is what is important in a DT class, not whether or not he/she is a grandmaster level shooter.
That being said, they should be able to get solid A hits on targets quickly at combat distance, while maintaining good awareness, position, and demonstrating movement and use of cover. That is the point, after all.
We didn't see that.
I still had fun in the class. I learned a couple of things (a different method of "sole position" used for a slightly different situation; had a good thought process going regarding car defense; found a couple of good new drills for practicing movement) and had a good time shooting moving targets.
The instructors again seemed like people who knew one way to do things, taught that one way, and wouldn't think about alternate methods. That's fine--I came there to learn what they had to teach. That being said, however, sometimes an alternate method is required for someone who can't do it the regular way--and there isn't always just
one "best answer". One assistant instructor in particular was rather abrasive in his "you are doing it wrong---you have to do it
this way!" method.
For example, one time after finishing a drill, I did my area scan, noted he was standing behind a barrel on my left just watching, the RO was behind me to my right, and the other instructor was sitting in a chair far uprange. No one else was close. So, I reloaded and holstered my weapon. He then said "Did you look" and I said "Yes" whereupon he stepped out from behind the barrel showing he was holding a rubber gun, and proceeded to chew me out for "assumptions."
He had a point, in that I saw him and didn't further check. In my opinion, I also had a point in that if I see an RO standing watching me and not doing anything else, it is reasonable to holster the firearm. The chewing out lasted for awhile, showing how much "in danger" I was for not paying attention, and how I can't afford to miss dangerous situations, etc.
Very non-productive, and not good teaching, I thought. Among other things, 1) it isn't reasonable to spend the first 4 hours with an RO watching you, and suddenly expect a student who sees an RO watching them to consider the RO a threat (when he is deliberately hiding the gun behind a barrel so it can't be seen), and 2) what did he want me to do, bring the gun around and shoot him? In previous situations, the ROs would hold up their hands, and the student would have to be able to later tell the RO how many fingers he was holding up. Not really what we want to look for, and yet more useful than what the RO did to me.
So, for the class: Just like last time, but more so, I wouldn't suggest this class for people who aren't already good shooters--and if they are, taking a class that actually teaches defensive tactics while using a handgun will keep them safer.
We've already signed up (and paid for) the third class in the series (CQT), so there is one more to go. That one won't happen until August, but I'll post about it when it happens.
For the record, when I start officially teaching pistol classes here (Basic Pistol, Intro/Intermediate/Advanced Defensive Pistol, and Basic IPSC instruction) my classes are going to run a little differently.
