believeraz
04-29-09, 23:17
I recently took a private carbine class at Frank Garcia’s Universal Shooting Academy, in Frostproof, FL. Frank is an internationally ranked competitive shooter, with an impressive number of wins under his belt. Likewise, Frank and his staff provide instruction to a long list of current champions, as well as government clients. USA offers public, private group, and private individual classes. As I had specific things I wanted to accomplish and work on, I elected t o go with a private day of instruction.
The training day started with paperwork and a review of my experience with a rifle as well as the rifle I brought that day, my perspective, training theory, and goals. My instructor, Roy Tyler, pegged my learning style immediately, and facilitated the day’s training in an approach that resonated well with me.
Roy is a Vietnam veteran, retired LEO, and former Police Academy Instructor, Smith and Wesson Academy Instructor, and Florida State LE training advisory council member. He is also an accomplished IPSC and 3 gun competitor.
I started off with zero/confirmation for iron sights and optic at 50m (my preferred zero). I also did some variance testing with a suppressor on the rifle. Roy’s wealth of knowledge on hows and whys led to some interesting discussion on barrel harmonics, a suppressor’s harmonic effect and its influence on zero deviation.
We moved to an array of 12 2” dots. Rather than spend the usual time shooting small groups of slow fire at the dots, we hit the ground running hard. We had some discussion on what my acceptable accuracy standards were, and Roy encouraged me to push my speed and cadence to the limits of my acceptable standards. We then moved to multiple target engagements, limited targets (2/3 target behind cover, headshots only, etc), and switching gears (pure speed in getting rounds on target, to slowing down for a long shot or head shot). A lot of emphasis was placed on repeatable, consistent speed in going from my normal carry position to rounds on target, and smooth trigger work. Drills ranged from 10-50 meters. This took us up to lunch.
After lunch, we carried on, working heavily on switching gears between near and distant targets (25-200m), as well as rapid target transition. A good bit of work was done on kneeling, prone, and oh-shit-under-the-truck-prone positions. We then moved to moving targets, restricted moving targets (headshots on a runner, etc), and shooting moving targets in a crowd, and between points of cover. We worked on shooting on the move, with some good CQB applications, including transitions to handgun. The day wrapped up with what I will refer to as “The Humbler”, which was made of transition drills between 4” plates at 20m, and pepper poppers at roughly 15-20m. We wrapped up around 1700. Total round count for the day was 1000 of 5.56mm and about 100 9mm.
The facilities were accommodating. There were roughly eight IPSC scenario bays, another couple 50 meter bays, and two longer lanes at 100 and 200m respectively. I had the place to myself, and shot on roughly six or seven bays and lanes. There were a wide variety of target systems, including IPSC cardboard, Larue resetting sniper targets, steel bobbers, gongs, silhouettes, plates, and poppers, a variable speed mover range, and a controllable robotic chassis 3D human torso/head target. NONE of the steel targets were normal human sized, which added its own challenging spin to the training day. On a plus side, I am adequately prepared should Oompa Loompas invade.
Bathrooms were clean, the grass was cut, and there were fish in the pond. Bottled water and a cooler of ice were provided. One nice touch to the private lesson format was that I spent my time focused on my training. That is to say, I wasn’t schlepping steel, pasting targets, setting up the range, etc. Roy did a phenomenal job of facilitating the training so I could get maximum use of my time. I honestly felt a little lazy since I didn’t lift a finger on the usual schlepping tasks that come along with a day at the range.
The instructor’s approach was interesting. There was always randomness and variation injected, even to repetitions of the same drill. Something was constantly changing, and this served to keep it fresh as well as prevent death by boredom through repetition. There was also no ballistic masturbation. (That is my term for shooting drills that have a student dump high round counts into a target over and over again, seemingly for the purpose of having a high round count or piling brass to a certain minimum depth.) Every round was a quality round, even if it was a part of a 20 round rapid sequence. Although USA is largely a competition school, we weren’t slaves to the shot timer. We used it at times, when it was conducive.
At all times, my pace was on me, allowing me to push it harder or dial it back as necessary. Roy encouraged me to use misses to my advantage. He described the quality of a miss as one of the most important aspects of a training session. The philosophy behind this related to pushing the envelope on speed and accuracy to the point that the wheels come off, then being able to self-diagnose and correct. This emphasized the ability to call a miss, self-correct during follow-through, and make the next round a solid hit, and to make it a repeatable event. The value of a miss was likened to high speed driver training. If you never come off the track a bit or spin out, chances are you’re not pushing yourself to the edge of your performance ability.
In short, in one solid, focused day, I saw my carbine skill set progress to another level. I attribute this both to the quality and focus of the training I received, as well as the dynamics of the individual class and the benefits it brought to the training experience. I don’t think I could have extracted the same experience from a 3 day class, when dealing with a 4:1 to 10:1 instructor to student ratio.
I had a great experience with Universal Shooting Academy, and would recommend them to others based on that experience. I would also encourage folks who are interested in taking an individual skill set up a notch, to consider investing in some one-on-one instruction.
For you gear homos, I used a Rock River Entry Tactical, with an Aimpoint, VFG, light, and Vickers sling, with Pmags. I didn’t clean it during the day, and only lubed it once prior to the start of class. I had zero malfunctions. Ammo was Sellier and Bellot M193 55 grain.
The training day started with paperwork and a review of my experience with a rifle as well as the rifle I brought that day, my perspective, training theory, and goals. My instructor, Roy Tyler, pegged my learning style immediately, and facilitated the day’s training in an approach that resonated well with me.
Roy is a Vietnam veteran, retired LEO, and former Police Academy Instructor, Smith and Wesson Academy Instructor, and Florida State LE training advisory council member. He is also an accomplished IPSC and 3 gun competitor.
I started off with zero/confirmation for iron sights and optic at 50m (my preferred zero). I also did some variance testing with a suppressor on the rifle. Roy’s wealth of knowledge on hows and whys led to some interesting discussion on barrel harmonics, a suppressor’s harmonic effect and its influence on zero deviation.
We moved to an array of 12 2” dots. Rather than spend the usual time shooting small groups of slow fire at the dots, we hit the ground running hard. We had some discussion on what my acceptable accuracy standards were, and Roy encouraged me to push my speed and cadence to the limits of my acceptable standards. We then moved to multiple target engagements, limited targets (2/3 target behind cover, headshots only, etc), and switching gears (pure speed in getting rounds on target, to slowing down for a long shot or head shot). A lot of emphasis was placed on repeatable, consistent speed in going from my normal carry position to rounds on target, and smooth trigger work. Drills ranged from 10-50 meters. This took us up to lunch.
After lunch, we carried on, working heavily on switching gears between near and distant targets (25-200m), as well as rapid target transition. A good bit of work was done on kneeling, prone, and oh-shit-under-the-truck-prone positions. We then moved to moving targets, restricted moving targets (headshots on a runner, etc), and shooting moving targets in a crowd, and between points of cover. We worked on shooting on the move, with some good CQB applications, including transitions to handgun. The day wrapped up with what I will refer to as “The Humbler”, which was made of transition drills between 4” plates at 20m, and pepper poppers at roughly 15-20m. We wrapped up around 1700. Total round count for the day was 1000 of 5.56mm and about 100 9mm.
The facilities were accommodating. There were roughly eight IPSC scenario bays, another couple 50 meter bays, and two longer lanes at 100 and 200m respectively. I had the place to myself, and shot on roughly six or seven bays and lanes. There were a wide variety of target systems, including IPSC cardboard, Larue resetting sniper targets, steel bobbers, gongs, silhouettes, plates, and poppers, a variable speed mover range, and a controllable robotic chassis 3D human torso/head target. NONE of the steel targets were normal human sized, which added its own challenging spin to the training day. On a plus side, I am adequately prepared should Oompa Loompas invade.
Bathrooms were clean, the grass was cut, and there were fish in the pond. Bottled water and a cooler of ice were provided. One nice touch to the private lesson format was that I spent my time focused on my training. That is to say, I wasn’t schlepping steel, pasting targets, setting up the range, etc. Roy did a phenomenal job of facilitating the training so I could get maximum use of my time. I honestly felt a little lazy since I didn’t lift a finger on the usual schlepping tasks that come along with a day at the range.
The instructor’s approach was interesting. There was always randomness and variation injected, even to repetitions of the same drill. Something was constantly changing, and this served to keep it fresh as well as prevent death by boredom through repetition. There was also no ballistic masturbation. (That is my term for shooting drills that have a student dump high round counts into a target over and over again, seemingly for the purpose of having a high round count or piling brass to a certain minimum depth.) Every round was a quality round, even if it was a part of a 20 round rapid sequence. Although USA is largely a competition school, we weren’t slaves to the shot timer. We used it at times, when it was conducive.
At all times, my pace was on me, allowing me to push it harder or dial it back as necessary. Roy encouraged me to use misses to my advantage. He described the quality of a miss as one of the most important aspects of a training session. The philosophy behind this related to pushing the envelope on speed and accuracy to the point that the wheels come off, then being able to self-diagnose and correct. This emphasized the ability to call a miss, self-correct during follow-through, and make the next round a solid hit, and to make it a repeatable event. The value of a miss was likened to high speed driver training. If you never come off the track a bit or spin out, chances are you’re not pushing yourself to the edge of your performance ability.
In short, in one solid, focused day, I saw my carbine skill set progress to another level. I attribute this both to the quality and focus of the training I received, as well as the dynamics of the individual class and the benefits it brought to the training experience. I don’t think I could have extracted the same experience from a 3 day class, when dealing with a 4:1 to 10:1 instructor to student ratio.
I had a great experience with Universal Shooting Academy, and would recommend them to others based on that experience. I would also encourage folks who are interested in taking an individual skill set up a notch, to consider investing in some one-on-one instruction.
For you gear homos, I used a Rock River Entry Tactical, with an Aimpoint, VFG, light, and Vickers sling, with Pmags. I didn’t clean it during the day, and only lubed it once prior to the start of class. I had zero malfunctions. Ammo was Sellier and Bellot M193 55 grain.