kwelz
08-22-11, 13:10
VSM 1 Day Basic Carbine Class
August 20th 2011
http://m4carbine.net/showthread.php?t=86814
**This was day one of a 2 day Class. The second Class focused on Carbine and will be covered in a separate AAR.
Instructors: Joe Barnsfather assisted by Barry Foster
Location: Knob Creek shooting range.
Total in attendance: 21 + instructors
Range conditions: The only word I can use is great. While a bit on the warm side it was clear and sunny all day. After a number of Muddy classes this was a welcome change.
Equipment: Handguns were a mix of M&Ps, 2011s, Glocks and 1911s. I was running my M&P9 with Hackathorn sights. Not the most accurate handgun to be sure but reliable as hell.
Class and Drills:
First off I would like to thank Tactical Tailor. They provided a number of goodies for this class to give away as prizes. And by a number I mean A LOT. These guys are amazing. I use a lot of their gear because it works and support of the shooting community like this just gives me even more reason to buy their stuff.
Now onto the meat and potatoes.
We split the class into 2 groups. Half were Police and half were civilians. Most of us had previous training to varying degrees.
Class started off as we always do. A safety briefing and some discussion on the range conditions. Today was more interesting than normal. A logging truck had taken out the main bridge leading to the range, it looked like someone had hit it with an airstrike. The owners of the range were trying to rebuild it and were moving rock all day. The road they were using to move this rock was on top of our backstop. So periodically throughout the day they would blow the horn on the truck Joe would respond with a small air horn to signal the range was cold. He had WAY to much fun doing this.
As usual we started out with simple dry fire drills. Focus was put on trigger manipulation. As I have said in previous AARs the core of the Vicker's method is controlling that trigger and putting rounds in the black. You can shoot as fast as you want. But if you miss you are just throwing money(and possibly your life) downrange.
Once everyone had practice dry firing we moved on to live fire drills. Singe shots from 5 meters into the 1 inch square on the head of the target. Some of the shooters were dead on, other like myself decided we didn't want to mess up that perfect black square and would rather put holes in all that white space.
As the day progressed we moved onto harder and harder drills. I won't go into details of each drill but I will say we were pushed HARD. Psychically it was probably no worse than any other class. Maybe less so since we were not fighting mud or ice. Just heat. However Mentally this was the most challenge Joe has put us through, and that is saying a lot.
Drills ranged from basic reloads to the ever popular "test" or 10-10-10 drill. As I mentioned earlier, only hits in the black count. Shooting ranged from 5 meters out to 25 meters. I find that I really struggle past 10 yards or so. At 25 I can put hits in the 5.5 inch circle if I really take my time but I struggle if I am under the clock.
A number of the drills ended with a challenge with the winner earning Tactical Tailor swag.
At one point we were practicing shooting from the draw on the timer and I screwed up royally(I wanted the swag). Somehow as I was drawing handgun something happened to my left eye. I am pretty sure my contact folded over or shifted but it hurt like hell. I should have re-holsterd flushed out my eye and then ran the drill even if it meant the clock continued to run. But instead I tried to shoot with double vision and ended up putting 2 rounds in the brown and the rest off paper. Stupid green mistake that I should have known better about.
I must say that a lot of the shooters were really squared away. I feel that my shooting has really improved over the last year. The way I shot at this class would have made me feel like hot shit when I started or even 6 months ago. However it was and made me feel very average.
One final note. By the end of the day we were all struggling. It was hot and we were getting tired. It really reminded me how badly I need to get in shape.
Overall the class was great. As always I had a lot of fun and learned a lot. I will get more into the detail of what was learned in the second part of the AAR.
August 20th 2011
http://m4carbine.net/showthread.php?t=86814
**This was day one of a 2 day Class. The second Class focused on Carbine and will be covered in a separate AAR.
Instructors: Joe Barnsfather assisted by Barry Foster
Location: Knob Creek shooting range.
Total in attendance: 21 + instructors
Range conditions: The only word I can use is great. While a bit on the warm side it was clear and sunny all day. After a number of Muddy classes this was a welcome change.
Equipment: Handguns were a mix of M&Ps, 2011s, Glocks and 1911s. I was running my M&P9 with Hackathorn sights. Not the most accurate handgun to be sure but reliable as hell.
Class and Drills:
First off I would like to thank Tactical Tailor. They provided a number of goodies for this class to give away as prizes. And by a number I mean A LOT. These guys are amazing. I use a lot of their gear because it works and support of the shooting community like this just gives me even more reason to buy their stuff.
Now onto the meat and potatoes.
We split the class into 2 groups. Half were Police and half were civilians. Most of us had previous training to varying degrees.
Class started off as we always do. A safety briefing and some discussion on the range conditions. Today was more interesting than normal. A logging truck had taken out the main bridge leading to the range, it looked like someone had hit it with an airstrike. The owners of the range were trying to rebuild it and were moving rock all day. The road they were using to move this rock was on top of our backstop. So periodically throughout the day they would blow the horn on the truck Joe would respond with a small air horn to signal the range was cold. He had WAY to much fun doing this.
As usual we started out with simple dry fire drills. Focus was put on trigger manipulation. As I have said in previous AARs the core of the Vicker's method is controlling that trigger and putting rounds in the black. You can shoot as fast as you want. But if you miss you are just throwing money(and possibly your life) downrange.
Once everyone had practice dry firing we moved on to live fire drills. Singe shots from 5 meters into the 1 inch square on the head of the target. Some of the shooters were dead on, other like myself decided we didn't want to mess up that perfect black square and would rather put holes in all that white space.
As the day progressed we moved onto harder and harder drills. I won't go into details of each drill but I will say we were pushed HARD. Psychically it was probably no worse than any other class. Maybe less so since we were not fighting mud or ice. Just heat. However Mentally this was the most challenge Joe has put us through, and that is saying a lot.
Drills ranged from basic reloads to the ever popular "test" or 10-10-10 drill. As I mentioned earlier, only hits in the black count. Shooting ranged from 5 meters out to 25 meters. I find that I really struggle past 10 yards or so. At 25 I can put hits in the 5.5 inch circle if I really take my time but I struggle if I am under the clock.
A number of the drills ended with a challenge with the winner earning Tactical Tailor swag.
At one point we were practicing shooting from the draw on the timer and I screwed up royally(I wanted the swag). Somehow as I was drawing handgun something happened to my left eye. I am pretty sure my contact folded over or shifted but it hurt like hell. I should have re-holsterd flushed out my eye and then ran the drill even if it meant the clock continued to run. But instead I tried to shoot with double vision and ended up putting 2 rounds in the brown and the rest off paper. Stupid green mistake that I should have known better about.
I must say that a lot of the shooters were really squared away. I feel that my shooting has really improved over the last year. The way I shot at this class would have made me feel like hot shit when I started or even 6 months ago. However it was and made me feel very average.
One final note. By the end of the day we were all struggling. It was hot and we were getting tired. It really reminded me how badly I need to get in shape.
Overall the class was great. As always I had a lot of fun and learned a lot. I will get more into the detail of what was learned in the second part of the AAR.