"Range Kata"

[Arctic1]

The exaggerated scan-and-assess is one of my least favorite range-isms.

I certainly understand it as a concept, but on a flat range firing drills it is movement for movements sake. Pat McNamara has a great explanation for it relating back to safety at NRA ranges or something, and that the phenomenon isn't really tactically based anyway. I think it's kind of silly to do the 360 look around as a means of driving home situational awareness for a couple reasons: 1. You're teaching people to look around but it becomes a finger drill, so they're not paying attention anyway and 2. I never did more than scan my target, and yet in combat my teammates and I are aware of our surroundings even though we didn't train on it at the flat range specifically, because it is an inherent part of all our activities, although that certainly may not be true of all gun toting people out there. There's also the very valid argument of taking your eyes away from a known threat to look at an area you already came through.

I usually ask guys that do it where they got the concept and I get one answer universally, then I ask what they're looking for, then I ask what the threat they engaged is doing. Never has one answered "I would have already assessed that threat as neutralized before doing my larger scan", but most often "I don't know" is the reply. I think it fits your "range kata" topic pretty well.

Thank you! Very well put.

And I couldn't agree more with the text I highlighted.

[rob_s]

For me at least, the scan and assess is an important drill as part of the *holstering* routine rather than the post shooting routine, if that makes sense.

I believe it was originated as a way to get students to not just rush to get the gun back in the holster, and perhaps catch that guy behind them that's about to whack them with a bat. Except that we've replaced the holster with the S&A and it's now just as useless.

Ignoring the number of people who will S&A in a shoot house and still get whacked, even on the range I have stood behind people during their S&A and asked them what color shirt I'm wearing, or fingers holding up, or whatever, and what I consistently get is people that haven't a clue.

Which is an indicator that it's nothing but a kata for them.

Another example is shooters in a shoot house who will enter a room and walk down a wall directly on their right who will S&A to their right when they are done. What are they looking for? Even worse, if they always start by looking to the right, in this situation they'll also look to their right. At the very least I think we can agree that if you ARE going to scan to your right, you probably ought to save that for last.

[TehLlama]

For me the most frequent items is the assumption of a 'SHOOT' threat. EVERY TIME. And running the same exercises differently when there's the possibility of a no-shoot. A useful training tool when focusing on an individual skill, but unless you're in pure reactive mode, preempting any sort of evaluation of the target usually shooters are already focused on taking up slack on the trigger.

Another one on the S&A is how much ground is covered on initial search. On an open plain, engaging somewhat distant targets go ahead and use a narrow search, but in enclosed spaces the drilled kata becomes apparent when somebody only covers a nominal amount of space with the muzzle before switching off aggressive mode, when they should be covering swaths of 90 degrees at least.

[Failure2Stop]

If so, would the hands high stance for drawing a pistol (simulating transition from a carbine) qualify as "Kata"?

I give it a "maybe".

Most of this comes down to the shooter.
Does he (or she) understand why they are doing what they are doing, are they doing it correctly, and can they clearly articulate the reason/application?

I don't think that holding a ghost carbine before a draw is a bad thing, as long as the shooter knows what it is to actually transition. The hand movement is different than that from a hands to the side, interview, or French, and as long as that is the purpose of the practice, rock on. However, if the shooter has access to a carbine with a sling, he can get the full stimulus response by actually pulling the trigger, getting no bang, and then performing the transition, and I would call this "better" than ghost gunning.

I have a special place in the darkest parts of my heart for the "weed wacker" search and assess, and all those that allow it to continue. The mindless sweep of the gun back and forth, I feel, is pretty much the defining point of the issue that rob is bringing up. I do have a "post shot sequence" that I use and teach, every part has a reason and a explaination, and clearly understandable bypass criteria. I also have some problem with the way people try to poke holes in another's scan. Shirt color or how many fingers the instructor is holding up is rarely a critical aspect of a gunfight, however, the location of cover, the proximity of friends/threats/unknowns, location of exit/entry points, and the proximity of transportation almost always are. The problem with this is that these things rarely change in square range environments, which encourages lazy scans. I can easily talk about the post shot sequence for hours, but that's not the point of this thread.

What I really read in this thread is that there are lots of people that simply mirror their instructor's video instead of paying attention to the "why". I am a big "concept over technique" guy, and so far I think that it gives more to the student's overally growth.

[ChocLab]

......

[kmrtnsn]

Let me provide my take on kata. I am a firearms instructor for a large federal agency. We get our shooters once a quarter for just a couple of hours. With recent cutbacks, we are very lucky to get this much time. Not every shooter we have is a meat eating, fearless, shooting demigod. We work with what we have and do the best we can for all of them. We have a good percentage of shooters who more closely resemble the stereotypical accountant. Instilling a fighting mentality in two runs of a qualification course in just a couple of hours is a tough row to hoe, especially only four times a year. When you add that time up, it equals just one of the many Saturdays I spend training on my own dime. Within the confines of our qualification course I can, while "running the qual" ask my shooters to do a few extra things that I hope, in the long run, might help them in the event of an armed encounter.

What we try to get our shooters to do are the following, with the rationale attached.

Step off line on the draw. A square qualification range does not permit fore and aft movement but If I can get them to step to the left and the right then I at least have them moving, and thinking about moving during threat engagement, not to be a static target in a gunfight. I also take the time to explain, every quarter, why we are moving; to gain cover, to get out of the line of fire, etc. I believe that if I can get them to think about the whys then then they can take that information and apply it in other situations.

Scans. In my world, we aren't just scanning for threats. We are looking for "blue", as in where is my partner, what is he/she doing, are they okay, as well as victims, witnesses, etc. If my partner is still drawn out, maybe I don't necessarily want to re-holster right now. I stress a 360 degree scan but it is a "scan with your eyes, not with your muzzle". "Front sight, front sight, front sight" is fine for target engagement, not so much for analyzing your coverage area. I like the close, compressed ready, with a depressed muzzle for scans. For LE there are clear articulable reasons for this kind of scan, it is non-threatening, and cannot be articulated as "he was pointing his gun at me, yelling at me to do this or that". We have seen during both training and post shooting debriefings where the shooter, if scanning with the weapon up in their field of view, looking down the muzzle misses seeing key items, not a good thing in L.E. engagements. Cover, I stress look for cover during the scan. "Hey!, You were just in a gunfight, maybe this particular spot isn't where you want to continue standing." Find a new place to be!

Reload when you want to, not when you need to. Hard during an admin qualification. Our course is designed around shooters having four, 12 round magazines, yet it is a 50 round qual. Back in the day we issued six but I guess that additional $50.00 per shooter was too much for the federal deficit to bear. Before the current cadre on our range we were having shooters remove the mag from their weapon while holstered, then add a few rounds to the mag to have enough to finish the course. I hated this and fought to have shooters start the course with half a box of loose rounds in their pocket to reload a magazine while we "worked our way back". Now we stress that all reloads happen with a drawn weapon, weapon close to the body, elbows close, eyes on the threat area. No chicken wing elbows. In a dynamic environment, a partner bumping a chickenwing is much more likely to push a muzzle where it shouldn't be than bumping a bicep or shoulder. Magazines always come from pouches, not pockets, we talk about consistent magazine placement on the body and the importance of it. No more administrative reloads. If you are ejecting a magazine, it ejects into your support hand, it is quickly evaluated, if it has rounds, it is retained, if it is empty, it is discarded.

Breathing. I am a big believer in what I call the "stress reset". Put a shooter in s stressful situation or engagement and you you'll watch the breathing stop, along with everything else. A few slow deep breaths helps the shooter overcome that adrenaline dump and get back into the fight, or as my partner describes it, "what's important now" be that a scan, reload, or moving to cover. manage your breathing. If you control your breathing, you have control over your voice while issuing verbals. A panting, hyperventilating agent, yelling commands has no officer presence and has no control of him/herself and isn't taking control of a situation with officer presence, get control, keep control.

We are also stressing covering your partner's reload. We use only four terms, "Cover, Cover up, Ready, Okay". This is probably an entire thread unto itself.

With a few small changes we have eliminated the "Charlie's Angels" and "T.J. Hookers" from the line. For the most part, we have shooters scanning, with reason, for articulable things. We have them moving, and thinking about why they are doing it, and now we have them reloading before slide lock.

These things are small, and similar to what a lot of other instructors have their students do on the line. Are they kata? Perhaps. Are there better ways? Maybe, we are always looking, and adapting. One thing for sure, for a static quarterly firearms qualification they are a far sight better than what was happening before.

[The_Swede]

Kmrtnsn: I don't despise the Kata as a mean to teach the basic concept. And if you get your guys for a few hours four times a year then I think you're doing the right thing, that is covering the basics. But I've seen instructors who are teaching their group for several days and it doesn't get more challenging then the braindead scan or a sidestep. That's what I'm opposed to at least. As rob said the Kata becomes the end state as opposed to being a part in a much bigger puzzle.

[Heavy Metal]

My two cents on the scan and assess are if you aren't doing it slowly and deliberately, it is of diminished value. You have to do it slowly enough to process what you are observing.

And M4G and F2S, what about the value of this in a team vs an individual environment where in a team situation, you have different people to cover differing sectors. Would it be more or less valuable in an individual scenario where you have to essentially do it all?

Another thing I have started doing before reholstering the pistol or letting the rifle hang is mentally ask myself these question:

1) Is the bolt/slide forward?(I.E. Do I have an obvious stoppage/empty weapon?)

2) Do I need to do an admin reload at tis time?(Or clear the malfunction first if one is observed.)

3) Do I want to close the dust cover/reholster at this time?

[Failure2Stop]

And M4G and F2S, what about the value of this in a team vs an individual environment where in a team situation, you have different people to cover differing sectors. Would it be more or less valuable in an individual scenario where you have to essentially do it all?

This is a bit of a thread-jack, so before getting too far down the rabbit hole, I would rather that a new thread be created on the topic or revive an older one.

But I will say this: they are different in execution but identical in concept.

[Guns-up.50]

For me at least, the scan and assess is an important drill as part of the *holstering* routine rather than the post shooting routine,

To me this sounds as if your are doing the S/A during the re-holstering..
If so dont you feel as it would be counter productive to put you wpn away before you know its safe?
Finding out there is another attacker while /after the pistol is put away could be catastrophic.

Not saying you, but many shooters are in a rush or speed through the re-holstering process for some reason.