"getting off the x"

[Ben Lenett]

This is a geat thread. I teach with Farnam and am influenced by his methods. One of the aspects of "getting off the X" that has not been covered here is getting off the X as a way of not getting in the fight to begin with. I live in an urban area and do it daily. Homeless guy tries to tell me his tale of tragedy, I say "sorry man, can't help you" and keep moving. If you never quit moving you are always going to be off the x. If the person then moves to block you, tehn you have learned alot about his intent. So for me, I teach and practice getting off the X as a reactive tactic while I'm drawing, but I also teach it as a daily avoidance tactic. If you literally don't stop on someone's X, you won't have to worry about getting off of it. I have finally gotten my wife to listen to me. "Sweetheart, if you don't break stride, the would be bad guy is likely not going to chase you. He is likely going to pic the next person walking down the street to harass".

You don't have to stop on someone's X to have a problem....simply walking or driving through it is enough to cause significant problems for yourself depending on the situation.

The X may not just be one exact spot, as it has the ability to move and sometimes move exactly where you are going in an attempt to flee the X.

[mark5pt56]

Three things a bad guy needs to do harm-Ability, Opportunity and Desire.

Three things the good guy needs to increase the chances of winning and more than likely will win--Time, Distance and Cover.

For the most part, you control the bad guy's Opportunity. Don't give that chance to him/her or them and your good. If you are faced with the threat, hopefully you are aware of what's going on and have trained to give your mind a bank of options to enable.

Concerning the moving thing-you need to train under various conditions to know what to do. Movement is fine, provided it serves a purpose. Many factors to consider-distance to the threats, cover close, far, effectiveness while moving and shooting vs. static and effective-not all black and white and there's no way to predict the variables. You can come to a reasonable conclusion as to the odds of encountering certain things, but don't etch them in stone.

[nickdrak]

You can come to a reasonable conclusion as to the odds of encountering certain things, but don't etch them in stone.

That brings up another thing that I try to do regularly while out and about: Visualization. Upon observing a potential BG on the street, I like to play out in my mind what my options are if he were to do A,B,C or D to me or someone else. What options do I have for cover, escape, etc? I know this is not ground breaking info, but still relevant to the topic.

[mark5pt56]

After some cold ones, here's a quote to ponder

"A determined mind can be a dangerous thing"

[RogerinTPA]

Here's another quote I've favored over the years: "Chance favors the prepared mind."

After some cold ones, here's a quote to ponder

"A determined mind can be a dangerous thing"

[Alpha Sierra]

Is this technique always appropriate? Is it oversold by those instructors who teach it? Can it be a detriment? What does "getting off the x" actually mean? How does shooting-on-the-move reconcile with moving off the line of force?

Training with Roger Phillips is a good way to find out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhVgERNjBXI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6SqlF-XiuU

IMO the slow, deliberate style of shooting on the move taught by most trainers is inappropriate for the reactive nature of most gunfights Joe CCW (me) is going to be involved in. What works in a proactive gunfight where you have (and usually keep) the initiative does not necessarily work in a reactive one where you start at a disadvantage. In that case, violence of action includes the way you move off the line of attack.

[oldtexan]

Deleted due to negligent keyboard discharge.

[oldtexan]

I can, however, see merit in training to get moving at the point that a threat is realized, draw on the move, and keep moving while assessing and engaging if needed.

What you've written makes perfect sense to me. If I even suspect there is a threat, I want to put greater space between the suspected threat and me. For me as an ordinary citizen carrying concealed, a fight avoided is a fight won.

[John_Wayne777]

After some cold ones, here's a quote to ponder

"A determined mind can be a dangerous thing"

I'm reminded of the posts here a while back about an FBI PDF that examined a police shooting where a guy with just a little THC in his system engaged three police officers in an extended firefight, sustaining seventeen gunshot wounds from handguns and rifles....and when the police were finally able to cuff him (after a round from a pistol broke his arm and made him drop his handgun) he was still trying to physically fight with the arresting officers.

I'd say that's sufficient evidence that even an untrained, poorly armed sh*thead can become one dangerous hombre when he decides he isn't going to quit fighting until his heart stops pumping.

I'm not a gunfighter or an expert in killing people, but I dare say that if we as good guys combined the most honorable intentions and excellent training with that mindset....well....it might work out really really well for us and for the world in general.

[Dport]

When I went through the police academy they used to teach this concept. It was centered around their OC spray curriculum, however. The idea was if you're in a fight with someone and you temporarily "blind" them with the spray, they will likely continue on their current path and try to grapple with you. In order to avoid the need for "ground tactics," as they called it, you would move to the left or the right, preferably moving your gun away from the subject, and let the suspect blow right by. Then you could use any number of techniques to take them to ground and cuff them.

They taught a similar concept in low light, particularly in searches. If you were to conduct a search in low light, you were supposed to shine the light briefly. In that time the light was on you were to search part of the area and find your next search spot. The light went off and you were to move so as to not be where the light was. (The one time I actually did have to search a large structure at night I was alone, we trained in teams of two to four, and I threw away everything taught to me and went in to the warehouse with the idea of flushing the game out the back. Whether or not I was tactically sound in that respect is open for debate. The point is moot since there was no one actually in the warehouse at the time.)

I generally think it is a good idea to not be where the fight started if at all possible. If for whatever reason your opponent loses sight of you, to reload or because something else distracted their attention, it may be valuable to be somewhere they don't expect you to be. As a general rule. One or two steps doesn't do it in my opinion, unless you're already at close quarters like in the OC spray scenario.