Dragging this thread back from the dead -- did a search and once I found this, didn’t feel like creating a brand new thread.
I took the CFS course in March 2011 with Rob Pincus and you can read my AAR
here. I just took the APH course taught by Paul Carlson (of Safety Solutions Academy) and Deryck Poole (of Echo-5 Training Group) this past weekend (Nov. 1-2, 2013) and thought I’d share my opinions.
The course builds off the CFS course and is essentially broken into two major categories: the first is the shooting from unorthodox positions (kneeling, seated, lying prone and lying supine), and the other is unorthodox manipulations of the pistol (one-handed reloads and malfunction clearances, both strong hand and weak hand). We also covered a few “low possibility/low plausibility” situations, such as shooting a handgun from 50 yards to see if you could get hits on target, and how to improve your chances of doing so. This all built up to the final exercise where we shot out of a vehicle, both out the front passenger’s window and the driver’s window.
So, a few observations:
1. This is a *tough* class. The shooting itself isn’t all that difficult, but Paul (who was the primary instructor) and Deryck really push you to your physical and mental breakpoints. Because of the unorthodox shootings positions, you’re constantly getting up and dropping back down on the ground. And some of the positions contort you around -- such as lying prone (on your stomach) and having to arch your back so you can see and put rounds into the target. Although I had kneepads on (I had the 5.11 kneepads inside my cotton 5.11 tac pants), they didn’t come low enough to really protect my knees, so my legs just below the knees and above the shins got tore up a bit from all the gravel. Suffice it to say that I had the seat warmers on both afternoons after shooting (and the air conditioning on as well, since it was still on the warm/humid side).
2. Mentally, it’s tough because you’re getting up and dropping down, so your heart rate gets worked up pretty good...and then they throw in a Balance of Speed and Precision drill, and all of a sudden you can’t hit the precise targets when they call for it. I can’t tell you how many times I was nailing a small target prior to doing the physical stuff, but then because I was huffing and puffing, I couldn’t get anywhere within 3 inches of a target afterwards. I was also having a tough time with one-handed strong side shooting -- I kept pulling shots low and left.
3. You will get dirty rolling around the ground. Deal with it, prepare for it (particularly if you have plans that evening, like I did...I brought a change of clean clothes with me to the range each day). Throw a big towel or coverall in the car so you can cover up your seat and not dirty up your interior if you decide not to change after the day’s shooting.
4. Make sure you test your kneepads and other protective gear out before the class (note what I just said above about tearing up my knees). I also wore long sleeves and gloves when going up and down -- shooting with the gloves actually did two things for me: protect my hands from the gravel, and validate whether I could effectively shoot with those gloves on (since I bought them specifically to wear in the winter so I could still handle my pistol in an incident).
5. The class really vets your gear and your setup. Coming into the class (in addition to the gloves I mentioned earlier), I had been carrying AIWB with a primary spare mag in my weakside front pocket and a backup spare mag on my belt roughly at my centerline/midline. What I discovered was that unless I was standing or kneeling straight up, it was much, much faster to go for my backup spare mag on my belt as opposed to the mag in my pocket. In addition, I run the ICE CLAW rear sight, which worked great when doing the one-handed manipulations -- definitely validated that purchase. Finally, I also run the Glock OEM extended slide stop lever. With the thumb-over-thumb grip I use, there’s always a chance that I’ll accidentally engage the lever and prevent slide lockback when the gun runs dry -- and while it hadn’t happened to me in a really, really long time (I think the last time it occurred to me was *before* I had installed the extended slide stop lever), it happened to me during the shooting-from-the-car drill. I’m now looking at the Ghost Bullet forward lever to replace it.
Paul got some really good video of me shooting from the car when the dreaded “click-no-bang” incident occurred. You see me immediately go to tap-rack to clear the malfunction only to have the slide lock back, so I go for a spare mag. I initially start to reach for a mag in my pocket only to realize that it’d be much faster to grab the mag on my belt, and I complete the reload and get the shot off. Total elapsed time from “click-no-bang” to getting the gun reloaded and ready to shoot: 5 seconds, and then I took an additional two seconds to break the shot since we were shooting under a very deliberate, step-by-step process. (If you’re interested in seeing the video, shoot me a PM with your email address and I’ll email you the 900k .mp4 file. I have Paul’s permission to share.) This is what I mean by vetting my gear setup -- my training going forward will be to go for the mag on my belt first, then the mag in my pocket.
Paul and Deryck were terrific instructors. Rob Pincus was supposed to teach the class, but had to back out -- as annoyed as I was by that (and I teased Rob about it, we go back to when we were teenagers), there was never a moment where I considered backing out. I know Rob well enough to trust that if Paul and Deryck were qualified and certified to teach APH, I knew I’d be getting quality instruction regardless of who actually taught the class -- and Paul and Deryck didn’t disappoint. They joked, they cajoled, they yelled at us -- all keeping in mind what were the most effective techniques for each of us (there were five students -- a great student-to-teacher ratio) to get the most out of what they were teaching us.
Highly encourage all to take CFS and APH if you’re interested in self-defense shooting training. As I said in my AAR for CFS, this won’t make you a better pure/competitive shooter, but you’ll be a much more capable and effective combat shooter. Feel free to ask questions, and I’ll answer them as best as I can (without giving away trade secrets).
