Sweatnbullets
Member
Here is a review I posted on another forum about the pointshooting course I took last weekend with Matt Temkin, 7677, and Robin Brown in Tucson.
**************************************************
First off, Robin Brown did an outstanding of putting this together. The facilities at Desert Trails Gun Range and Training Center were perfect for the course. Our range was out in the back away from everyone else. The class room, training room, and bathrooms were all clean and air conditioned. Rick the owner or the range was an excellent host and unbelievable shot. While we were working on elbow up/elbow down at the three yard mark, he was shooting next to me. From the hip, in well under one second, he was shooting a one hole drill. When the hole got to the size of a quarter he started on another hole. At the end of the drill he put about forty rounds through two perfect quarter size holes. I want some of that!
Robin Brown, 7677, and Matt Temkin were all very knowledgeable and each had the ability to pass on their knowledge. Each were excellent teachers and very passionate about what they were passing along. Not only were they great to learn from they were just plan good guys. The times that we had outside of the training environment were a lot of fun and was like hanging out with old friends. They all went well beyond the call of duty and gave and gave and gave.
We got into town at about 10:30 PM on Friday and put a call into brownie. He was down in Bobby's room going over the knife. Yeah, that's right, the course had not even started and we got about two hours of knife work in. Brownie trained for eight years under James Keating and really seemed to know his stuff. Brownie loves passing along his knowledge and would have trained in knife all night if we would have let him. He is also one tough SOB and as hard as a rock. I accidently caught him with a stick in the head, did not even blink and eye or hurt me..........seriously.
Saturday morning Matt Temkin started Fairbairn/Applegate/Sykes (FAS) form of PSing. It was divided up into two seperate forms, Applegate first and Fairbairn and Sykes second.
Matt is an absolute expert when it comes these two forms of PSing, let alone the historical context of the two systems. He started with the Applegate method first due to the fact that it was less involved. Applegate did not teach shooting from the hip as Fairbairn did. Applegate taught the three quarter hip and the point shoulder.
The three quarter hip is shot one handed, with a bent elbow, with the HG about 6-10 inches below the line of sight, out of a crouch. The accuracy with this technique is quite (amazingly would be a better word) good and I was making good hits out to about ten yards with it.
The point shoulder is done with the same crouch, shot one handed, with the HG held with the arm locked and up in the line of sight. This is very close to what I have been doing in FOF while moving and shooting to the firing side. The accuracy once again is quite good. I was making good hits out to 17 yards (51 feet)
Many of you know that I had been studying this form of PSing well before this course. The truth be told is that I was pretty damm good at it even before the course. Matt took that skill level and made me twice as good as I was before. He did some minor tweaking, but what really made the difference was the "convulsive grip" and the "making your HG sound like a machine gun."
You really have no idea what is possible with these PSing systems until you have been trained in them. There is no way that you will believe the things I saw and did, until you do them yourself. For instance, do you think it is possible to use three quarter hip (see above) and empty your 17 round magazine, as fast as you can pull the trigger, into a fist size group, from five yards?
The rest of Saturday was spent with the Fairbairn system. The biggest difference between the two systems is the shooting from the hip in the Fairbairn system. This skill is by far the most amazing part of FAS PSing.
The position is called half hip and the description of the draw is EU/ED "elbow up/elbow down." The elbow comes up as you clear the holster, then the elbow is crashed down into the ribs. The trigger is pulled as soon as the elbow hits the ribs. This is by far, the fastest way that I have seen to get hits on target as soon as possible. We did not have a timer but we put it to the test in FOF. My training partner, who has always been better and faster than me, and probably always will be was to do a standard flash sight picture and I was to go EU/ED. At the buzzer we drew and shot. I was consistantly able to get two hits on him before he got a hit on me. Everyone was amazed at how fast he was (hell, he's always been that fast) but there was no way for him to beat EU/ED down. Remember this was a Modern Techniques/competition guy with 15 years experience going against a guy that only had 15 minutes of formal training in EU/ED. I had spent a couple of hours playing with EU/ED before the course, but found out that I had been doing it incorrectly.
Once again, the convulsive grip and the "make your HG sound like a machine gun" made this technique remarkable. The accuracy was VERY GOOD out to three yards and the speed of the technique from the draw to emptying your magazine is something you are just going to have to do and see to believe.
My Modern Techniques buddy knew about my fascination with threat focused shooting and he came to this course on my recommendation. I was a little worried about what he was going to think about the FAS PSing. He came with an open mind with a "I'm just going to do whatever they tell me to do" attitude. After this segment of training his quote was "This is amazing!" Yeah, "No **** Sherlock!"
FAS PSing is an excellent addition to my Modern Techniques tool box. I admit that I have such a big investment in my tool box that FAS PSing will only be an addition. Now if I had it to do all over again, or if my son was going to become a Police Officer, FAS PSing would be the very first discipline I would train myself or my son in.
BTW, FAS does cover two handed sighted fire, but this was a threat focus course.
Saturday night we worked with WWII Combatives with Matt and knife with brownie. These we introductory sessions where we learned a handfull of simple and effective techniques.
Both Matt and brownie are very good at what they do. These sessions made me very interested in training with these two men again, but this time with the focus on combatives and knife.
Sunday morning we started in on Quick fire. 7677 taught this block of instruction. I have been following 7677 posts on a number of forums for over three years now and have learned quite a bit from him. Only tackdrivr has given me more usefull knowledge on the net. I was always a bit pissed off that he was an LEO only instructor, and I swore that if I had a chance that I would train with him.
Quick fire is a two handed threat focus shooting system. It works within the Modern Techniques default drawstroke and seems to be a threat focused solution to a Modern Techniques problem. Shots can be taken throughout the drawstroke, from when the hands come together, all the way to full extention. This is where zippering comes in. Whether you hands come together at abdomen level or at chest level you start getting hits at the compressed ready and continue to fire until extension.
The first shot at compressed ready is the key and the most difficult to get to hit, but with a little practice and the use of the centerline with HG parrallel to the ground, you will be good to go in short order. After that just punch forward while firing. A good four-five shot zipper is opimal with the first two hitting before your first shot on your default drawstroke would.
Sunday afternoon we started in with brownie and Quick Kill (QK). Let me get this out up front. Matt and 7677 have been teaching their stuff for free for years. I believe that I can freely discuss or teach their stuff as much as I want (with the proper credit). Out of respect for brownie, I will not be going into the specifics of QK. Everything that you need to know about the technique is already on this forum, search it. That will get you the concept. But, the concept is based on confidence. Without hands on instruction you will never get the full potential out of this technique. As brownie says "the only limiting factor is your mind."
For those of you that followed along as I was trying to figure QK out, you are probably wondering if I indeed, had figured it out. The answer is yes, I did. But that was not enough. Since it is based on confidence, finding out for a fact that I understood the technique and receiving hands on instruction and refinement really makes this technique shine. I can do things with QK that I am not capable of with deliberate sighted fire.
The technique excels when speed is the key factor. Speed of the shot, speed of your movement, and speed of your opponents movement. All the while giving you excellent accuracy and possible the very best accuracy possible when there is dynamic movement.
For anyone that has followed my writings or seen me train with dynamic movement, you know that I want to go way past the crab walk or the groucho walk. I want to make hits "on the run." I believe that this is an extremely neglected part of the skillset. I have been trying to figure out what the mental block is with so many of the HS/LD students and instructors. The only thing I can come up with is that they just can not get the hits "on the run."
And in comes QK! IMHO, without a doubt, this is the very best way to get hits while you are exploring your limitations of dynamic movement. If for just this one reason, I would recommend, in the strongest way possible, that you learn QK. If you think that getting hits without being hit is important...see brownie. If you think that a confrontation may include dynamic movement or shooting on the run....see brownie. If you think that getting hits on the run is a skill that you may need......yeah, you get the idea.
Damm good technique! I got to put it to use in FOF with mutual dynamic movement. Dude, it is a no brainer, it is like just reaching out and touching someone. It is actually so simple it's scary. With this skill, I will put my ability to makes hits "on the run" as my "greatest strength." That is a very reassuring fact!
Sunday evening was spent with more WWII combatives with Matt and stick work with brownie. Good stuff! I have got to get more training with these two on this.
Monday morning we had to do some catch up on QK, due to strong winds on Sunday afternoon. We banged away on steel with multiples and with dynamic movement. Brownie covered QK from the hip, firing to the rear without turning. Matt covered PSing with long guns. 7677 ran some FOF and went over the "Sight Continuum." There was a lot of different things going on, more than I will remember to write down.
All in all, it was an excellent three days of training. I will not go as far as saying it was the best course I've ever attended, but I will say this. This course gave me the most beneficial information that I have ever received in a course. Threat focus shooting is a skill that we all should own. You can train and train to go to the sights, but when the action is fast, the urgency is high, and you find yourself behind the reactionary curve you will either use threat focused shooting or you will die trying to get to your sights (credit given to 7677 for these words of wisdom.)
Sooo....You can either try to train away your natural reaction or except the fact that if someone is going to be trying to kill you, you will focus on the threat. Now if my front sight was trying to kill me, I would focus on that.
With that said, in a life threatening confrontation, there is nothing that I would rather see than a perfect sight picture on the threat. It is what I would want and what I would strive for. But if it ain't there......no problem!
http://www.politesociety.org/showthread.php?t=3112
**************************************************
First off, Robin Brown did an outstanding of putting this together. The facilities at Desert Trails Gun Range and Training Center were perfect for the course. Our range was out in the back away from everyone else. The class room, training room, and bathrooms were all clean and air conditioned. Rick the owner or the range was an excellent host and unbelievable shot. While we were working on elbow up/elbow down at the three yard mark, he was shooting next to me. From the hip, in well under one second, he was shooting a one hole drill. When the hole got to the size of a quarter he started on another hole. At the end of the drill he put about forty rounds through two perfect quarter size holes. I want some of that!
Robin Brown, 7677, and Matt Temkin were all very knowledgeable and each had the ability to pass on their knowledge. Each were excellent teachers and very passionate about what they were passing along. Not only were they great to learn from they were just plan good guys. The times that we had outside of the training environment were a lot of fun and was like hanging out with old friends. They all went well beyond the call of duty and gave and gave and gave.
We got into town at about 10:30 PM on Friday and put a call into brownie. He was down in Bobby's room going over the knife. Yeah, that's right, the course had not even started and we got about two hours of knife work in. Brownie trained for eight years under James Keating and really seemed to know his stuff. Brownie loves passing along his knowledge and would have trained in knife all night if we would have let him. He is also one tough SOB and as hard as a rock. I accidently caught him with a stick in the head, did not even blink and eye or hurt me..........seriously.
Saturday morning Matt Temkin started Fairbairn/Applegate/Sykes (FAS) form of PSing. It was divided up into two seperate forms, Applegate first and Fairbairn and Sykes second.
Matt is an absolute expert when it comes these two forms of PSing, let alone the historical context of the two systems. He started with the Applegate method first due to the fact that it was less involved. Applegate did not teach shooting from the hip as Fairbairn did. Applegate taught the three quarter hip and the point shoulder.
The three quarter hip is shot one handed, with a bent elbow, with the HG about 6-10 inches below the line of sight, out of a crouch. The accuracy with this technique is quite (amazingly would be a better word) good and I was making good hits out to about ten yards with it.
The point shoulder is done with the same crouch, shot one handed, with the HG held with the arm locked and up in the line of sight. This is very close to what I have been doing in FOF while moving and shooting to the firing side. The accuracy once again is quite good. I was making good hits out to 17 yards (51 feet)
Many of you know that I had been studying this form of PSing well before this course. The truth be told is that I was pretty damm good at it even before the course. Matt took that skill level and made me twice as good as I was before. He did some minor tweaking, but what really made the difference was the "convulsive grip" and the "making your HG sound like a machine gun."
You really have no idea what is possible with these PSing systems until you have been trained in them. There is no way that you will believe the things I saw and did, until you do them yourself. For instance, do you think it is possible to use three quarter hip (see above) and empty your 17 round magazine, as fast as you can pull the trigger, into a fist size group, from five yards?
The rest of Saturday was spent with the Fairbairn system. The biggest difference between the two systems is the shooting from the hip in the Fairbairn system. This skill is by far the most amazing part of FAS PSing.
The position is called half hip and the description of the draw is EU/ED "elbow up/elbow down." The elbow comes up as you clear the holster, then the elbow is crashed down into the ribs. The trigger is pulled as soon as the elbow hits the ribs. This is by far, the fastest way that I have seen to get hits on target as soon as possible. We did not have a timer but we put it to the test in FOF. My training partner, who has always been better and faster than me, and probably always will be was to do a standard flash sight picture and I was to go EU/ED. At the buzzer we drew and shot. I was consistantly able to get two hits on him before he got a hit on me. Everyone was amazed at how fast he was (hell, he's always been that fast) but there was no way for him to beat EU/ED down. Remember this was a Modern Techniques/competition guy with 15 years experience going against a guy that only had 15 minutes of formal training in EU/ED. I had spent a couple of hours playing with EU/ED before the course, but found out that I had been doing it incorrectly.
Once again, the convulsive grip and the "make your HG sound like a machine gun" made this technique remarkable. The accuracy was VERY GOOD out to three yards and the speed of the technique from the draw to emptying your magazine is something you are just going to have to do and see to believe.
My Modern Techniques buddy knew about my fascination with threat focused shooting and he came to this course on my recommendation. I was a little worried about what he was going to think about the FAS PSing. He came with an open mind with a "I'm just going to do whatever they tell me to do" attitude. After this segment of training his quote was "This is amazing!" Yeah, "No **** Sherlock!"
FAS PSing is an excellent addition to my Modern Techniques tool box. I admit that I have such a big investment in my tool box that FAS PSing will only be an addition. Now if I had it to do all over again, or if my son was going to become a Police Officer, FAS PSing would be the very first discipline I would train myself or my son in.
BTW, FAS does cover two handed sighted fire, but this was a threat focus course.
Saturday night we worked with WWII Combatives with Matt and knife with brownie. These we introductory sessions where we learned a handfull of simple and effective techniques.
Both Matt and brownie are very good at what they do. These sessions made me very interested in training with these two men again, but this time with the focus on combatives and knife.
Sunday morning we started in on Quick fire. 7677 taught this block of instruction. I have been following 7677 posts on a number of forums for over three years now and have learned quite a bit from him. Only tackdrivr has given me more usefull knowledge on the net. I was always a bit pissed off that he was an LEO only instructor, and I swore that if I had a chance that I would train with him.
Quick fire is a two handed threat focus shooting system. It works within the Modern Techniques default drawstroke and seems to be a threat focused solution to a Modern Techniques problem. Shots can be taken throughout the drawstroke, from when the hands come together, all the way to full extention. This is where zippering comes in. Whether you hands come together at abdomen level or at chest level you start getting hits at the compressed ready and continue to fire until extension.
The first shot at compressed ready is the key and the most difficult to get to hit, but with a little practice and the use of the centerline with HG parrallel to the ground, you will be good to go in short order. After that just punch forward while firing. A good four-five shot zipper is opimal with the first two hitting before your first shot on your default drawstroke would.
Sunday afternoon we started in with brownie and Quick Kill (QK). Let me get this out up front. Matt and 7677 have been teaching their stuff for free for years. I believe that I can freely discuss or teach their stuff as much as I want (with the proper credit). Out of respect for brownie, I will not be going into the specifics of QK. Everything that you need to know about the technique is already on this forum, search it. That will get you the concept. But, the concept is based on confidence. Without hands on instruction you will never get the full potential out of this technique. As brownie says "the only limiting factor is your mind."
For those of you that followed along as I was trying to figure QK out, you are probably wondering if I indeed, had figured it out. The answer is yes, I did. But that was not enough. Since it is based on confidence, finding out for a fact that I understood the technique and receiving hands on instruction and refinement really makes this technique shine. I can do things with QK that I am not capable of with deliberate sighted fire.
The technique excels when speed is the key factor. Speed of the shot, speed of your movement, and speed of your opponents movement. All the while giving you excellent accuracy and possible the very best accuracy possible when there is dynamic movement.
For anyone that has followed my writings or seen me train with dynamic movement, you know that I want to go way past the crab walk or the groucho walk. I want to make hits "on the run." I believe that this is an extremely neglected part of the skillset. I have been trying to figure out what the mental block is with so many of the HS/LD students and instructors. The only thing I can come up with is that they just can not get the hits "on the run."
And in comes QK! IMHO, without a doubt, this is the very best way to get hits while you are exploring your limitations of dynamic movement. If for just this one reason, I would recommend, in the strongest way possible, that you learn QK. If you think that getting hits without being hit is important...see brownie. If you think that a confrontation may include dynamic movement or shooting on the run....see brownie. If you think that getting hits on the run is a skill that you may need......yeah, you get the idea.
Damm good technique! I got to put it to use in FOF with mutual dynamic movement. Dude, it is a no brainer, it is like just reaching out and touching someone. It is actually so simple it's scary. With this skill, I will put my ability to makes hits "on the run" as my "greatest strength." That is a very reassuring fact!
Sunday evening was spent with more WWII combatives with Matt and stick work with brownie. Good stuff! I have got to get more training with these two on this.
Monday morning we had to do some catch up on QK, due to strong winds on Sunday afternoon. We banged away on steel with multiples and with dynamic movement. Brownie covered QK from the hip, firing to the rear without turning. Matt covered PSing with long guns. 7677 ran some FOF and went over the "Sight Continuum." There was a lot of different things going on, more than I will remember to write down.
All in all, it was an excellent three days of training. I will not go as far as saying it was the best course I've ever attended, but I will say this. This course gave me the most beneficial information that I have ever received in a course. Threat focus shooting is a skill that we all should own. You can train and train to go to the sights, but when the action is fast, the urgency is high, and you find yourself behind the reactionary curve you will either use threat focused shooting or you will die trying to get to your sights (credit given to 7677 for these words of wisdom.)
Sooo....You can either try to train away your natural reaction or except the fact that if someone is going to be trying to kill you, you will focus on the threat. Now if my front sight was trying to kill me, I would focus on that.
With that said, in a life threatening confrontation, there is nothing that I would rather see than a perfect sight picture on the threat. It is what I would want and what I would strive for. But if it ain't there......no problem!
http://www.politesociety.org/showthread.php?t=3112
