Weaver: Well Entrenched, but Perhaps Detrimental?

[shooter503]

Vern,

A lot of range time is spent firing from a Weaver or other stance. However, most combat instruction suggests that you should gain some sort of cover, either protection or concealment. There is NO TRUE Weaver stance that can be used safely behind cover. Think about it, by definition this would involve exposing some large, vital, part of your body to returned fire. Now, if you want to talk about MODIFIED Weaver stance that is different but how "modified" do you want to get? Please explain to me how a "slightly modified" Weaver stance can be used lying on the floor (which may be a heck of a good place to be).

I cannot give you a perfect stance that works in all these situations. As I said, that is the whole point I am trying to make. There is no single stance that is going to work in all situations so practice accordingly. My personal set up is to build an obstacle course on the range and take shots stepping over, or climbing on and off, boxes and mini-stairways.

In case you think I am way out of line:

In shooting from behind a barracade such as the side of a building or the edge of a doorway, the shooter places his feet in what appears to be an unbalanced position in order to secure as much protection from the barracade as possible.

That quote is from a police training book of 1978. (Combat Shooting for Police by Paul B. Weston).

 

[Vern Humphrey]

All stances require adaptation to use various kinds of cover. There is no perfect stance. But the Weaver works as well as any other, and is a good general shooting stance.

I note one thing here -- defenders of things like point shooting are quick to point out that you can adapt point shooting for various situations, use the sights, and so on, but want those who use the Weaver to be restricted only to the classic, "pure" Weaver stance.

 

[shooter503]

Hey Redneck - where's your ranch?

I think the problem here, and it has been deeply discussed in other threads, is that individuals tend to draw a divide between aimed and point shooting.

On paper, point shooting is point shooting, aimed shooting is aimed shooting. In reality aimed shooting fades into point shooting in a fairly smooth sequence. There is point shooting using just muscle memory, there is point shooting using unconcious gun alignment with the gun below line of sight. There is point shooting using the frame of the gun as a sight with the gun at near eye-level. There is "snap" sight shooting and finally varieties of aimed fire. All of these are valid techniques under certain circumstances and with certain shooters. Some shooters are better with some techniques than with others. We need to firmly establish that the only important technique is the one that succeeds on the day. There is no really practical way of confirming which technique is the "best".

 

[shooter503]

The Weaver method is the method that imparts skills that do not deteriorate as quickly as other methods.

All stances require adaptation to use various kinds of cover. There is no perfect stance. But the Weaver works as well as any other, and is a good general shooting stance.

Vern, you can't have it both ways. You start by implying the Weaver is the only way then change to saying the Weaver requires adaption to use with various kinds of cover. However, with reservations I now agree with you.

As far as the Weaver stance goes. You need a fixed reference for initial training, a stance. At some point, as soon as you are comfortable with your shooting, de-emphasize it. There are not many situations where you will be able to adopt a classic stance in practice so practice from a variety of standing positions. I suspect the NYPD versus LAPD hit numbers bear no true relation to what sort of stance is used in training.

I do not care what stance is used in basic training. It will probably be Weaver or Isoceles. As I said in my earlier post, when you are comfortable, the stance should be "de-emphasised". Note, I did not say forgotten. There are going to be opportunities to use a Weaver but far, far, more to use a modified Weaver- and many occasions where you will use no "stance"at all.

 

[Vern Humphrey]

Vern, you can't have it both ways. You start by implying the Weaver is the only way then change to saying the Weaver requires adaption to use with various kinds of cover. However, with reservations I now agree with you.

How do I "imply" that?

The Weaver stance is a sighted stance, with solid control. In the absense of any specific scenario (and there was none originally specified), it is the best choice. When you introduce other elements, any stance must be modified. The Weaver is a superb base for such modification.

 

[Jeff White]

shooter503 said;

I will agree with Skyguy on one point. There is a reversion to previously learned techniques, or no technique at all (panic), unless the latest training regime is deep enough to erase all previous learned techniques. It is not unheard of for people to revert to ideas they learned in their mid-20s in the face of shock, rather than to use the training they received 6 months ago in their 50s. Fact of life I suppose.

I have seen people revert back to previously learned habits under stress. I chalk that up to insufficient training on the new techniques. Which brings up another point. When is a new technique so good that it's worth unlearning an old technique and learning the new one? This is especially true in law enforcement firearms training. Someone attends a new school and comes back to their agency and attempts to mandate everyone change over to the new and improved technique. A good example is the use of the slide stop vs. using the slide. When our dept transitioned from revolvers to semi-autos back in 92, the transition course had everyone using tthe slide stop on the new issued SW 5906s. This was easy for those of us who had been shooting autos for years and the guys with little or no experience with autos picked it up just fine. Fast forward 5 years. One of the firearms instructors attended a course and came back and decreed that from here on out we would never use the slide stop again. You can imagine the fumbling around as people tried to do something differently then they had been doing it for years. This was especially true of those officers who only fired their weapons the three times a year the department mandated range time. In 2000 a switch to Glock 21s as an issue weapon pretty much made all of us learn to run the slide instead of using the slide stop.

The point of this long disseration is, that if you don't spend sufficient time training on any new technique, you will default to the old way under stress. Instructors need to be certain they allow sufficient training time as part of introducing any new technique or they can't expect their students to use it under stress. And they also shouldn't be so rigid as to require a change to a new technique if it doesn't offer a significant improvement over the old way of doing things. You can talk gross and fine motor movements all day long, but I will assert that the guy who has 10K repetions of dropping the slide with the slide stop is not going to miss the slide stop under stress and he will probably fumble the reload if he only has 150 reps of sweeping the top fo the slide. The only reason you need to mandate a change like that is when you change to a different platform that makes it problematic for anyone to hit the slide stop because of the poor ergonomics of the weapon. And once you change, you absolutely must program sufficient training time to learn the new technique. That's why people fight with the TTPs they were trained best on, not necessarily the ones they trained on last.

As for stance, I've been shooting from a sort of boxer's stance that keeps me more square to the threat ( body armor coverage is best from the front). Its sort of like weaver in that sometimes the strong foot is back 6 or 8 inches. It slight crouch gives you good balance and mobility. I also train to shoot from some very unconventional positions. The grip and arm position is pretty much straight weaver.

Jeff

 

[shooter503]

Vern,

You said:

The Weaver method is the method that imparts skills that do not deteriorate as quickly as other methods.

That is a pretty strong implication. OK you said, flatout, that the Weaver "is the method", the bold face type was in your original post.

The Weaver stance is a sighted stance, with solid control. In the absense of any specific scenario (and there was none originally specified), it is the best choice.

In just the same way that there was no specific scenario to use the Weaver position there was no specification that you must use the sights (I just checked several references to confirm this). Because of the period when the Weaver was developed the assumption was that sighted fire would be used (we were still in the old 7 yard minimum shooting distance mentality) but there was no indication that sighted fire must be used as part of the technique.

 

[Mad Magyar]

Competitive shooters would love to put every round within an inch of the aim point at 15 yds. To paraphrase one of the last messages from Col. Cooper, "If that is the object of the lesson then it is successful".
However, in combat, I define the "kill zone" as anywhere form the base of the throat down to the lower abdominal area, or within about seven to eight inches across the center area of the torso within that span. Two quick hits in this zone can be accomplished w/o the need for sights or two-hands...
I agree about the need for practice in any form or style...I am disillusioned with my friends who "talk a good game"; but find every excuse for not going out regularly.:banghead:
It seems at this point that a consensus is developing about a lack of training and individual reactions to stress.

Art, I like your style....
Shooter, real good point..There is an article currently out about "trigger flinching", and it states: We are born with two fears: Falling & Loud Noises....

 

[shooter503]

Jeff,

A slightly amusing example of pre-conditioning happened to me on a training course. We were practising malfunction drills. When it came to the "tap" rack" bit, one of the instructors jumped on me with both feet because I turned my pistol to the wrong side when I did the "rack".

When he had finished berating me as an idiot I pointed out that the extractor on my pistol was on the LEFT side of the slide not the "normal" side (P38).

MM
As a small example of conditioning have you ever been duck shooting? The first few times someone has a shotgun blast off four feet from their head when they don't expect it they jump four feet into the air. After a lot of duck activity I have actually heard someone who was sharing a blind with another shooter ask that other shooter if he had got a shot. They were actually four feet apart but one fellow did not notice if his partner was shooting. That's what conditioning will do.

 

[Art Eatman]

What I've always liked about the Weaver-ish stance is that it's enough like a boxer's that you can spin off to the side, or down, to use cover. Easy to practice not being upright and shot. The isometric hold allows rapid shots on different targets, if necessary, via the control over recoil.

I just never figured on this Hollywood-movie shootout thing. What I want, if possible, is to get behind something and make my play from there. If it's really way up close and personal, I figure on shooting as soon as I can get into action, and that's most likely with one hand and from down around my hip. No two-handed anything, no sights.

There isn't any such thing as, "One size fits all."

Me, personally? I'm a "Used to be." Arthritis in the shoulders, the back hurts and all that old-age stuff. Coffee and four Aleve for breakfast makes for a less-pain day. But in my recent CHL renewal, even my worst shots hit inside the ribcage. 50 rounds, five to twenty-five yards. I shot way inside the time limits on each round, on purpose. My right shoulder was on fire when I was done. But I made it.

IMO, learn to shoot well with either hand and with both hands. Practice shooting while moving and adapting to various scenarios without getting all hung up on "style". There are no prizes for style.

Art

 

[Sam]

Art gets the prize for most realistic answer.

For those of you who have been involved in social discourse with firearms, ask any of the people who witnessed it what stance you were using.

The answers will be enlightening.



Sam

 

[Harold Mayo]

Read the article by Paul Howe and take a look at his background. It's kinda hard to argue with a guy that's spent his entire life not just PRACTICING for a fight but who has actually DONE it and come back and trained based on lessons learned...and not only once but time and time again. Lots of times through the OODA loop should give some pretty good results...

 

[Sam]

Got a link?

Sam

 

[Harold Mayo]

Up above...fourth post

 

[Sam]

I won't comment on Mr Howe's experience, I will just reiterate, ask someone who watched the fight what happened and how.

Seen a few trained folks in "discussion' and they wern't doing anything they were trained to do in the way of stance. Very dew were using their training in much of anything else either.


Folks that trained a whole lot performed differently but Still not always in accordance with their training.

Sam

 

[Harold Mayo]

To each his own. I'll debate a lot of things with a lot of people but Howe would not be one of them that I would debate on this particular topic.

 

[Jeff White]

Sam,
Are you suggesting that because some people don't do as they have been trained under stress that training is a futile endeavor?

Isn't your background Air Force? Where would the Air Force be if they hadn't decided they needed to go back to school to relearn to dog fight in the late 60s and early 70s?

If people be the soldiers, pilots or cops don't perform under stress as they have been trained, isn't that a clue that it's time to look at your training to see if it was relevant for preparing the people to accomplish the task you wanted them to, or to see if it was conducted to standard? Don't you guys do after action reviews after every engagement and retrain or make changes to your training program as necessary?

Training is a continuous program. It's never complete. The key to an effective training program is the after action review where you identify what went right and what went wrong and then modify your training program to correct any deficiencies.

Jeff

 

[Sam]

Not at al Jeff, just that few people are really that well trained.

Me, I was trained to shoot Weaver and it was beat into my head to a point of numbness along with a lot of other stuff. I will guestimate 800 hrs of supervised training on teh range. In matches and contrived shooting, I still shoot that way.

On social ocassions, my buds have assured me that I ended up looking like Joe Benner on the line at Helsinki Almost infamous for it in my circle (I do not put my off hand in my back pocket, but straight up 1 handed is how it was told to me). Some of that may come from outside influences and circumstances on the spot. Personally I never remember how I moved or stood although I remember taking deliberate aim.
Guess I'm just lucky.

Added:
AARs are done afterr every engagement, air and ground. Air is easy, you have tapes, on the ground we never had a videographer available. You have to go on teeh recollection of the persons involved, and involved persons are seldom (never) good at relaying all the details of the action. Only really profound actions get remembered.

Sam

 

[SkyGuy]

In times of great SNS overload we will not default to training, we will default to instinctive survival reactions. Best to include that in training because one will likely fight for their life that way. (see graph below)

Here's some wisdom from Ralph Mroz...the Director of Training...at the Police Officers Safety Association:

"This 'training' often works as planned when we have control of the real-life situation, such as with warrant executions and HR entries. But all too often we see operators not able to execute trained skills when they lose control of the situation.
In these cases they simply revert back to whatever Mother Nature allows them to do in the state of SNS over-ride.

In a many real life encounters we will be in the severely debilitated state of SNS over-ride. In FoF training, we are training people not to enter this undesirable state. Therefore, we cannot claim that because a technique holds up in FoF training that it will be reliable-or even possible-in a real-life encounter.

In a state of SNS override, we have no conscious control over our responses, and we are completely at the mercy of Mother Nature's genetically programmed reactions. In a state of SNS override we cannot help but lose fine motor control, we cannot help but look at the threat (not our sights), we cannot help but crouch, and we may not even be able to move (we may freeze in place.)
One of the things that's often not understood is that this pattern holds true for each and every one of us.

Regardless of training level, the more stress we are under, the greater the SNS dominance, and thus the less voluntary control we have over our physiological mechanisms and even muscle control.

Training does not overcome the tendency towards SNS override as the stress we are exposed to increases. The most highly trained operator in the world will target focus, freeze in place, and become incapable of anything but gross movements if placed under enough stress."

.

 

[Sam]

I ain't never been "in control".
Sam

 

[shooter503]

Good posts Jeff and Sam.

I think we can say that the problem is in the depth of training. Economics is a big part of this but the basic ability of the trainee and their attitude is a factor too. Some people are just more keen and they catch on faster than others.

An institutional training course that has a high throughput of trainees is not usually designed to provide individualised training to each student. If that institute has cost constraints it usually trains everyone to a minimum acceptable level, that saves money. The result is that some people barely make the grade, others pass easily. It is not economic to design the training so that everyone can make a high grade. If you do that money is wasted "over training" the capable people.

The result of this training is predictable. Some people will react according to their training under stress, others will revert to their virtually untrained state.

 

[shooter503]

Skyguy,

Training does not overcome the tendency towards SNS override as the stress we are exposed to increases. The most highly trained operator in the world will target focus, freeze in place, and become incapable of anything but gross movements if placed under enough stress."

Total BS. Have you never heard the cockpit voice recording of the test pilot who lost control of a prototype of an early commercial jet airliner (It was not pilot error, this was in the days before airplanes first flew in computer programs, the aircraft had a severe flight characteristic problem)?

He KNEW they were about to die but the pilot tried every trick he could think of to recover the situation before they hit the ground. The amazing thing is, not only did he try to recover, he calmly described all of his actions on the aircraft voice recorder so that the pilots following him would fully understand what had gone wrong.

I am getting the feeling that a lot of the people you quote did their research from their computer keyboards.

 

[Mad Magyar]

Kind of a side-note, but I noticed Dave Spaulding while thinly disguising his promoting of the "Rotator target" stand in the latest issue of Handguns; divides the instructor camps into two categories. 1st, those instructors who attend all the camps, read all the material on drills; but have no "firefight" experience, to those who have "firefight experience", like himself, however limited...He discredits the former as "Research Gurus".
I'm not sure that is fair....Even a guy like Mr. Ayoob, who admits to having not been in a firefight, but has drawn his weapon & used a verbal command to halt a threat would be considered not much of an authority...I must admit a leaning toward what a Chuck Taylor has to say then some of the others w/o such credentials.
However, Spaulding does have some good ideas of making the practice scenarios as realistic as possible..Stationary targets are strictly a "no-no".
BTW, he admits to teaching "point shooting" but insists on using sights at all times...

 

[shooter503]

MM, It is an unfortunate thing but the guys who have been there and done that do not always make the best instructors. Mr. Spaulding may know journalism but he apparently knows nothing about instruction. He seems to be working hard to justify his own situation.

Instructing in a skill requires (amongst other things):
A level of proficiency in the skill, otherwise you totally lack credibility with the student.
An understanding of the practical application of the skill so that you can point out that application to the student.
The ability to pass on your knowledge, to be an effective instructor.
The ability to assess the students progress and errors.
The ability to frame alternative instructional routines (ie if the student does not get the message one way find another way to explain).
The ability to create a "learning environment" (difficult to explain).

Practical experience is a great benefit to an instructor but, unless the instructor continues on with the students tactical training, not an essential. The important thing is that the instructor must have skill and be able to pass that skill on to the student. Ask yourself, does a coach in high school athletics need to have played in the Majors? That same coach can produce winning athletes. A really great instructor is the one who rejoices that he has taught his student to be better than he is.

I am talking at the institutional level now. I think the majority of experienced people make superb instructors. Unfortunately, there is a proportion of experienced people who are useless. They waste time BS'ing, some have ego trips, they can't teach and revert to yelling at students instead of working with them etc etc. The most obnoxious types are the ones who keep implying to the students that they will never be as good as he himself was.

An interesting point is that, in a competition on a range, many instructors will probably outshoot any line officer. The reason, of course, is that the instructors spend all their time on the range shooting targets whereas the line personel only visit the range occasionally.


Frankly, I would put no more credibility in the opinion of gun journalists than I would any other journalist.

 

[Tim Burke]

In a state of SNS override, we have no conscious control over our responses, and we are completely at the mercy of Mother Nature's genetically programmed reactions. In a state of SNS override we cannot help but lose fine motor control, we cannot help but look at the threat (not our sights), we cannot help but crouch, and we may not even be able to move (we may freeze in place.)

I will assume, for sake of discussion, that this is correct.
It is clear from the graph that trained people can go further than the untrained before "losing control." So clearly there is utility in training. OTOH, since once we lose control, we are at the mercy of genetically programmed reactions, there is no point in training for that state, as it is pointless. There is no need to target our training toward the panic state, since our training is useless then anyhow.
The fact that our training requires fine motor coordination is not a hindrance, since our training is only going to be utilized when we are in control. Obviously our training ought to be targeted toward allowing us to remain in control under ever increasing levels of stress. I don't see how training that is designed to replicate the panic state does that.