AAR CTT solutions - Basic rifle

First off I'm new to this so I apologize for any mistakes.

AAR – CTT Solutions Basic Rifle
May 22, 2016
Host: Alias Training through SMGLee
Location: Prado Olympic Shooting park
Instructor: Mike Pannone
Rifle: CA compliant featureless Franken build – BCM upper 16” midlength light weight with VTAC free float. POF USA muzzle brake, Diamond head back up sights, Vortex Sparc 2, Magpul carbine fixed stock, solar tactical kydex. RRA – lower parts kit, spikes tactical lower (this is the first rifle I ever built back in college that I never really used except for ~1000 rds (brass cased ammunition of various manufactures – wolf, pmc, remingington umc, fiocchi) through it on an intermittent basis). Frank Proctor Sling
Belt: HSGI Duty belt
Mag pouch: HSGI taco
Dump pouch: HSGI belt mount
Ammo: Wolf classic steel case ammo for 500 rds, Wolf Gold 200 rds. class requirement only 500 rounds, but I used extra rounds during the competitive strings.

Safety brief: big boy rules, don’t do dumb shit with guns, don’t point guns where they don’t need to be pointed. 4 gun rules.

General description of the class some extra detail other aspects left out (train with Mike Pannone)

Began the class with 50 yard zero on NRA b8 targets. Irons were not explicitly zeroed and as far as I could tell no one was running with Irons only. My optic was previously zeroed 3 days prior to the class and my irons were co-witnessed at that time as well, at 50 yards. Rate limiting step was I suck. We started with a 5 round zero, my hits initially to the right. Adjusted the optic one click to the left and I was on – after that anything out was user error.
Once the dots were zeroed – we went up to the 5 yard line and did offset zeroing. We drew on circles and triangles. We shot the shapes and of course we could see our offset. This was followed by a 2-1 drill where we did 2 to the center in a hammer pair fashion followed by a shot into the shape, not only did this get the speed aspect going but we also were forced to get our offset into the shape, each shape was serviced in this 2-1 fashion as well as the uspsa head a-box. Then the fun part started with weak/other strong/other side non-dominant side shooting, and of course everything for me opened up. However this was a great opportunity to really settle me down to focus, and eventually the speed picked up but more importantly the accuracy/grouping improved. Then we did shoulder transitions with the same drills as noted above. Mike’s philosophy is by continuously adding content at the tempo we were going we would learn more quickly (personally I appreciate this method).

We broke for lunch and after wards we did another b8 50. My group was in the upper right corner of the bull. He took this moment to let us know that depending on the light exposure (i.e. lighting conditions) our perceived location of the dot would be off (this is something I had never heard before and hopefully I’m phrasing it correctly).

We did position drills at the 50. Standing-kneeling-prone-kneeling-standing. 3 shots in each position. Obviously my groups opened up in fact they were all over the place. Somewhere along the way I realized that I had to slow it down and get back to fundamentals. I really had to focus on the sights-trigger press. Once my inner child’s need to go fast was subdued the groups went back in the black. We did support side shooting as well in the various positions and my groups moved to the right (left hand shooting). Instead of going pew pew I focused and got back to the fundamentals and I was back in the black (with the support side).

Steel targets came out and now were shooting against each other. Position drill as described above against another shooter. This was a good opportunity to see that speed kills. Again I wanted to go fast but the lack of hits don’t lie – go fast when you can, slow down, make the hits.

At the end of the primary shooting instruciton we did 2 more b8 targets now with 10 shot groups. One dominant hand shooting and one non-dominant. Before the string I reminded my self to slow down, and focus the fundamentals. At the end both targets all in the X to 9 ring – for me this was a huge improvement of the day and all I needed to do was listen to the professional and do what he said (who would have thought?).

By this point many people were just about tapped out on ammo. So with limited rounds left we focused on malfunctions and specifically the bolt over-ride drill video on youtube. I learned a valuable lesson – steel case ammunition was not my friend for this part of the day. Wolf is cheap and went bang every time and I had no malfunctions for 500 rounds, but steel doesn’t bend like brass and well it was a really MFer to clear it. Right as we I created the malfunction and then somewhere along the way Mike said steel case is not ideal for this…too late…I told him about the amoo and he said “Sucks to be you bro”. I’m glad he let me struggle with the malfunction, ultimately I needed use a mortaring technique which he showed me after I failed miserably to get clear the malfunction with the standard clearing operation. I switched over to the brass ammo that I brought with me and it went down as advertised in regards to clearing. I also learned that I would probably like a larger/extended charging handle in the future.

As a new guy in the training world I learned a ton. I have minimal experience with Rifles and I felt as though Mike really layered the content (a one day class – lots of stacking). Thankfully I’m used to this form of education and I benefitted from it.


Mike answered everyone's questions basically on demand. He also came up to me (while i was loading mags) and we had a chat about steel case ammo and extractor wear. He said that a lot of people say that there are chamber issues but in reallity the extractors are the issue. To sum it up if I used steel cased ammo the extractor would probably wear out 70% faster (hope i'm paraphrasing correctly). He also said that in his experience Colt extractors seem to last the longest. he also said that if i planned to used steel case ammo in the future I should have an extra one and a trianing one for when it breaks.

We had one students rifle have a pmag really jammed in the rifle, Mike gathered use all around to show us the differnece in polymer mags vs GI mags. basically the polymer tab that helps lock the mag in place can shave off and make the mag really get in there when the bolt is open, so he generally recommends GI mags.

Lesson’s learned: the whole class. Some specifics: steel case ammo is cheap but not my friend. I want an extended charging handle now (the malfunction drill showed me that it would help to get a large purchase with my hands had this happen again). Maintaining a focus is crucial in all walks a life. And given that I like shooting a lot and my inner child wants to take over I have to really force it. Keep an open mind and understand that I don’t know what I don’t know. Seek out professional, vetted instruction.

Overall Mike is an amazing instructor and I hope I can take more classes with him.