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Thread: AAR:Insights Close Quarters Confrontations w/ John Holschen, Issaquah, Wa (5/18-5/21)

  1. #1

    AAR:Insights Close Quarters Confrontations w/ John Holschen, Issaquah, Wa (5/18-5/21)

    Eight students, John Holschen, and several assistance instructors met up at the Issaquah Police Station at8am on Friday. John opened by saying that Close Quarters Confrontations was “about reality and about going from the square range to the real world”. Sometimes this may mean doing things non-optimally. “You can shoot faster than you can think. From beep to bang, you often don’t need to make an assessment” He explained further “That’s okay in competition but ignores reality”. If you’re worried about shaving hundredths of a second off your time, it’s probably not something practical.

    We next proceeded to a brief review of the four universal firearms handling rules ending with the statement that “This is the class you have the greatest opportunity to shoot yourself” He further explained that even in real life, when in close quarters people frequently become lax with things like muzzle discipline. He related one story in which he was training with a law enforcement agency. For the drill, the officer in a FIST suit was instructed to enter the room. As the officer entered, he was to approach John to speak with him. That’s all he knew of the scenario. As the officer approached, John brought up a bat he was holding at his side and started swinging at them. Almost a 1/3 of the officers had paint marks on them after the first run. None of the officers had simunitions guns, so they had shot themselves. After John realized what happened, he was able to get about 50% of the officers to shoot themselves. He was swinging downward at their arm and as they tried to ward off the blows while shooting, they were shooting their own arms.

    John also spoke to the fact that too many people train with gear and clothes they wouldn’t use in real life, things like civilians in drop leg holsters or wearing chest rigs with multiple magazines. If you’re training for fun, that’s fine, he continued, just be aware that’s what you’re doing. Instead, most of us should analyze our weapon usage and practice with gear that we’ll actually use in real life.

    John explained that he and Greg Hamilton have been working on this material since the early 1990’s and they have “reasonable answers to most questions”. Three big points to retention are:
    1. Retention needs to start to start before the bad guy has his hands on you.
    a. This includes awareness of your surroundings, posture, and other things that might call you out as a victim. It also means you’re not leaving the weapon “hanging out” where it can be grabbed
    2. It needs to allow lethal and non-lethal retention
    a. For example, none of the Lindell techniques, in which both he and Hamilton are certified, involve shooting DURING the struggle. That only comes after you’ve secured the weapon.
    3. Retention techniques need to work on demand not just on command.
    a. They can’t depend on a particular set-up

    We then paired off and started working on a techniques using dummy guns. The first drill was:
    1. Aim in at a partner with a blue gun
    2. Come back to the closest position you can while maintaining a full grip
    3. Ensure at all points the slide has enough clearance to cycle

    Next drill
    1. Partner raises one arm upward to shoot
    2. Move in line (not arc) towards the side
    a. Step first with the foot in the direction you’re moving
    b. It’s counterintuitive but if you step towards the assailant as you step out, you force them to move a greater number of degrees to come back on target than if you just move laterally

    The next drill was a retention drill:
    1. Partner has his hands on the gun/your wrists as you’re holding it with both hands
    2. Step into the gun strong
    a. Make sure you’re not pull the weapon. The gun should end up close into your chest
    3. Arc your non-dominant elbow up and over
    a. Come across both of your assailants arms, twisting with your pelvis
    4. Drop the elbow straight down and through
    a. You should come through both of your assailants arms
    b. If this does not remove his hands, twist the other direction bring the other elbow down and through in a mirror of the previous motion
    5. Bump
    a. Use your shoulder to bump the assailant
    6. Strike and draw
    a. Bringing your non-dominant hand, protecting your neck and base of your skull, holding your bent bicep/forearm tightly against your head and strike your opponent with your elbow by driving forward.
    b. Have your weapon anchored to your side, digging is slightly into your ribs and slightly canted outboard so the slide will clear your body.
    c. Keep your head down, essentially staring at his lower body/pelvis and shoot

    Retention if the attacker tries to grab you gun after you already have your hand on it
    1. Guns on you weapon while holstered
    2. Drop down rather than trying to pull weapon *out*
    3. Execute the CQB strike and fire from your side

    We then practiced firing at close quarters using SIRT pistols. From the ready position, raising the weapon slightly while still at ready. We then added to this by shooting from ready, then arcing around the opponent, keeping the weapon close to our chests while using body index to make hits (at only a few feet away). The SIRT helped demonstrate that it was possible to make fine hits at this distance without a sight picture.
    John shared that while he was initially lukewarm about the SIRT, he is no longer a big fan for most trainees to use them on their own as he feels it causes too much focus on the target. If used as a diagnosis tool with someone watching or in very specific applications such as this, he feels they can be useful.

    We then moved to disarms.
    1. Attacker points gun at chest
    2. Victim has hands up in surrender, arms slightly bent
    3. Swing into the left, coming into the attackers arm
    4. As you swing drop left hand down over the forearm, an inch back from the wrist. Your right hand should come up under the attacker’s hand, cupping his fingers and the handle/trigger guard of the pistol (don’t grab the barrel since for shorter pistols there might not be anything to grab)
    5. Pivot to you left, rotating the gun on a flat plant (as if under a table). If done correctly, the attackers shoulder should drop down.
    6. Drive downward (not out)
    7. As the attacker goes to the ground, keep control of his hand. Step under his shoulder and pull his arm upward, bracing it on the outside of your arm and twist the gun out of his hands violently
    a. Keep in mind f his finger is in the trigger guard this will break his finger and rip all the flesh off possibly interfering with weapon function.
    8. Step away as you release his hand
    a. If you release sooner than this he may grab your leg
    9. Draw your own weapon if present, otherwise tap-rack (and possibly cleaning off flesh/etc from the gun)

    If performing this on a left handed individual the initial motion is the same, i.e. is it NOT reversed or a mirror image of the right-handed technique.
    1. Swing to the left of his arm placing your left hand on top of his forearm just above the wrist and grasping his hand at the trigger guard with right hand
    2. Twist the gun in a flat plane (Now this will be bending it backwards instead of inward) to compromise the grip
    3. Point the gun upward and drive down
    4. Instead of going down as in the other technique the attacker will move forward so you will need to step to the side out of the way
    5. Once on the ground the remaining steps are the same

    We then practiced with the attacker from behind holding the gun at the back or head. You simple twist backward keeping close to the arm and the technique is other wise the same.

    Falling to the ground and drawing.
    1. Shoot the leg on which the gun is holstered straight out so you don’t flag it
    2. Roll slightly to the side so you can draw the weapon
    3. Bring the weapon over
    4. Fire
    5. Tuck the leg of the dominant side into the knee, roll upward to kneeling
    6. Stand, scan and holster or move if appropriate

    After the drills of falling and recovering, we concluded the first day.

    On day two, we started with a review of the various retention and disarming techniques we’d learned on day one, then proceeded to the range. John had us run through a number of drills to assess the skill level of class participants, including six slow fire shots, 2-on-1 drills, 1-on-2, and then using targets with multiple number targets to simulate a moving target.

    We then used live fire to practice the contact distance draw we’d been taught the previous day. We stood right next to the target, struck the target with the elbow, bringing the gun to the ‘lock’ position at the side and firing two rounds at the pelvis, move back then two round from the ready, move back, two rounds while aimed at the head.

    We spent much of the rest of the day doing a variety of drills combining things such as verbal commands and target to target transitions at close range, layering draws from concealment, and minor backward and lateral movement.

    On day three, we again reviewed what we’d been taught on the first two days. We spent a good bit of time on the same drills we’d done on day two, now adding a greater degree of movement. In general, John advocated against backward movement. He also made the point that if shooting and moving, “you should compromise your upper body to optimize your lower movement. Moving is more important than shooting.” Your hips should always be facing the direction you’re moving.

    Later in the day, John brought up the well-known Teuller drill. He explained that it’s frequently misinterpreted by police to mean that if the attacker is closer than 21 feet, you won’t have time to draw and shoot. The problem with this, he explained, is that the 1.5 draw and shoot time at 10 yards that led to the Teuller drill is for an aimed shot. This ignore that, one, the attacker is running toward you, so he’s closer than 10 yards and, two, as we’d all learned at this point, one doesn’t need to have an aimed shot from a full firing position to make hits at this distance. We paired off and experimented with the SIRT guns to see how far we did have to be away to be able to shoot the attacker before he reached us. Typically, this ended up at around 10 feet. Obviously, a shot or two in no way guarantees the attacker would stop, but it’s likely it would change things. When you add into this lateral movement, you have time to make even more hits.

    We ended day three with a discussion and practice of disarms from various other positions, including within vehicles. We also practiced the core techniques again. All in all, it was a good class, with a little extra practice, I would feel confident enough to use the disarm techniques and far more confident about my ability to retain my weapon at close distances. Thanks to all the other students, John, and the other instructors for making it a fun and productive three days.

    Didn't take any photos and only a handful of video with a Contour on my ear pro. This is from day three. Draw from concealment with movement:
    http://youtu.be/vu__Q9i9YaI

  2. #2
    Excellent review!


    Sent from my 300 baud modem

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