Originally Posted by
EricM
It's clear that Gabe has put just as much effort into this class as he has into his own training. He was very well-prepared for the lecture segments and is an excellent speaker. Drills/tests were well-organized with clear purpose, and run very efficiently -- when targets were to be changed/taped was planned in advance and communicated clearly, negative taping was used when appropriate, etc. He instantly made adjustments to minimize the impact of some bad weather on our training. Everything in the class was structured for effective learning, practice, refinement, and pressure testing (scored tests/competitive exercises).
Much of the material on Day 1 would be familiar to those who have been following Gabe online for several years. That's not a bad thing in the least; it was really impressive that he's condensed so much of what I've picked up here over the past 5 years on this forum into one day of class. And there were multiple things that, while familiar, were expressed in a new way, or that I perceived now a little differently. In my opening post of this journal, for example, I referenced a quote from Bruce Lee: "Before I learned the art, a punch was just a punch, and a kick, just a kick. After I learned the art, a punch was no longer a punch, a kick, no longer a kick. Now that I understand the art, a punch is just a punch and a kick is just a kick." The journey described in that quote is a big part of what drives me. In class, Gabe explained it this way: if you're an untrained person, you just "do things"...poorly (like draw a gun, or whatever). With some training, you experience the "burden of technique" (love that term!). Achieving automaticity (look up John Hearne's posts and podcasts), you come full circle to where you again "just do it", but now with speed, reliability, and precision. "Shooting without doubt."
Range time on Day 1 centered around the draw and the first two tests of Gabe's standards, the Bill Drill and Failure to Stop. I was frustrated with my performance, with only 1/4 runs at the light pin level. I think I had one C on each of my Bill Drills, and may have been a few tenths too slow for that to matter anyway, I can't recall for sure. I thought during my outdoor range trip last weekend I'd finally pushed through that, but it remains a weakness. Plenty of the practice runs felt good, but I think I had passed my personal point of optimal performance...sometimes it becomes really hard to run the trigger fast enough. It doesn't have anything to do with the DA pull and can happen even in dry fire with my Glock...say I have an array of 5 targets, and with LASR I'm practicing 2 shots each with quick transitions, it doesn't take too many back-to-back runs before my trigger finger starts to get sluggish and out of time with what my eyes and mind are wanting it to do. Whether it was the cooler temperatures, more intense mental focus, or just having more sleep, I fortunately shot better on Day 2, going 4/4 to earn a light pin.
It would have been worth the trip and the cost of the class just for the movement and cover sections on Day 2. We've all seen Gabe's videos where he explodes laterally while drawing and gets impossibly good hits. I've never attempted anything like that, sure it looked like a good skill to have but there are so many other things I need to work on...hmmm, kinda sounds like an excuse to stay in my comfort zone. Gabe broke this complex drill down to its elements and then worked individually with each student on a USPSA target around 5 yards or so. I was absolutely stunned at what I was able to achieve in a very short period of time. No doubt I'll be working on it for the rest of my life..."learn to love the process", as Gabe would say, and in this case the process was pretty damn fun. We later did some competitive exercises with each student exploding in the opposite direction from center trying to hit their own piece of steel first, and I did reasonably well, getting a lot of first-round hits.
The cover section was also extremely valuable. Not having a military background or anything, the details of how to utilize cover and movement, taking into account human performance factors, were completely new to me. Gabe discussed several different ways an engagement could evolve and how to achieve or maintain an advantage. Ultimately it forms sort of a system where you know what options you have and how/when to choose between them. He emphasized the importance of "fluid use of cover" freeing you to take in and process more information, enabling you to make split second decisions at moments of opportunity and remain aware of what your adversary may be doing. As with everything throughout the class, we did multiple drills that you could easily set up yourself for practice. Sure, the odds of becoming involved in a protracted engagement are low for an armed citizen, but I shudder to think of how utterly unprepared I would have been in this regard. To me this rises to the level of stuff anyone who carries a gun needs to know.
I'm very glad to have attended this class, many thanks to Gabe for taking the time to come out and to Spencer for hosting. Really solid group of students too, hope to see you all again next time.