I’ve written a number of posts on training, including classes that use force-on-force, which elaborated on some of the most effective forms of self-defense training available to civilians today. In response, there always seems to be a commenter or two criticizing civilian firearms training for a host of reasons. One went as far as to call me an unscrupulous a-hole collecting a ton of money teaching pure, unadulterated, uh, merde.
I had a chuckle. Who was it who said that it’s better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt? Oh yeah, Mark Twain.
One said he didn’t trust firearms trainers/”dumbass mall ninjas” and that he’s too much of a cheap-ass to pay thousands of dollars and devote weeks of time to training. “‘Untrained’ people have perfectly good DGU’s all the time,” he wrote. “It seems to me that most of this stuff is a solution in want of a problem and it’s hellishly expensive in many cases.”
Let’s discuss some of that with an eye towards America’s newer gun owners.
Time and money
First off, you don’t need to spend thousands or devote weeks of time to training in order to develop more competence and confidence than the average person at shooting, while going a long way toward keeping yourself out of the crime victim pool.
There are thousands of experienced NRA and other instructors across America who provide competent training for very affordable rates. Most Americans — including non-gun owners — would benefit from taking an NRA course or two. While these courses aren’t really thought of as the slick, high-speed, low-drag stuff that Walter Mitty-types with an extra-thick man-card want, they provide real value and good basic fundamentals to build upon.
In reality, the things you learn at basic NRA and other classes really are high-speed, low-drag in that most HS/LD is really nothing more than the fundamentals executed very well with minimal wasted movement (and without thinking about how to do it which we call “unconscious competence”).
In fact, a single, high-quality class over a weekend — taught by some of those NRA-certified instructors — will often get even the greenest of noobs shooting somewhere on par with some police officers. That same class, for a more accomplished shooter, will eliminate wasted movements and tighten their groups.
Average cost to pull a trigger as well as some cops? Maybe $150 to $300, depending on location and range availability. A better class will also include lectures on how to avoid becoming a victim at home and in public, the proper care and feeding of your guns and legal considerations to using deadly force justifiably in self-defense.
You can learn the same things from nationally known trainers like John and Vicky Farnam for about twice as much for the same two-day class. The Farnams and their adjunct staff know their stuff and you’re paying a premium in part for their reputation, not because they’re going to teach you something from a “Mystical Order of the Secret Stuff.” I use the Farnams merely as an example. There are more than a few other very good instructors of the same high caliber…pun intended.
Again, in most parts of the country, you can get more affordable and more local options from NRA instructors. Be cautious and seek out referrals or recommendations from people you know and trust to avoid disappointment.
Most NRA trainers are competent and many teach for mostly altruistic reasons. Some are better than others and word of mouth will help you find them. Insider information: There’s not a lot of money in training, especially where trainers are using “team teaching” with a group of instructors as opposed to one person trying to run a class by themselves.
Project Appleseed is an even better bargain than NRA classes. For about a hundred bucks and 800 rounds of .22 ammunition, you and your kid can get a weekend of solid training on firearm safety, the fundamentals of rifle marksmanship and some American history at an Appleseed rifle event…and they’ll give each of you a t-shirt on top of that.
Appleseed instructors, regardless of the color of their hat, are pretty much range from good to excellent and the only variable is the ratio of instructors to students at any given event. They (actually “we” as I’m an Appleseed Instructor-in-Training) will teach you how to become a rifleman.
Shooting the “Rifleman” standard doesn’t usually happen on your first outing, but it does for some. It took me three years of frustration, bruises and practice before it all came together. Today, I shoot Rifleman (at least 210 of 250) in my sleep and you can too, but probably not without some training and practice.
Other outstanding groups also offer similar training, including the United States Rifleman’s Association and Revere’s Riders.
Formal training is good training
I’ve trained under scores of instructors ranging from local NRA people to regional trainers to some of the most famous names in civilian training – Ayoob, Tarani, Rogers (God rest his soul), Farnam, Grossman and plenty more. I’ve also watched plenty of training videos ranging from very good and slickly produced (the old Magpul series) to the snooze-fests.
The bottom line: even a mediocre training class is better than the best training video. Here’s why: with a class, you have someone who knows what they are doing critiquing your technique, pointing out any bad habits you as the student might be exhibiting during live fire, and helping you improve your skill set.
I’ve trained thousands of kids and adults over the years, and there are darn few people walking into classes without aspects of their shooting they can improve upon. Most people need help internalizing basic safety protocols including muzzle control and keeping their cotton-pickin’ fingers off the trigger before we begin tackling the fundamentals of good shooting.
Yes, the men are usually the more challenging students. It’s sometimes why their wives or girlfriends (or both) out-shoot them towards the end of class…the women are usually more inclined to listen to instruction and leave preconceived notions behind.
Untrained people have perfectly good DGU’s all the time
Yes, :untrained people do have perfectly good defensive gun uses all the time.” And if you Google “rejected self-defense claims“, you’ll get millions of hits, most of them from people who thought they were acting legally in using deadly force. But they weren’t.
You, as a gun owner, need to know the legal standard by which you will be judged so that you can act accordingly. If you haven’t had training in the justifiable use of deadly force, then you can unwittingly find yourself in a heap of trouble.
Look at the man pictured at the top of the page. His name is Orville Wollard III and the Miami Herald sums up his case this way . . .
…Mr. Wollard is serving 20 years in a state prison for firing a warning shot inside his home to scare away his teenage daughter’s unwelcome 17-year-old boyfriend; the shot was meant to scare the teen, and no one was hurt. But the use of the gun triggered the state’s mandatory-minimum sentencing. Mr. Wollard was convicted of aggravated assault with a firearm, and a judge had no choice but to throw the book at him.
And there are others. In Pennsylvania, a carry permit holder intervened in a spat over reserved church seating. After getting punched, the carrier drew and fired two rounds, killing the other man. Dollars to donuts Mr. Permit Holder saved himself a weekend and a few bucks by not getting any training…after all, “untrained” people have perfectly good DGUs all the time. And it cost him his life as a good citizen, his livelihood and his reputation.
I’ve had first-hand experience with an untrained good guy getting jammed up in the criminal justice system. In my role as president of Guns Save Life, I’ve received all manner of calls, including people needing help or wanting to tap GSL’s legal defense fund.
One such call came from a member who found himself facing prison time for using his handgun to hold the grandson of our then-Congressman for skipping on a cab fare until sheriff’s deputies arrived. It took place at 2:30 in the morning in a small Illinois town.
The GSL member, also named John, got a plea bargain offer to avoid prison, but it involved taking a felony charge, serving time in the county jail, a fine, a couple hundred hours of public service and forfeiture of his gun rights. John didn’t have a lot of money and he dreaded the felony, but he dreaded prison a lot more. He thought his goose was cooked.
I coached him on better articulating the threat he faced (the crook threatened to kill John if he wouldn’t let him go, the punk wouldn’t show his concealed hands in the low light, and a few other things). He took that back to his attorney along with a check from Guns Save Life. Six months later, John called with good news: The charges had been dropped, he got his gun back and his attorney sent the check – uncashed – back to GSL.
But if John had taken a class, he might have known better how to articulate the threat and saved himself a lot of time, stress, grief and expense… or avoided it in the first place. If he hadn’t been a GSL member and hadn’t called me, he might be a former gun owner, for life.
Losing in court is the second consideration in critical incidents. If you ever find yourself getting served a crap sandwich in the form of a deadly confrontation with a violent criminal predator, you will have the rest of your life to consider the pros and cons of your training experience or lack thereof.
Rob Pincus has talked and written about what untrained gun owners do in a critical incident. They observe, orient, decide, and act. While good old American ingenuity and improvisational skills are good, Pincus writes, “we are better when we’ve trained realistically to respond efficiently.” Agreed. Responding efficiently in a tactically sound manner almost always trumps dumb luck and improvisation.
Take the case of the crossfit gym owner T.J. Antell. He went to the aid of a woman screaming for help after she had been shot. As a carry permit holder in Texas, he’d taken a short firearms training class to get his carry license.
However, in a perfect storm of poor tactics, he ended up getting himself killed in a Walgreen’s parking lot. Mr. Antell accessed his gun, pursued the bad guy who had broken off the confrontation, approached the suspect, and was then shot in the head.
If Mr. Antell, a former Marine, had spent a weekend and a few hundred bucks on tuition and ammo for a good class, there’s an excellent chance he’d be with us today. With training, your likelihood of success in self-defense situations increases dramatically.
It’s up to you. What is your health, wealth, and ability to earn an income worth? Is your life and freedom worth a weekend or two and a few hundred bucks of education?
Experience gunfighting?
Another one of our would-be Armed Intelligensia offered this nugget: “If I take any advanced firearms training the first question I’m asking the potential instructor is how many gun fights has he been in? If none, he don’t get my business.” Really?
Renowned self-defense expert instructor Massad Ayoob has never been in a gunfight. The person offering that comment would apparently never train with Ayoob simply because Mas has avoided needing to fire the gun in self-defense. That’s OK…it means extra attention for people like you and me who don’t impose meaningless, arbitrary standards when considering a teacher.
The best way to win a gunfight is to not be in one. How do you avoid it? Practice situational awareness and confidence in your daily life using skills you pick up in class or study. Bad guys, when given a choice, will pick on those who don’t practice those behaviors. I’d rather continue to avoid or manage potentially deadly confrontations than to become a member of the gunfighter fraternity. I believe most clear-thinking people would agree.
Breaking the “freeze”
“Some people, no matter how much training you give them, will freeze when the metal meets the meat. Most people can be trained to react to a threat but some simply can’t be.”
Hint: Everyone freezes when the metal meets the meat. How long it takes to break that momentary freeze is what distinguishes people who have had training from those who haven’t. And pretty much everyone can be trained to break the freeze and react to the threat. Some will be a little quicker than others.
Once more, many of those with training will have already skipped the freeze by avoiding the confrontation through their situational awareness and threat management skills.
Training offers something for everyone
In short, formal firearm and self-defense training offers something for everyone. It helps keep you on the law-abiding side of the criminal justice system and helps keep you around for the people who love you. It instills confidence and skills you will use everyday to avoid becoming a victim.
Training makes you safer, both for yourself and the people around you, at home and in public. You might not be an expert using a gun after training, but you’ll be an expert at firearm safety and that’s something you can share with the people around you to help keep them safe, too.
With a modicum of effort on your part, you can find reputable training programs by using the Internet or by talking with family and friends to get their advice and recommendations. Keep reading The Truth About Guns and this coming month I’ll have an article on what to look for in a better training course – and red flags to watch for when considering a class.
Good training is a very good thing. I always got all I could. Keep what works for you, discard the rest. None of it’s carved in stone.
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No, no, no.
This is all the wrong sort of training and should be banned.
The proper training that should be mandatory is to berate the students for choice to be armed, scare them with all sorts of statistics lacking any context and set them up for failure during live fire with impossible time/accuracy requirements and loads of distractions.
That way you leave broken, shaky, afraid and never touch your gun again.
Oh, and it must cost $1,000 and take 16 hours over the course of two days. Preferably weekdays so you’ll have to take off work.
And if you pass, they’ll consider giving you a permit in a year or two. Maybe. But only if you can prove that someone is trying to kill you. Being alive is proof that they aren’t trying very hard to kill you. Next.
Below is a link to free online training, no obligation, no personal information ask for offered 24/7
This is designed for beginners but could be a help to old timers too if noting else a good place for new shooters to start.
https://www.learningsciencescorp.com/coursedemos/lsp/firearms/
Common, I’ll be polite and suggest you exaggerate.
Just a guess, but that reads like sarcasm to me Gadsden.
As for the article John, you could’ve said the same without drilling down on the NRA, NRA, NRA all teh things. Makes it appear as though an unacknowledged sponsored post brought to you by the NRA, even if it is above boards.
Or they are in NY taking our new course.
Gadsden
Not far off some of the Australian CCW courses I did in the 1990’s all done by ex police who firmly believed only they should be allowed to carry.
8 to 12 hours plus live fire only done during the week.
Once the government let private instructors in it improved and weekends, recognition of prior training etc became normal. Last time was 4 hours including the range qualification.
Rifleman course??? My only rifle is verboten in ILLannoy. And I got a nasty response opinion from my LGS tards. ASSault weapons ban upheld by the bribed “judge’s”. Some might suggest time for an April 19,1775 moment🙄
Been saying that for over a year on this site. Except all I ever got in return was whining, pissing and moaning. You deserve the tyrants and tyranny… You allow.
For better or worse you will be saying it for decades to come with similar results.
You deserve the tyrants and tyranny… ‘You’ allow. New York, Illinois, California, Oregon, Washington, New Jersey, Arizona and the rest of the Liberal Democrat shitholes across the nation. If you aren’t willing to fight for your Freedoms. You never deserved them in the first place.
Ok cool so what does that accomplish posting again?
We might be able to right the ship in Arizona. As for the rest, they won’t be free states anytime soon. I’m not saying to abandon them. I’m saying it’s time for a tactical retreat. All resources should be focused on flipping purple states and strengthening red states. We don’t give up ground the next time we gain it. I know I’ve said that before too.
Sensible but there has been quite a bit of good to come from fighting “losing battles” in the lost states and I see no reason to slow down now. At the very least I am curious about what Bruen part 2 (and maybe 3) will look like and we have some more congressional seats that can be flipped just here in NY. May not change much for the state but can do some good for the country and keep the Dems from a lock on lawmaking.
Didn’t NY also have a surprise House win? Like I said, we can’t abandon those places. We just have to focus resources where they’re actually doing something. The Bruen win was made possible by Trump winning. It was made possible by having more red states than blue states.
The 2020 election was very different from the 2016 election. Republicans were doing business as usual while Democrats were busy upending the norm and changing the rules. ( https://archive.org/details/time.com-the-secret-history-of-the-shadow-campaign-that-saved-the-2020-election ) If you want more Bruen wins, then we have to flip purple states. If you don’t want more RINOs unconstitutionally changing state laws, like they did in PA, then we have to strengthen red states.
Getting a few surprise House wins in enemy territory is great. But it won’t matter if we control the House, and even the Senate, if the Puppet is installed again. How do we win MI, PA, and WI again? Even AZ and GA is in doubt. The 2020 election was “lost” by a few thousand votes. Disregarding fraud, less than 50,000 strategically relocated CA Republicans would have changed the election outcome.
NY got a lot of the “surprise” congress wins (which was about the number that flipped the house) due to census redistricting and conservatives continually taking the democrats and rinos to court when they attempted to disregard the NY constitution in the impartial third party drawing up the districts and actually allowing a lot of Upstate NY to be accurately districted for the first time in decades. Those in power want nothing more than for people to give up in their strongholds as total control would allow them to take greater control of the rest of the country.
If they can use blue state strongholds to control the rest of the country, then it stands to reason that we could use red states to control the rest of the country which is my point. Which state would be easier to turn red, AZ or NY?
Focusing on flipping AZ doesn’t mean completely abandoning NY. It does mean stop wasting resources on deep blue districts within the states. If someone has an opportunity to move, consider how your vote would be counted just like you might consider the local school system, neighborhood, etc.
Dude the problem is nuance gets lost in the noise, you are absolutely correct that migration to purple districts to produce burgundy to crimson results is the best use of people resources. The focus for deep blue states/counties is an entirely different fight and use of resources in that it has to be lawfare. There are not enough people to conceivably flip the vote at various levels but it only takes a few to tie a system up in knots by forcing it to play by it’s own rules and/or force the issue at a larger more impartial court. Still takes people there to have standing and fight and yes it is retardedly expensive but Bruin did not come from Arizona just as NY is not going to flip red. Different tactics for different fights.
There will always be blue state strongholds. But there doesn’t have to be too many. Americans are waking up to Dem lies and propaganda. That’s why Democrats are focused on replacing the population with easier to deal with future constituents. They’ve given up on winning people over by making the country better.
Edit
I made this before seeing your latest comment. I agree with you.
All I can say on the replacement stuff is keep sending them to NY, it is causing beautiful chaos for the Governor and her minions.
They’ll try to hide the problem by sending federal money to the areas in question. We have to end federal aid (bribes) to the states. They have to suffer the consequences of their choices, or they’ll never change.
*Just heard on the radio some details from tranz shooter manifesto being released*
Good to hear some of that should trickle out finally and as to the first bit depends on congressional approval and winter is coming.
The Regulars fired first, killing Crispus Attucks. We can not start the fight.
“If Mr. Antell, a former Marine, had spent a weekend and a few hundred bucks on tuition and ammo for a good class, there’s an excellent chance he’d be with us today.”
How do we know this?
This happened not far away from me and the news stories were short on details. I’ve read that the Marine had his gun slapped out of his hand, then he was shot. That doesn’t tell me much, and I don’t even know if that was true. I don’t trust the media to report anything accurately. I need to know more, and it’s impossible to find more through the news. What I know is that I’ve taken no class where the instructor said to never intervene in a 3rd party dispute. They always say: understand the risks, because the chances of dying, being injured or going to prison will be greater than zero. No one can ever predict how far above zero.
A Marine will understand the risks of getting involved after shots are fired, probably more than any given concealed carrier.
So what was or were the mistakes he made? We don’t know. He decided to run toward the gunfire. Is that always a mistake? In this case, it was a decision that led to the end of his life. But, no, that isn’t what got him killed. He was murdered after that. What else happened? There is no way for us to find out reading the news. I’m all for as much training as you can get, but I think it’s an insult to this Marine to say – he wouldn’t be dead if he’d only taken Handgun 101.
“So what was or were the mistakes he made? We don’t know.”
As clearly stated in the article, he chased the bad guy after said BG had broken off the encounter. That’s a pretty big mistake.
He wasn’t shot while going after him. He was shot after. Also, define chase. I have no idea what that means in this incident. Did you read the news stories? This article is a third-hand account. The news stories don’t give any details except you might find one that says the Marine’s gun was slapped out of his hand. WTF does that mean? What are the details? We don’t know. It’s important to know. I already said that getting involved is a risk. It’s ludicrous to think a Marine didn’t understand that.
My greater point is that it is the height of stupidity to say, knowing almost nothing about what happened, oh this guy would be alive if he took one GD (undefined) gun class.
“Journalists” lie and twist facts to fit their agendas constantly. I don’t believe anything a ‘repoter’ writes these days. Facts are pretty darn flexible when it comes to today’s “journalism.”
Back when me n Albert LJ Hall were installing screen windows in HMS Submarines he took me out and we shuted soup cans with a 9mm Brownie Im HighPower.
I learned all I could learn
The prince he is seems to always be in the can…did you have to let him out first to install those screens?
“…better to remain silent…who said it?…oh yeah, Mark Twain.”
Actually, neither Mark Twain nor Abraham Lincoln, as the rumors have led us to believe. It was actually Maurice Switzer. But point taken.
This is a good article on the nuance of training. Finding that difference between “If you don’t spend tens of thousands you’re gonna die next Tuesday” and “All training is horseshit”.
Once again, I suggest that TTAG is a good place for a repository of comprehensive reviews of training at various “tiers”. Done right, it’s the kind of thing that an interested party can use in a couple of hours to determine which training is right for them. A well set up directory can assist anyone from retired .mil or LE to a housewife with her first gun.
The lack of this specific knowledge is the reason that a lot of people don’t get any training. Regardless of the “sticker” price, such training usually has significant associated travel/other costs and people are often unwilling to drop that kind of time and coin on something when they’re not really sure what it is that they’re getting and how it applies to them.
Learning to engage a target at 300 with an AR with a dot is cool and all but most housewives correctly assess that this skillset mostly isn’t applicable to them. The number of times they will need to do it in their life is near zero, even less common are the iterations where it would be legal.
This goes in several directions. In my general area, medical and tactical medical training are far, far easier to obtain than most gun training past a CCW class. Some CCW classes are the bare bones, others bring in a DA to talk to you about the law. Higher end classes, at the same basic price point may bring in a DA and a defense attorney. From a noob’s perspective it would be nice to know what’s what before buying the class.
Past that, training often breaks down into two forms. Cool guy and baby-steps-to-cool-guy where you can stop in the middle if you like. While the second option is cheaper per class, it also often requires a stupid amount of time and ammo. Oh, you want to take a step forwards or sideways while shooting? Well, first you need three other classes along with the associated time, gas, ammo etc. That first step is going to cost you several grand when you actually total up all the costs.
OTOH, you can get some cool-guy training in two or three days, more of a comprehensive all-in-one class. But now you usually have larger travel costs (hotel, food, gas etc) and you need to figure out what to do with your kids/dogs/whatever while you do this. Ultimately this class is probably going to cost you about the same.
A directory of mixed “secret shopper” reviews, vetted for actual attendance, would assist many people in making choices and thereby allow what I suspect is a fair number of people to make the choice they’ve been putting off due to a lack of information. Done right would also go a long way towards preventing the trainers from monkeying with the results for advertising purposes.
The distributed nature of the internet makes this fairly easy to do at low cost and would probably drive some decent traffic too.
From everything I have heard the SIG academy is actually pretty ok for only having a class or two of basic things before getting into interesting things and being relatively open with course objectives. More locally one of the bigger upstate NY gun store chains has a mix of what you described with excellent private instruction. Not as much readily available and/or affordable medical training past basic first side, cpr/aed, stop the bleed, and narcan. Wouldn’t have thought my combat lifesaver training would be more advanced than some of what our first responders get but welcome to NY where our weed taxes don’t even go to funding schools.
I’m surprised that you don’t have a larger Tac-med presence in upstate NY.
You actually might, but sifting through who does it and will allow people who are not active duty .mil/LEO into it can be a PITA.
Again, something a repository could cover in a very fast and efficient manner.
Eventually someone like Mike Glover or Shawn Ryan are going to notice this and make a killing off of it because they have easy connections to send people to whatever level of training they want as a blinded review process and they have a large Patreon-style membership following that will gladly swap a review for a steep discount on training.
I think (hope) it is a regional issue around Albany (lots of medical colleges) that stifle it as they have money to take in. Will have to check with Walt next time he is active for the west of Syracuse perspective. As for reviews we did have one that put on a reloading class that does longer range shooting in classes (600 yards) that did have some level of feedback and Internet reviews. If they are as good with live fire training as with reloading should be pretty good.
After reading “NRA” eight times in the first few page scrolls- I just stopped reading. It’s sad that NRA is such a loaded word- but they’ve done it to themselves. And they simply refuse to rectify their impropriety- it’s borderline unforgivable… a near-fatal self-inflicted wound.
The NRA must make amends for its dereliction… or die.
I’ll take die for $1000 Alex.
Does NRA mean anything today? Their reputation ia just as a money-grubbing monster. They don’t care about the 2A -only fundraising. How much money does it take to buy “NRA Instructor” credentials? hmmm…..
Last I knew it was $200 and the ability to read.
Being an NRA instructor is a lot like reading to children. Read the text, turn the book around to show the pictures to the group, turn the page.
Tests are always multiple choice with an open book. Maybe the instructor cert was not open book. I can’t remember. Either way there’s nothing skillful, special or exceptional in getting an NRA cert but that’s fine because the system is in place to satisfy idiotic state mandates not make you an operationally operating operator so it should be easy, affordable and accessible. Think of it as being a notary complete with magic stamp valued by the myth of bureaucracy but useless in reality.
My NRA certs lapsed years ago having served their purpose, helping people get their permits at no cost to them, but no longer being necessary having moved out of that state.
Good info. The one good thing is that the certification is recognized and accepted by states that are making concealed carry ecercisors jump through hoops to exercise their rights. The NRA loves these barriers because they get to collect their own fees by being an official gatekeeper on the toll road to citizens exercising their rights. They are complicit in these violations and have always supported the barriers they get to gatekeep.
I am glad that I have always been able to produce my military form DD214 instead of having to pay a 3rd-party gatekeeper like an “NRA certified instructor” with my time and money when exercising my 2A rights. My rich uncle trained me fairly well as a combat arms soldier and after reading about the hokum many “professional firearms trainers” foist upon their “students” and from talking to various friends who have attended some of these firearms challenge schools I think I am better off.
The NRA could have been great if it wasn’t corrupt. I understand their history, but things can change. I used their site to find an NRA instructor when I bought a shotgun. I gave him a tip since I was the only one there for the class. He did a good job.
We say, “we use a gun to stop the threat”. That is said for a reason.
Unfortunately, people follow what they see in Hollywood movies. That’s what gets them in trouble and gets them killed.
As a civilian, you don’t take people into custody. And anyone and everyone needs to study the law. If you’re going to do a citizen’s arrest.
My gun is for forcing a break in contact. I want the bad guy to stop hurting me and stop hurting my loved ones.
If I have to pull my gun and the guy runs away. And I haven’t shot him. Then it’s a success.
Last year I took Chuck Haggard’s “pocket gun” class. I learned a lot about my guns in his class. I’d love to take his revolver class as well.
I have a feeling location of classes would be a limiting factor on my end but both sound very interesting/useful.
Since I instruct with John it should not be a surprise that I agree with almost everything in this article. Let me add a couple of thoughts. I highly suggest getting training from multiple courses and instructors. I’ve attended classes and range sessions with Massad Ayoob, Tom
Givens, Marty Hayes, John Murphy, and Chuck Haggard. All of them offered nuggets which I have incorporated. Also, I am another believer in Force on Force training. The extra stress and experience of being shot at will be an eye opener for you.
Simunitions can be a bitch to work with but I cannot argue they take a lot of stupid pride out of experts in a hurry.
While it may require time and financial commitment, the peace of mind and personal development that come with firearm and self-defense training make it an investment that’s truly worth every moment and dollar spent.
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