AAR Sage Dynamics Force on Force

We moved on to scenerio based training. We were given real world incidents to work through, most were no shoots. I'm going to go through the ones that I participated in and discuss lessons learned.

The first one of note was the bank robbery. I was playing crowd control as a robber as the other robber went to the teller. The player was to enter the line and wait for the situation to develop. I burst out and told everyone to grab pavement and covered them with 2 pistols, that's right, akimbo bitch. I told them that we were there for the money and it's not about them. They're were a few people that looked up at me and I yelled at them for them to look at the pavement. I went so far as to stand over the player trying to provoke him into a gun battle. He did the wise thing and swallowed his pride doing nothing.

There were a few others but I've posted videos on those. I apologize for not getting them all, I have a tripod on the way. Anyway, I'm going to get my first scenerio. I was to walk into my hotel room and as I approached the door to the room was open. I saw shadows and pressed out to the other wall and looked in to find a man with a knife sawing at the throat of another man who was slummed against the wall. I commanded him to drop the knife, he instantly complied. I told him to get down and he said "No" in a normal tone. I began to shout another command and he walks off into the room behind a wall. YOUSONOFABITCH! I wait a moment and decide he's not getting away. I move slowly forward and pull into high retention. I do a quick scan of the bathroom which was empty. I creck the guy slummed against the wall by placing my hand on his head and he slums limp. It wasn't his day and he's done. I opt to clear the room as the victim was done. I approach slowly and pie in 10 degrees increments. Of course, he's in the blind 90 degree corner faced out to me. I press out on him and us my corner as cover. He's standing there with his hands up. YOUSONOFABITCH! I command him to get on his knees and face the wall. "No." What! WAHT! I command him again. "No, I'm not doing it" as calm as he could be. I thought, ok, I can stand here all damn day with my front sight on his nose and he's not going to move or take my commands. I opt to call 911 as I'm pressed out on his face. The scenerio was called as it would have been 30 minutes for the cops to arrive. Aaron Cowan asked me why I didn't shoot him. I look at it this way, it'd have been a shit storm with the media, the guy didn't pose an immediate threat to anyone, I wasn't going to take him down alone and at the end of the day, I'm not going to gun down anyone that's not an immediate threat.

My next scenerio was to walk through a gaggle of 7 wannabe gangster who were taunting me as I walked through them. Hey, this is just like walking to work! I kept my head down, didn't engage and kept walking. I was expecting some sort of strong arm robbery but nothing developed. Lesson: Just cause they look jinky and are assholes doesn't make them a threat.

We then had a few more situations that I've posted in videos. We then moved to action/reaction drills. You can't react fast enough to beat someone in action. If someone needs to be shot and you pull your gun, shoot. Don't wait.

The last drill was my request, I asked if we could shoot at each other while we moved. We were given 5 sims and told to make them count. If you hit all five you'd go on to the final round. I started as a target and the guy with me was young and fast. He was all over me and popped me in the ear and got four other hits. Bar set. Redeyes also got all four hits. Then it was my turn, I got all five hits too. Oh crap!

So in traditional southern fashion we were going to have a pace off duel with one shot. Redeyes and "The Kid" met back to back and paced off, they turned and fired on Aaron's command. Redeyes was fast but the kid was faster. Damn, I was up next against The Kid. Damn, we paced off and he whipped around and fired, whap! hit me but I got my round on him too. I guess this threw him of his accuracy game. We paced off again and he whipped around yet again beating me to the shot, he fired wide of me. I said HA! and drilled him in his glove which is not present would have been high upper chest. Isn't that interesting? When real world shoots are presented it's sort of out of the ordinary to get those perfect chest shots. Hands were hit, shoulders, and legs all with the intention of hitting the chest.

I highly recommend this course. The only thing I wanted to do but didn't remember to ask was non-participant movement drills.

Aaron continually asked if people had seen their front sight. I think I was the only one that has said yes, however other were getting hits none the less. This brings me back to a theory I have and I suspect it's Aaron's theory as well, it's all "muscle memory". Some how the body "knows" how to get hits or rather you've done it so many times that you go on a auto pilot when you're shooting and the alignment of your hand, head and hips allow you to hit the target. I was purposefully picking up my front sight with what I call a flash sight picture and once I have it I work the trigger reset. The term proprioceptions was mentioned and I believe this is true. Loads of people can do things without thinking about them and I don't think shooting is any different. I also believe people were "seeing" their front sights but the brain wasn't giving the information to the consiscous mind because ti really didn't matter. What mattered was the threat so the mjority of processing power for the mind was focused on it. I think the eyes did see the front sight it wsa just a very low priority as was external sounds and any other stimuli outside the focus. It's like a quarterback picking out the reciever, he's not focused on anything else. Just on the person he's looking for. This is one reason for the scan, to break the focus on the one person you're focused on.

I'm not sure threat focusing is a bad thing, I think practicing with poor techique is. I believe you should practice as perfectly as you can and in the very outside chance you have to shoot defensively the mind and body will work in concert to aid you accomplish the task.

No one could with authority how many shots they fired. We were running around an 80% hit rate.