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Gunfighter Moment – Ken Hackathorn

Saturday, October 15th, 2016

Red Dot or Optic?

Quite often the question as to whether the red dot sight or magnified scope is better for use on an AR/M4 style firearm is best comes up. The answer is really quite simple, in that you should choose the sighting system that best serves your mission requirements. Typically the M4 style of firearm in 5.56Nato is pretty much a 400 meter max range blaster. It can be used effectively at greater distance, but for the most part engaging targets successfully beyond 400 meters is not common when you are involved in any situation where all conditions are not ideal, like when the bullets are coming your way. For most folks, the AR in police and private sector markets is a 150 yard or less weapon. Even military engagements that result in successful placed hits is generally limited to 250 meters or less.

If you can clearly articulate your AR/M4 needs to 150 yards or less, the red dot sight is probably your best choice. Note that most urban use will much less than 150 yards. If your mission is likely to be in terrain or environments of 150 to 400 meters, the optic scope can provide a much wider benefit.

If your evaluation of needs reflects your needs will be in the 150 yards or less, a good quality red dot has much going for it. I recommend a Aimpoint Micro as the way to go. There are many red dot sights on the market, you can pretty much match price with quality. For general range use where the red dot is mostly for pleasure sport shooting, the less expensive versions may have merit. I have a few that fall into this need, and they provide for my needs. For anything that you may be staking your life on, don’t buy cheap; all my serious carbines have Aimpoint Micro T1, H1, or T2 red dots installed.

The fact that you can turn them on and leave then that way for 4 or 5 years is proof of their value, plus they are pretty much bomb proof. Pick a mounting interface that is rugged and reliable. My current favorite is the Scarlarworks Aimpoint Micro mount. I generally mount my Micro over the ejection port far enough forward that my breath will not fog the lens during cold weather.

For a magnified optic, I highly recommend a good 1X4 or 1X5 scope. You must have a low power setting for use at close range, CQB, or low light operations. Some folks demand a true 1 power setting, others do fine with the lowest settings at 1.25 or even 1.5. It depends on your eyes and how well you can focus quickly with both eyes open. Most of the time, your scope will be set on 1 power, or if working in more open terrain, you may click up to 2 or 3 power. One major advantage the magnified optic has over the red dot is in the area of target ID. There are often times that a target beyond 100 yards is not really clear or exposed well enough for clear identity, simply twisting the power ring up to 4 or 5 power will easily allow you to see what you need to know.

The problem with good 1×4 or 1×5 optics is how much to pay. You can spend the equivalent of a good used car, or just a few hundred bucks. I own a 1×4 S&B that has great optics, as well as some rather inexpensive varieties like Primary Arms, Weaver, and Leupold 1.5×4 1″ tube versions. The Trijicon 1×4 T24 is a great optic, and I have a few of these on various carbines. I am not so sure that the most expensive variables are worth the money for my needs. In some cases they can be grossly overpriced. Oftentimes end users choose first focal plane optics, which great for much higher magnification sniper scope use, but terrible for close range carbine applications. At 1 power on a first focal plane scope the reticle will be small and hard to see in low light or dark background environments.

Yes, illuminated reticles can fix this problem, but note that the battery life of most of these models is extremely short compared to a Aimpoint or even the ill famed EOTechs. Remember, the need for a ranging reticle on a 400 yard carbine is a real waste. You can deal with most every ranging issue you have with just hold over out to that distance, even to 400 meters, the trajectory of the 5.56 round is pretty easy to master by adjusting different aiming points. You want an simple easy to use reticle, and you DO NOT need target adjustment knobs on a carbine scope; hey get damaged easily, and move position far to easy with bumps and rubs against gear.

Pick a good rugged mount interface to your carbine. In some cases this may be a quick release throw lever design. Sadly, most of the current offerings are heavy. Everything you add to a 5.56 carbine adds weight. The last thing I want to lug around is a heavy carbine: handy means lightweight.

Consider what you want your carbine to do; what is its mission? Then, select the sighting system that meets your needs.

– Ken Hackathorn

Old Guy With A Blaster

Ken Hackathorn has served as a US Army Special Forces Small Arms Instructor, Gunsite Instructor, and NRA Police Firearms Instructor. He is currently an FBI Certified Firearms Instructor, Certified Deputy Sheriff with Washington County SO, Ohio, and a SRT member and Special Response Team trainer. Ken has trained US Military Special Operations forces, Marine FAST and SOTG units and is a contract small arms trainer to FBI SWAT and HRT.

Ken has provided training to Federal, State, and local law enforcement agencies and been active in small arms training for the past 25 years. He has written firearms related material for Guns & Ammo, Combat Handguns, Soldier Of Fortune, and currently American Handgunner and contributed to at least six other gun/shooting journals. Ken was also a founding member of IPSC and IDPA.

Gunfighter Moment is a weekly feature brought to you by Bravo Company USA. Bravo Company is home of the Gunfighters, and each week they bring us a different trainer to offer some words of wisdom.

Gunfighter Moment – Aaron Barruga

Saturday, October 8th, 2016

Natural Instinct

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A “combat snapshot” refers to how much information a shooter can process in his environment. This is both a proactive and retroactive process. For example, if an individual proceeds into a room from a hallway, he identifies the layout of the new room while remembering the layout of the hallway. This mental process is what helped our ancestors avoid becoming dinner for lions, and is what helps us perform other tasks such as texting while driving.

Our minds default to pattern recognition. If we enter an unfamiliar room (whether in combat or at a dinner party), our eyes will be drawn to motion. Our brains then employ a friend or foe heuristic that indicates whether we can remain calm or if other action should be taken (e.g. get out, there’s a lion at this dinner party!).

The quality at which we perceive information determines whether we receive data that is actionable or just noise. Entering a crowded room, you can scan the environment by simply moving your eyes within their sockets. Moving your head left and right may be necessary to gather data at different angles, but if we jerk our heads too quickly, any information about our surroundings becomes a blur. Another gift passed on to us from our ancestors is our body’s preference for expending the least amount of effort possible to accomplish a task. Unnecessary movement expends precious energy, but can also signal to predators our location.

Excessive movement also distracts our ability to obtain a combat snapshot. Recall any time you’ve been in the woods hunting or just hiking with family. Regardless of being a soldier or civilian, if you hear something that doesn’t sound right, you naturally slow your movement and alter your posture to scan your surroundings. Your eyes scan in their sockets, and your head moves in a methodical manner to assess the environment.

Consider that natural behavior in the woods and apply it to range training. Although tactical shooters are taught a variety of techniques for gaining a combat snapshot or regaining situational awareness, some methods tend place greater emphasis on performing pre and post shooting rituals. Unfortunately these movements provide no advantage in the real world, or worse, actually contradict our natural survival instincts.

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Search and assess theatrics are heavily critiqued among instructors with extensive combat or use of force experience. Although it is important to maintain situational awareness, unnecessary head whipping movements do little to provide a shooter with actionable data. The sister action to theatrical search and asses is a movement I’m going to coin as “spider monkeying”. This occurs when barriers or vehicles are incorporated in flat range training. Rather than reading the terrain and modifying their posture, shooters begin to bob and weave their head around obstacles. This is accompanied by excessive pushing and pulling of a pistol in and out of ready positions (e.g. position three to position four, back to position three, etc).

At full speed, spider monkeying looks like a shooter continuously bobbing and weaving like a boxer, combined with the push-pulling of a pistol into and away from his chest. This behavior occurs for two reasons. First, the shooter is attempting to maximize perceived cover while mistakenly assuming that the extra bob and weave movements are causing the enemy to remain reactive. Second, the shooter knows where all of the targets are located and isn’t required to alter his approach. Instead he can just shoot the scenario similar to a USPSA stage with no regards to application of cover and minimizing his silhouette.

Spider monkeying emphasizes the importance of adding blind shoots to range training. When a shooter must interact with a tactical scenario similar to the real world, it decelerates his movements. Instead of exaggerated bobbing, a shooter obtains a combat snapshot through purposeful action and throttle control. Although a shooter might transition between moving quickly and slowly, these are still deliberate actions as opposed to random head jerking. Why? Because in an uncertain environment, excessive movement will either visually give away your position or inhibit your ability to read data in the environment.

Further examination of throttle control can be observed in certain war movies and combat helmet camera footage. This week marked the 23rd anniversary of the events that would become famous through “Black Hawk Down”. Despite the movie’s delineation from actual events, the actors did do justice through their tactical portrayal of Rangers and Delta Operators. Weapon’s handling and fire team movements appeared similar to the real world. No unnecessary head bobbing or peek-a-boo, just methodical clearing of sectors.

Throttle control is also observed by watching helmet camera footage of soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. When soldiers make contact with the enemy there is chaos and ambiguity as platoons attempt to identify where the enemy is located. What is not readily observable is unnecessary movement. During the initial phases of a firefight, it is very hard to tell where enemy fire is coming from unless you are amid the enemy’s formation. This is why soldiers minimize their silhouette and scan their sectors to find new data to add to their combat snapshot. Unnecessary movement is not only disorienting, but it might attract the attention of a PKM machine gunner.

Our instincts represent the culmination of handed down survival mindset from our ancestors. Every lion evaded, spear dodged, or musket ball avoided has fined tuned our senses. To our advantage, we are genetically hardwired to avoid threats. In preparing for violent encounters, we should utilize as much of these senses as possible during range training events.

aaron

Aaron Barruga is a Special Forces veteran and founder at Guerrilla Approach LLC. He teaches vehicle tactics and speed shooting for tactical marksmanship.

www.guerrillaapproach.com
www.facebook.com/guerrillaapproach
www.instagram.com/guerrilla_approach

Gunfighter Moment is a weekly feature brought to you by Bravo Company USA. Bravo Company is home of the Gunfighters, and each week they bring us a different trainer to offer some words of wisdom.

Gunfighter Moment – Daryl Holland

Saturday, October 1st, 2016

After retiring from Delta Force, I’ve spent another decade training Special Operations Forces and Law Enforcement units throughout the U.S. ”You can’t teach experience”, so I still have the privilege of training awesome Americans that protect and serve. “Police Brutality” is an overused term that should only be for a very small percent of individuals that shouldn’t be in uniform. While 99% of LE are doing a great job, there are those few who sneak through by a weak selection process or having quotas due to Political Correctness. It’s easy for the media to judge after an event, but some folks simply handle stress better than others and it’s up to trainers and leadership within those units to identify those not right for the job.

“Where is the Threat?” A suspect running away is not a threat! Not complying with your commands is not an immediate threat that should lead to an execution on the street in Tulsa, OK…or like the Arizona Rancher involved with the Bundy/Wildlife Refuge standoff last winter. The old man had his hands up then he lowered them, only to be executed in waist deep snow…Even if the old dude was reaching for a gun, the agent 30 yards away with a carbine didn’t seem to be in immediate danger. I would have a hard time calling that one a “righteous” kill because I know the average old guy that spent his life ranching couldn’t hit a target at 30 yards with a pistol. And in this business, righteousness means you can sleep at night.

I’ve received my last few traffic violations through the mail, so why can’t we lessen the force? Why not have tougher standards and selection criteria? By trimming the fat, you can pay more and offer incentives that will attract a larger pool to select from and wear the blue uniform to serve the community with honor, respect and professionalism. I remember patrolling the streets of Ramadi and Fallujah where the locals hated me and wanted to kill me despite my efforts to bring peace and security to these dangerous insurgent filled neighborhoods.

Tragically in America today, men and women in blue are experiencing the same trying to bring law and order to rough neighborhoods in the inner-city from Ferguson, MO to Baltimore, Chicago’s South Side to Charlotte, NC. With a world full of growing radical Islam, racial tension and race baiting, why wouldn’t you pick those who protect and serve from the top of the pyramid? We need “Law and Order” now more than ever, to include a leadership who won’t water down standards, hold men and women in uniform accountable and back their decisions to the hilt when they make the right call.

“The phrase Black Lives Matter suggest racial superiority. It excludes the importance of anybody else’s life.” “THAT IS RACISM DEFINED.”
-Sherriff David Clarke

Respectfully, Daryl Holland

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Daryl Holland is a retired U.S. Army Sergeant Major with over 20 years of active duty experience, 17 of those years in Special Operations. Five years with the 1st Special Forces Group (SFG) and 12 years in the 1st SFOD-Delta serving as an Assaulter, Sniper, Team Leader, and OTC Instructor.

He has conducted several hundred combat missions in Afghanistan, Iraq, Bosnia, Philippines, and the Mexican Border. He has conducted combat missions in Afghanistan’s Hindu Kush Mountains as a Sniper and experienced Mountaineer to the streets of Baghdad as an Assault Team Leader.

He has a strong instructor background started as an OTC instructor and since retiring training law abiding civilians, Law Enforcement, U.S. Military, and foreign U.S. allied Special Operations personnel from around the world.

Gunfighter Moment is a weekly feature brought to you by Bravo Company USA. Bravo Company is home of the Gunfighters, and each week they bring us a different trainer to offer some words of wisdom.

Gunfighter Moment – Aaron Barruga

Saturday, September 17th, 2016

Beyond Benchmarks: Why Tactical Shooters Plateau

I felt like a rockstar the first time I achieved a sub second draw from the holster. In my best Maverick from Top Gun impersonation, I punched my fist in the air while delivering a controlled grin at my GoPro. I looked back at my shot timer and welcomed myself into the pantheon of top tier marksman. What happened afterwards immediately bumped me back down onto the plateau that I belonged.

I fired another 50 single shots from the holster and failed to break one second. No problem, this is easily fixed by shooting another box of ammo, then another…. $50 later and I’m not even burning in anywhere near 1.10 seconds.

Every shooter plateaus in performance and we often delay growth by assuming we can solve our problem by shooting more ammo, finding a better piece of gear, or seeking out more pro-tips on YouTube. Although these behaviors may facilitate some progress, collectively they waste time and fail to address the root of the problem in the development of maintaining a performance-based training mindset.

Mindset is deterred by ignoring general information, focusing on specifics and valuing benchmarks (e.g. sub 1 second draw) as outcomes instead of methods. During training, this manifests as misinterpretation of a single outstanding performance that inappropriately calibrates expectations to an assumed level of expertise (e.g. inconsistent sub second draw). Similarly, valuing benchmarks as outcomes instead of methods can distract from improving overall skills development. This is best demonstrated by a performance phenomena known as “range roboting”.

We “range robot” by executing a high volume of repetitions on a single exercise, but only narrowly increase the scope of our overall performance. For example, shooting an entire box of ammo at the El Prez drill means nothing, if, when the drill is performed in reverse, our skills regress back to mediocre. The solution to the problem is not expending another box of ammo while performing El Prez in reverse. Instead, we must look beyond benchmarks and focus on mindset.

Although benchmarks are important qualifiers in measuring mechanical performance, they are not always a good indicator of how skills transfer to the real world. For instance, shooting a carbine bolt-lock reload exercise for speed can cause shooters to overlook the importance of learning the subtle feeling of a bolt that has not returned to battery. One should never argue that speed is unimportant, but when speed is performed hastily, it is not always the best metric for building well-rounded tactical abilities.

A key activity in developing a performance-based mindset is measuring consistency. “Slow is smooth… and smooth is fast” or the alteration of “slow is slow… fast is fast,” regardless of which version of the quote is more en vogue, we should endorse behavior that encourages relaxed skills execution. This doesn’t mean excluding benchmarks in measuring ability, however, benchmarks should be incorporated during training with the understanding that there is a difference between learning to perform a task consistently versus going as fast as you can. This is most important for shooters that are constantly outrunning their headlights with the assumption that speed is corollary to performance. Scenario based exercises immediately surface this fallacy among other performance inabilities because these shooters are required to combine multiple skill sets, most of which are mental.

A performance based training mindset can be developed through several methods, and the most cost efficient technique is adopting the “less is more” mentality with ammo expenditure. If I exceed 300 rounds per training session, I encourage going through the motions on certain exercises. Reducing the total number of rounds fired forces me to budget my efforts and decreases opportunities for complacency in which I chase a benchmark that cannot be performed with any real consistency.

Visualization is another key activity that allows us to think through different scenarios and develop a performance-based mindset. In the conceptual and developmental phases of tactical courses, some students demand specific sets of rules that need to be followed in order to win a gunfight. If the threat does X, I respond with Y. Tactical encounters are not linear and this is why instructors place greater emphasis on well-rounded skills development instead of excellence in a single benchmark.

A month after my first sub second flat range draw, I trained to the point that I was able to meet the benchmark with consistency by focusing on a single outcome. This required a lot of ammo, dry-fire practice, and neglecting to develop other skills that are essential to being a tactical marksman. Speed is important, but it may be an overvalued metric if the more necessary outcome is being familiar with drawing from concealment from inside a vehicle with a support hand.

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Aaron Barruga is a Special Forces veteran and founder at Guerrilla Approach LLC. He teaches vehicle tactics and speed shooting for tactical marksmanship.

www.guerrillaapproach.com
www.facebook.com/guerrillaapproach
www.instagram.com/guerrilla_approach

Gunfighter Moment is a weekly feature brought to you by Bravo Company USA. Bravo Company is home of the Gunfighters, and each week they bring us a different trainer to offer some words of wisdom.

Gunfighter Moment – Kyle Defoor

Saturday, September 10th, 2016

In the last article I laid out my beliefs on the best optic for a mag fed carbine. Here, I’ll go over how we have gotten true one power scopes with daytime visible red dots to work as good as a traditional red dot up close with speed by mounting them the best way possible for your application. I’m going to break this down the three categories; height, type, and placement.

Height- how high you mount the scope off the top of the rail is important for a few reasons. First, if you are using a true one power scope with a daytime visible red dot you will need to make sure when you are on one power you don’t see anything in the bottom part of the reticle. This will adversely effect your short range shooting.

If you have a short barrel rifle out to about a 12 inch barrel you can generally get away with a 1.5 inch tall mount. If you have a 16 inch long barrel it’s very possible you will see part of your rail or flipped down front sight in the bottom part of the reticle on one power with a 1.5″ tall mount. There is a little bit of this that depends on the type of buttstock you are using and your overall face structure-whether you have a thin face or a more round face. The last factor would be where you like to position your butt stock, all the way out or somewhere in between?

Next, If you use any type of IR laser on the top rail this will also make a difference in whether the bottom part of your reticle has any image in it on one power. There are two solutions for this problem. One, is to use a higher mount. Typically somewhere around 1.9 to 2 inch height will give you a clear view over the top of any IR laser mounted on the top rail even with a 16″ barrel. The second option is to slide the IR laser closer to the objective lens of your scope. This may or may not work depending on the construction/type of the IR laser you have and barrel length. With my personal 11.5 inch barreled upper I can use a 1.5″ mount with a DBAL IR laser top mounted and have no issues with my USO 1-4 on one power. The second solution is to side mount your IR laser.

Mount types- I personally only use QD mounts simply because I never want to be in a position where I cannot use the gun because of some odd issue with the scope or my surroundings. I also always have zeroed irons on there ready to go. I’m a big fan of Bobro mounts because of the lever which takes away any movement in the rail slot. For non Q/D mounts I use Badger Ordnance. The type of mount you choose may depend on what mount height you need. As of this writing Larue is the only Q/D mount I’ve seen that will make a 1.9~2 inch tall mount. Do your research and make sure though.

Placement- The first thing you should know when mounting a scope to a rail is if there is any slack between the mount and the rail push as far forward toward the barrel before you lock down the mount. Recoil ends up forward and this will help in keeping your optics from shifting especially on higher calibers.

Secondly, and the real juice for this article is where to mount your LPV (low power varible). What I found to be the most beneficial it is to mount your scope a little bit forward of where it traditionally should be done. You can do this by moving the mount one, two or more slots forward in the rail or by moving the scope forward in the mount or a combo of both. I personally will put my scope on one power with the daytime visible red dot on and move it far enough forward that I do not have a traditional eye relief or sight picture that most people would call “good” for a scope. Another way to describe it is that my scope is mounted far enough forward that I actually do have a bit of scope shadow on one power. Although this may be counterintuitive to what most people have been taught or read this is the only possible way you can match the speed and target transition of a traditional RDS with an LPV. Keep in mind that when you are on one power with the red dot traditional fundamentals of scope shooting don’t apply. Also keep in mind how very little (.5-.75″) I am trying to describe with written word I push the scope forward to get the speed shooting benefit. Lastly, by doing this it will mean that when you are on max power (4,6 or 8) with your LPV you will need to slightly slide your face forward on the butt stock to get a fundamentally acceptable scoped sight picture for an accurate long range shot- but, because it is a long range shot you have time to do that.

Kyle Defoor is one of the world’s most committed and passionate shooting instructors. Literally growing up with a gun in hand he took his talents into the military where he was combat decorated as a SEAL assaulter and sniper. Kyle helped to create and define modern training while along the way personally teaching thousands of military personal and civilians from around the globe. His shooting prowess led to appearances on multiple TV shows including Shooting Gallery, Tactical Arms, and Tactical Impact, and guest appearances on History Channel. Kyle’s outdoor athletic lifestyle includes shooting, ultra running, stand-up paddle surfing and climbing. He  is a sponsored athlete of MultiCam and runs his own company, Defoor Proformance Shooting, which offers tactical training, wilderness navigation, TV and film consulting, and motivational speaking.

Gunfighter Moment is a weekly feature brought to you by Bravo Company USA. Bravo Company is home of the Gunfighters, and each week they bring us a different trainer to offer some words of wisdom.

Gunfighter Moment – Pat McNamara

Saturday, September 3rd, 2016

As there are techniques, there are just as many gun related gizmos, gadgets, and gimmicks. Bolt and strap on. Theatrical movements and dance steps. Tales of woe or implausible performance enhancers. Some live long and become center of debate issues while others die off quickly.

One of the things I encourage on the range is discovery or tactile learning. In other words, learn by doing vice taking one’s word for it. One can now make the determination for himself on whether to shit-can or to maintain a technique or piece of gear for he sees that it will or will not offer positive development in a gunfight.

Battlefield multipliers are often the simplest in solutions versus high tech gear or high motor skill movements. My go to Battle Rifle is a 16” BCM KMR and it’s pretty much meat and potatoes. Full length 2-point sling, good optic, good BUIs, good light.

Patrick McNamara
SGM, US Army (Ret)

Pat McNamara

Patrick McNamara spent twenty-two years in the United States Army in a myriad of special operations units. When he worked in the premier Special Missions Unit, he became an impeccable marksman, shooting with accurate, lethal results and tactical effectiveness. McNamara has trained tactical applications of shooting to people of all levels of marksmanship, from varsity level soldiers, and police officers who work the streets to civilians with little to no time behind the trigger.

His military experience quickly taught him that there is more to tactical marksmanship than merely squeezing the trigger. Utilizing his years of experience, McNamara developed a training methodology that is safe, effective and combat relevant and encourages a continuous thought process. This methodology teaches how to maintain safety at all times and choose targets that force accountability, as well as provides courses covering several categories, including individual, collective, on line and standards.

While serving as his Unit’s Marksmanship NCO, he developed his own marksmanship club with NRA, CMP, and USPSA affiliations. Mac ran monthly IPSC matches and ran semi annual military marksmanship championships to encourage marksmanship fundamentals and competitiveness throughout the Army.He retired from the Army’s premier hostage rescue unit as a Sergeant Major and is the author of T.A.P.S. (Tactical Application of Practical Shooting). He also served as the Principle of TMACS Inc.

Gunfighter Moment is a weekly feature brought to you by Bravo Company USA. Bravo Company is home of the Gunfighters, and each week they bring us a different trainer to offer some words of wisdom.

Gunfighter Moment – Frank Proctor

Saturday, August 27th, 2016

Train like you Fight

Hey Folks, we’ve all heard it or said it: Train like you Fight. A lot of times, folks think that means wearing full kit in order to train to better shoot your gun. I disagree with the party line that you have to wear full battle rattle to train to shoot better.

For tactical shooters I would strongly recommend shooting ‘slick with no kit’ and learn what they can truly do with their guns, what their full capabilities are, how fast can they really put bullets on targets, maneuver through a challenging course of fire, get into positions, etc. Once that base line of what’s possible is established then put your duty gear on and see if you can still do the same stuff.

If you can’t, why?

If it’s because your body armor is too restrictive, there are plenty of ways to keep the defensive capabilities of your body armor AND be mobile and able to mount your gun to shoot well, and give yourself and your team mates some valuable OFFENSIVE capabilities. This concept applies to all the gear you carry to duty; if it hinders your optimal performance I would fix it or get rid of it and stay as light as possible.

Here’s a proven concept that we all as tactical shooters can use to ‘Train to Win’. Every organized sports team in the country (especially the ones that win) use a similar concept to train. Football teams don’t go full speed in pads everyday in practice. That would be the conventional shooter’s wisdom of “train like you fight”. What they do instead is break down individual skill sets and train them to perfection. Then they’ll put on the pads and put all those things together and scrimmage. They take note of what went well and what didn’t go well, and then they take off the pads and train again. When it comes game time they are prepared to WIN.

That’s my ramble for now, maybe I’ll put together a video explaining it some more.

Thanks y’all!

-Frank Proctor

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Frank Proctor has served over 18 years in the military, the last 11 of those in US Army Special Forces. During his multiple combat tours in Afghanistan & Iraq he had the privilege to serve with and learn from many seasoned veteran Special Forces Operators so their combined years of knowledge and experience has helped him to become a better operator & instructor. While serving as an instructor at the Special Forces Advanced Urban Combat Course he was drawn to competitive shooting. He has since earned the USPSA Grand Master ranking in the Limited Division and Master ranking in the IDPA Stock Service Pistol division. He learned a great deal from shooting in competition and this has helped him to become to become a better tactical shooter. Frank is one of the few individuals able to bring the experiences of U.S. Army Special Forces, Competitive Shooting, and Veteran Instructor to every class.

All this experience combines to make Frank Proctor a well-rounded shooter and instructor capable of helping you to achieve your goal of becoming a better shooter.

Gunfighter Moment is a weekly feature brought to you by Bravo Company USA. Bravo Company is home of the Gunfighters, and each week they bring us a different trainer to offer some words of wisdom.

Gunfighter Moment – Larry Vickers

Saturday, August 20th, 2016

I recently returned from a trip to Switzerland and after shooting with some friends I was once again reminded of two things; the AR-15/M4 and Glock handguns absolutely dominate in terms of sheer numbers being used each and everyday on ranges around the world. They are by far the most popular of their type and we live in the best time ever for both weapons. As you can guess I use and recommend BCM carbines as my first choice and for Glocks check out my Vickers Tactical editions available exclusively thru Lipseys. It’s in everyone’s best interest to know these two firearms as they are the industry benchmarks and will be for some time to come.

Be safe and shoot straight.

LAV out.

Larry Vickers
Vickers Tactical Inc.
Host of TacTV

Larry Vickers of Vickers Tactical is a retired US Army 1st SFOD-Delta combat veteran with years of experience in the firearms industry as a combat marksmanship instructor and industry consultant. In recent years he has hosted tactical firearms related TV shows on the Sportsman Channel with the latest being TacTV of which Bravo Company is a presenting sponsor. Larry Vickers special operations background is one of the most unique in the industry today; he has been directly or indirectly involved in the some of the most significant special operations missions of the last quarter century. During Operation Just Cause he participated in Operation Acid Gambit – the rescue of Kurt Muse from Modelo Prison in Panama City, Panama. As a tactics and marksmanship instructor on active duty he helped train special operations personnel that later captured Saddam Hussein and eliminated his sons Uday and Qusay Hussein. In addition he was directly involved in the design and development of the HK416 for Tier One SOF use which was used by Naval Special Warfare personnel to kill Osama Bin Laden. Larry Vickers has developed various small arms accessories with the most notable being his signature sling manufactured by Blue Force Gear and Glock accessories made by Tangodown. In addition he has maintained strong relationships with premium companies within the tactical firearms industry such as BCM, Aimpoint, Black Hills Ammunition, Wilson Combat and Schmidt & Bender.

With over 300,000 subscribers, his Youtube channel features a new firearms video every Friday. 

Larry Vickers travels the country conducting combat marksmanship classes for law abiding civilians, law enforcement and military and works with Aztec Training Services to coordinate classes to best meet the needs of the students attending the class.

Gunfighter Moment is a weekly feature brought to you by Bravo Company USA. Bravo Company is home of the Gunfighters, and each week they bring us a different trainer to offer some words of wisdom.