Just as stated. I was doing a presentation to a ccw class of 25 yesterday, 23 men, 2 women. I asked how many had had formal basic pistol instruction, 3, of those 3, how many had any tactical based class with a handgun, 1. My emphasis was on training & developing a practice regime. Its not a rabbits foot & the oft used phrase of having a gun is enough often is not. I wish them all good luck.
Why do so many that ccw resist training & practice?
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fredj338
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146 Posts
You really think that on a website devoted to preparedness with firearms, very few people will have taken martial arts long enough to get punched in the face at some point or another? Hell, I've lost count of the times I've been punched in the face. Kicked in the groin, now...I remember the EXACT number of times that's happened.
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14,573 Posts
Yep...
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1,223 Posts
Just a few comments. One of my favorite quotes..."In a situation of high stress, you don't rise to the occasion, you sink to your level of training." Second, let's distinguish between training and practice. Everyone who carries a firearm should seek out some competent training (instructor, friends who are former or current military or law enforcement, etc.). I say that because if your objective is to protect your life and the lives of your family members, proficiency doesn't just happen, it is acquired over time. Firearm skills are perishable. My recommendation is a little competent training (which may be expensive) and a lot of practice (that is a lot less expensive)!
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146 Posts
You should post a poll.
Yeah…… a lot of men think they were born with the gun powder gene ……
But to some honest self reflection is required.
Are you safe?
Can you hit what you are aiming at ……….???
Shoot - No shoot ?????
To me that’s the basic……..
Beyond that it’s a matter of degree. My hundred thousands of rounds make me relaxed,
But to some honest self reflection is required.
Are you safe?
Can you hit what you are aiming at ……….???
Shoot - No shoot ?????
To me that’s the basic……..
Beyond that it’s a matter of degree. My hundred thousands of rounds make me relaxed,
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6,901 Posts
Gotta check the ego at the door. That includes the instructor. If you need to stress students out during a drill or period of instruction for the sake of realism that’s one thing. Depending on the level the students are at that can be important. But skilled or not, adults can smell arrogance a mile away and it’s not conducive to learning. It’s usually a coverup for other inadequacies.
As for why few folks seek out training or don’t practice? Myriad of reasons. Don’t know they need it. Don’t have time. Can’t afford it. Don’t care enough about it. Basically it’s not high enough on their priorities. Fine. Their decision, not mine, and it’s nothing worth getting bent out of shape over. We all make our choices.
As for why few folks seek out training or don’t practice? Myriad of reasons. Don’t know they need it. Don’t have time. Can’t afford it. Don’t care enough about it. Basically it’s not high enough on their priorities. Fine. Their decision, not mine, and it’s nothing worth getting bent out of shape over. We all make our choices.
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11,417 Posts
The cost of an hour with an instructor is about the same as the cost of the ammo that missed the target paper entirely for these folks. If they can afford to go the range and shoot ammo only into the backstop (hopefully), they can afford an hour with an instructor.
And it will catapult them up the learning curve. And they'll have fun, AND they'll feel much better about their shooting (instead of constant frustration).
Otherwise, they're just practicing and getting "better" at missing the target.
I believe the #1 reason for resistance to getting instruction / coaching is ego. They don't think they need it. They think they're natural shooters, even though they're missing the target. They'll blame the gun or assume they're missing a gizmo or just need a quick "hack."
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12,519 Posts
Well, no, it's been around for decades, I got my first one in 67, but only easier to get in certain counties, notably San Bernardino, Kern and the northern counties. The classroom was only recently regulated by the state, before that every county and PD had different systems. Some 16 hours, some 4 hours, some just an interview. The quals are all different also, and still are today. San Bernardino now farms out the classroom for requals, but in house for the initial. And now CA is issueing out of state permits in some counties, not all, because of staffing issues. So our qual for over 25 years has been 5 rounds at 5 yards, not timed or scored by points, not under the clock, then reload, repeat. All 10 rounds must be within the perimeter of a B27 target. They have 3 trys to qual, if not, come back in 3 months, and try again. My opinion is if they fail once, they should be done, although I've witnessed it many times. Riverside county, and Riverside PD, does a nicer qual, 50 rounds per weapon, at various distance 7-15, reload while moving, and drawing from the holster, and 80% hits to pass, up to 6 weapons, qual for each. Orange county is similar.
I shoot USPSA/IDPA and Steel Challenge (SCSA) every weekend (6 times a mont), and practice drawing with my actual CCW weapons, from an AIWB holster, at 3 to 15 yards, drawing from concealment, while moving, scored and timed targets. Also take a "legal" CCW class every other year, no shooting, just liability, before and after shooting, updates on laws, etc. However in requals, the instructor will ask how many have shot in the last 2 years, and out of 100, half will say none, 25% 3-6 times a year (not training, just a static target at an indoor range). Only a few will answer once a month, and maybe one or two, once or twice a week, and the same for actual training.
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11,417 Posts
Find better instructors.
I agree... I'm not interested in learning about "low drag, high speed tacticool bullsh*t" taught by neckbeards. But I have found great instructors that teach practical defensive shooting.
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146 Posts
That's easier said than done depending on where you live.
But it could be good marketing, and a business opportunity, as well as a way to provide one avenue of access for solving the problem you are concerned about.
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The majority of gun owners have not received formal training and do not practice regularly. These same people make up the majority of self-defense situations where they successfully used a gun to defend themselves. Training makes you better... practice helps you remain "better". The fact is that for most average people simply living their lives, the type of circumstances that they find themselves in that require the use of a firearm, is not rocket science. In many of these instances, emotional fortitude, general knowledge of how the weapon works, a general ability to hit a pie plate at 10 paces and common sense, is about all that is needed. People do it all the time while having less skills than I just described. Realistically, the average criminal is not some spec-op commando.
I dont say this to suggest that people should not train... training is good and I am a proponent of training. That said, I think that there may be a segment of gun toters that want this stuff to be rocket science so that they can feel as if there is a much wider margin between themselves and the average joe who doesnt live on the training field.
I am more concerned with people driving on the roadway with minimal training.
I dont say this to suggest that people should not train... training is good and I am a proponent of training. That said, I think that there may be a segment of gun toters that want this stuff to be rocket science so that they can feel as if there is a much wider margin between themselves and the average joe who doesnt live on the training field.
I am more concerned with people driving on the roadway with minimal training.
Some reasons they avoid ........
1. Cost
2. Convenience - schedule, distance
3. Boredom - no real interest in firearms
4. Poor instructors
5. Feel no need beyond basic firearms training
I knew two elderly ladies who shot and killed home intruders. (One was written up in the American Rifleman's Armed Citizen column.) The ladies were armed with revolvers. They picked up the weapon, stored in a drawer, pointed it at the intruder and fired 6 shots into the chest.
They had no expensive, hours long training at a distant firing range.
They did not have the fear of being sued implanted into their brains.
They acted to protect their lives.
1. Cost
2. Convenience - schedule, distance
3. Boredom - no real interest in firearms
4. Poor instructors
5. Feel no need beyond basic firearms training
I knew two elderly ladies who shot and killed home intruders. (One was written up in the American Rifleman's Armed Citizen column.) The ladies were armed with revolvers. They picked up the weapon, stored in a drawer, pointed it at the intruder and fired 6 shots into the chest.
They had no expensive, hours long training at a distant firing range.
They did not have the fear of being sued implanted into their brains.
They acted to protect their lives.
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1,748 Posts
Probably going to get roasted for this but.........
Freedom is hard. The ability to defend oneself and those they care for is a right. Is there some risk for allowing people to lawfully defend themselves, sure there is. Life is dangerous...........something many have forgotten or have been told it should be otherwise.
I would much rather live in a world where we're all free to choose how we go about defending ourselves than living under the thumb of another who wishes to control how I do it.
Is training a good thing...........absolutely. Instead of trying to mandate training or ridicule those that don't have much or any maybe passing knowledge down and paying it forward. It's a slow process but changing the culture is a much more permanent and is resilient to forces that want to render us defenseless. Heck, that's what the other side has been doing for the last 60 years which has put us in the place we are now. Changing hearts and minds takes time....patience.
Freedom is hard. The ability to defend oneself and those they care for is a right. Is there some risk for allowing people to lawfully defend themselves, sure there is. Life is dangerous...........something many have forgotten or have been told it should be otherwise.
I would much rather live in a world where we're all free to choose how we go about defending ourselves than living under the thumb of another who wishes to control how I do it.
Is training a good thing...........absolutely. Instead of trying to mandate training or ridicule those that don't have much or any maybe passing knowledge down and paying it forward. It's a slow process but changing the culture is a much more permanent and is resilient to forces that want to render us defenseless. Heck, that's what the other side has been doing for the last 60 years which has put us in the place we are now. Changing hearts and minds takes time....patience.
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Same as cops. There was a DOJ report some years ago that looked at OIS from the top skill level to barely able (out of the academy). It was about even. Chaos rules, training helps.
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This right here. Every combat situation. I have faced it never ceases to amaze me how people react exactly as they have been trained. If you've never been trained and think you can make it up as you go along think again...you aren't that good and you don't think that fast under extreme stress. Trained soldiers ALWAYS fell back on their training when the SHTF and afterwards to a man will tell you I didn't think I just reacted exactly how we trained... You may think self defense has nothing to do with combat and you are probably right. We had armor and grenades and indirect fire, machine guns etc etc etc... AND almost always outnumbered our enemy 4 or 5 to 1. Defending yourself on the streets is from a violent threat is far more hazardous.
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51,135 Posts
Sorry for your experience. It's never a good look to start off a class by speaking from up on a high horse. Folks are folks, and they deserve to find an instructor who can treat them as folks and make them feel welcome, creating a learning environment that encourages them to participate and enjoy learning.
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51,135 Posts
Sadly, there are innumerable numbers of instructors who take an instructor class and think they are one.
After I'd passed the oral interview to be accepted on our range staff, and was being prepared to be sent off for my basic firearms instructor class, they made it quite clear that when/if I passed the class, I was going to be an apprentice instructor. I was kept under the watchful eyes of the senior staff for at least the first year, so the head instructor could make sure I was not only applying the basics I'd learned, but continued to learn how to train others. I had to pay my dues, so to speak, and demonstrate I was worth further training.
I wondered how smaller agencies made it work if they only had one instructor, and that person just had the basic instructor training under their belt. Then, I realized that in some agencies people were sent off to instructor training who not only were barely competent shooters themselves, but had been assigned to serve as instructors. I met one guy from a small agency who said he'd been sent to training against his wishes, and thought it was a form of punishment.
In the firearms instructor update I attended a few years before I decided to retire, I was appalled at not only the shooting skills, but the 'instructor' skills being exhibited by some of the people in the class. And that class was for agency instructors who were already serving as instructors, and had already passed at least a basic instructor class of some sort. There were a few people in that class who struggled to pass the scored course-of-fire, demonstrate identification of stoppages and how to quickly resolve them (without raising their hands to ask for help), let alone step in and take over training situations, etc. By the time that week was done, I was (sadly) unsurprised that at least a couple of the 'working instructors' failed to pass the class and return to their agencies with class certificates. Damn.
I've seen a few instructors from other agencies come through the classes we taught at my former agency, who seemed as though they really ought to be going through remedial training.
The world continues to spin round, though.
After I'd passed the oral interview to be accepted on our range staff, and was being prepared to be sent off for my basic firearms instructor class, they made it quite clear that when/if I passed the class, I was going to be an apprentice instructor. I was kept under the watchful eyes of the senior staff for at least the first year, so the head instructor could make sure I was not only applying the basics I'd learned, but continued to learn how to train others. I had to pay my dues, so to speak, and demonstrate I was worth further training.
I wondered how smaller agencies made it work if they only had one instructor, and that person just had the basic instructor training under their belt. Then, I realized that in some agencies people were sent off to instructor training who not only were barely competent shooters themselves, but had been assigned to serve as instructors. I met one guy from a small agency who said he'd been sent to training against his wishes, and thought it was a form of punishment.
In the firearms instructor update I attended a few years before I decided to retire, I was appalled at not only the shooting skills, but the 'instructor' skills being exhibited by some of the people in the class. And that class was for agency instructors who were already serving as instructors, and had already passed at least a basic instructor class of some sort. There were a few people in that class who struggled to pass the scored course-of-fire, demonstrate identification of stoppages and how to quickly resolve them (without raising their hands to ask for help), let alone step in and take over training situations, etc. By the time that week was done, I was (sadly) unsurprised that at least a couple of the 'working instructors' failed to pass the class and return to their agencies with class certificates. Damn.
I've seen a few instructors from other agencies come through the classes we taught at my former agency, who seemed as though they really ought to be going through remedial training.
The world continues to spin round, though.
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811 Posts
When I’m shooting in competition I’m not really thinking. Things are happening much to fast to consciously ‘think’ through every step. I think of it as a flow state. Even when things don’t go perfectly I tend to stay in that state until the end of the stage.
To me, training involved mentoring by other shooters, reading With Winning in Mind and Breaking the Shot multiple times. Those helped me learn how to manipulate the guns correctly, efficiently and accurately but didn’t help get me to flow.
That took years of practice.
Both SD situations I experienced dropped me immediately into flow, which made the adrenaline dump manageable and maybe even beneficial, though I was exhausted afterward.
It takes both training, the easy part, and practice the hard part which is a journey, not a destination.
To me, training involved mentoring by other shooters, reading With Winning in Mind and Breaking the Shot multiple times. Those helped me learn how to manipulate the guns correctly, efficiently and accurately but didn’t help get me to flow.
That took years of practice.
Both SD situations I experienced dropped me immediately into flow, which made the adrenaline dump manageable and maybe even beneficial, though I was exhausted afterward.
It takes both training, the easy part, and practice the hard part which is a journey, not a destination.
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