AFTER ACTION REPORT: Ernest Langdon 2-Day Tactical Pistol Course
October 9th &10th, 2010 at Aurora Sportsmen's Club in Waterman, IL

Introduction
First off, sorry that this AAR is coming a bit late: Last week got away from me and I had to drive from Chicago to Las Cruces, NM to compete in the New Mexico State IDPA Match (It was a total blast!). Anyway, on with the show...

Mr. Langdon needs little introduction here - if you haven't heard of Ernest, then check out some of his background/credentials: http://pistol-training.com/archives/3363

Over the summer, a few members from the McHenry (Illinois) IDPA club got out to the Illinois State IDPA Match and, unbeknownst to us, one of our members was in the USMC with Mr. Langdon and asked him to come out and shoot the match. Those of us fortunate to be squadded with Mr Langdon got a chance to pick his brain on the principles of performance, stage breakdown and other minutiae of pistol shooting.
(He won the match, overall…)

Since we had asked so much during the course of the day, and seeing that there was more to learn/deeper levels to dig into, we decided to ask about the possibility of Mr. Langdon coming back for more formal instruction. Early on, it was decided that holding a course geared towards the fundamentals of pistol shooting was probably more beneficial than a course oriented towards competition.

This AAR gives a brief overview of the course with regards to topics covered, presentation style, and things that I found most interesting.

My Background
Growing up near Chicago, I was exposed to handguns fairly late in life - I started shooting revolvers when I was ~25 years old - and purchased my first semi-automatic 3 years ago with the intent of starting USPSA, PPC and IDPA competition. Currently, I'm a SSR Expert in IDPA and mid-B Production Division competitor in USPSA. I've taken about 8-10 course: LFI/Mas Ayoob, Team Spartan (John Krupa), etc.

Class Statistics
-Weather was perfect for both days: Clear, upper 80's with a gentle breeze and mild humidity.

-The Aurora Sportsmen's Club (hence forth "ASC") is a great range: Excellent facilities, 600 yd Rifle range (in Illinois, that is a treat!), clean and well maintained. They're really looking to grow an IDPA club… Additionally, it is close to the Ho-Ka Turkey farms - Thanksgiving is right around the corner!! (Insert "bunch of turkeys" joke here... )
Attachment 6310

-Originally, we had 10 participants, but one had to cancel for a medical emergency.

-All used semi-automatics:
3 CZ 9mm (One well-maintained, high round count 75 SAO, one older 75 DA/SA, and one compact DA/SA)
2 Glock 9mm
1 Glock .40 with AmeriGlo tritium sights (Mine)
1 XD 9mm
1 XD in .45
1 S&W M&P 9mm with Warren 2-dot Tritiums.
1 Sig 229 in .357 Sig

-Mr. Langdon instructed using a .357 SIG S&W M&P with Speer 125 gr ammunition. The pistol was sporting Warren 2-dot Tritium sights. Additionally, he was running Arredondo magazine extensions.
Attachment 6308

-Most folks ran kydex holsters, three of us were using retention holsters (2 Serpas and 1 Safariland ALS). I didn't catch what Mr Langdon was using.

- One older CZ 75 B had a lot of problems and the user switched to a new stock DA/SA CZ compact that functioned well throughout the day.

-Round count was roughly 1000 rds. I shot 950 rounds and some shot as many as 1100.

-All shooting was done on paper (diagnose the hits), on IDPA targets. When targets were shot up, we'd glue on a paper IDPA target overlay. Sometimes Langdon would spray paint dots into the target which were used for transition drills.

-Cost was $400.00 for 2-days of instruction.

-Roughly 3 hours classroom/10 hours range.