Course: Jason Falla (REDBACK ONE) 2-Day Intermediate Pistol Course - Nov 27-28, 2010 - Chino, CA
Location: Prado Olympic Shooting Park
The purpose of this review is to share my personal experience of taking the two day intermediate pistol course offered by Jason Falla (Redback One) through Grey Group Training. Hopefully it also serves as a set of notes for people that did attend so they can recall the skill sets we worked on. I will provide an overview of topics covered in the two days of training and personal impressions and experience(s). I won’t be able to cover everything but hopefully enough to give some insight into this class and the instructor.
Student count was about 16 mostly civilians and some LEO.
Day 1
Class started with a lecture about various topics that related to being a competent shooter. These topics included the following:
[ul]
[li]- Deep seated understanding of fundamentals (i.e. second nature to you)[/li][li]- Thinking about the difficulty of the shot you are about to make (high percentage/low percentage)[/li]o Distance to target
o Size of target
o Are you moving is the target moving
[li]- Thinking about the shot and planning it out[/li][li]- Shooting on the move[/li][li]- Safety Brief[/li][li]- Gear Placement [/li]o Holster location
o Mag pouch location
[li]- Shot Placement (locations of vital areas on the human body)[/li][li]- Types of Ammunition[/li]o Calibers
o Hollow Points, Ball
[li]- Mind Set, stress and anxiety[/li][li]- Mental Toughness[/li][li]- Breathing[/li][/ul]
We then hit the range and started a set of self assessment drills and Jason showed us how to break down the deficiencies so we could self analyze ourselves in the future. I believe we shot at 5/10/15/20/25yds and Jason came around and helped us understand what we can improve on. We also went over reloading as Jason wanted to introduce us to an efficient way of conducting the reload (palm up/ palm down). He asked we do our ready checks in a similar fashion which helps make us more proficient at both skills (reloading/ ready check) making the most out of the overlap in training.
We then moved to working on transitioning between high percentage shots and low percentage shots at 7 yds. We would shoot at various 7" circles and 3" circles based on the command that was given.
One of the things I have found unique to Jason is his emphasis on the lower body and how he teaches your stance. As most people know, your stance is a very important fundamental to help control your recoil. Jason advances this skill set by having us shoot with the feet in different positions (left foot forward/ right foot forward/ slightly leaning on one foot etc) . Basically to get us used to shooting with different foot positioning while maintaining a solid center of balance to control the recoil. He reminded us that we may be transitioning from something else (moving someone, parrying a punch, moving out of the way, moving) and our lower bodies will not always be in that nice square fighting stance. So it is important to get used to shooting with different foot positioning.
We then worked on the draw and then the high ready/ high port position. Jason explained to us the pros and cons of these ready positions and we utilized these throughout the course.
The day ended with a team drill utilizing communication and most of the skill sets we had learned throughout the day.
Day 2
Day two started with a timed assessment, as Jason likes to say “Cold and on Demand”. A few people asked that I post the test and I got the ok from Jason to do so. He wanted me to note that the qual times are STUDENT times and there were more advanced times that I didn’t write down.
[ul]
7yds
[li]1 Rnd Body From Holster 1.75 sec[/li][li]1 Rnd Low Ready .75 sec[/li][li]1 Rnd High Ready .75 sec[/li][li]2 Rnd From Holster 2 sec[/li][li]Failure Drill from Holster 3 sec[/li][li]5 Body 1 Head Strong Hand Only from Holster 6.5 sec[/li][li]1 Body Reload 1 Body from Holster 5 sec[/li][li]7 Body 1 Head from Holster 6 sec[/li][li]6 Body Support hand 5 Sec[/li][li]8 Head from Holster 5 Sec[/li][li]Shooting on The Move (SOTM) 2 body (10-7yds) 3 sec[/li][li]3 Body 2 Head (SOTM) 6.5 sec[/li]20 yds
[li]6 Body 10 sec[/li][li]3 Body from Kneeling 6 sec[/li][li]6 prone 10-11 sec[/li][li]7yds[/li][li]16 rounds body with one reload 11 sec[/li][/ul]
From these set of drills I wrote down my hits and misses and if I had made the par time or not. I never went over time but I did have C zone hits so I probably could have utilized my time better. These drills are more or less a set of drills to help diagnose weak areas and improve them. Jason showed us how to break down the mechanics (i.e. how fast is your draw, where can you become more efficient?) using the par times. After going through that thought process you can find out what needs to be better to make our shooting more efficient.
Jason showed us a neat way to practice trigger reset when dry firing. You can incorporate this into malfunction drills as well. I definitely will be utilizing that since mine needs improvement.
Next we went over acceptable sight pictures. Jason drew out some sight pictures and demonstrated how accurate they were at 7yds. Then we setup and did the Compass Drill to gauge what an acceptable sight picture for us was at 7yds. He recommended that we have a good understanding of what sight pictures we need to get the accuracy we want at various distances. So we did a few drills where we used our acceptable sight pictures to make faster shots.
The second to last lesson of the day was about cadence at 7yds. The idea behind this was to find the speed of shooting where you start to lose accuracy. This was achieved by shooting 1 round per second on a target and slowly reducing the split time until you reach a breaking point. Then you continue to practice at that speed until you get faster. I believe the goal was 6 rounds in 1.5 seconds with the gun presented all in the black.
Our last assessment drill was a modified 700 point aggregate. First time I have shot it and I did poorly, most people were humbled and I find it a great test to do every now and then to gauge your improvement and find where you are weak at. The qualifying score was 620 I believe for anyone that is interested.
We ended the day with a couple of tactical drills all involving shooting on the move and a mix of shoot or no shoot targets. Jason also added a little bit of stress by shooting with us as our partner when we ran the course of fire.
Summary
This was an intermediate level course. My fundamentals are not as great as they should have been and so I was dragging through some of the exercises.
I still did pick up many important things along the way though. Jason wants to push you to the next level in the class but also leave you with some homework that you can do to get even better. We were also taught some more advanced skills (high port, high ready, feet positioning, and more) which we can add to our current skill set. This course provided the student with education on how to train to become a better shooter. So I do think if you are looking for a course that is above the beginner level this class should fit the bill. There were a lot of seasoned shooters but I am fairly certain they were able to walk away with a few nuggets of knowledge that they didn’t have before.
Jason is also very down to earth and approachable so do not be afraid to ask Jason to pay attention to something you are doing or ask for help.
Thanks SMGLee and Grey Group Training for bringing Jason out to California again!
Pics should be coming once they are processed.
