After Action Report
Course: LMS Defense Carbine 1
Dates: 16-17 October 2010
Location: Sacramento Valley Shooting Center
Equipment Used: Aim point red dot. Mag pull flip up front & rear sights. Shooting vest with AR 15 mag pockets. 511 single point sling with quick release.
Approx. Round Count: 700-800 rounds
Day 1: Met with instructor Jackson and other members of the class about 0830. After introductions I learned there was from business men, current law enforcement officers, retired officers, to active duty Marines taking the course. We immediately moved into range safety and the 5 rules of safety. 1. Always assume a gun is loaded. 2. Never point a gun at something you are willing to destroy. 3. Always be aware of your target and what is behind it. 4. Keep your finger off the trigger until you are on target and ready to engage the target. 5. If a weapon is dropped do not try and catch it.
Next we moved into the concept of line of sight versus line of bore. This means or typical AR 15 or M4 style gun that where you set your sights will not be where you bullet impacts the target. This is due to the sights sitting roughly 2 inches higher than where your barrel is. This turns out to be crucial to remember at distances less than 25 yards.
Next it was time to zero in our rifles from a distance of 50 yards in the prone position. This was done shooting at approximately half of 3 by 5 cards. We shot 3 round groups and adjusted our sights until everyone was putting all 3 shots in the card. Now we were prepared for shot accountability. Our rifles were now accurate; therefore we were responsible for our shot placement. This helped us with 2 new concepts. 1. Being aware of how we were handling our weapon while shooting, trigger control. 2. Also in a real life scenario if we were engaging a threat we would be responsible for our missed shots. See rule #3.
Now that our rifles were dialed it was our turn to begin the same process. This was done with several drills through out the day that were a good balance of weapon handling drills and marksmanship drills. In between our marksmanship drills we learned how to handle our weapon through several malfunctions that were intentionally induced in our rifles. We learned how to handle stove pipes, double feeds, failure to feed, failure to extract, and charging handle impingements. After we learned how to address those situations, we learned to handle them under stress induced by friendly competition and a clock.
Day 2: We again got a little bit of an early start shortly after 0830. This turned out to be quite fortunate because the morning was the only good weather we had that day. It began overcast and breezy, and immediately after lunch became windy and rainy for the remainder of the day.
We started off immediately doing some failure drills (2 to the body & to the head) along with NSR drills (non standard response 4 or 5 shot to the head or body). We soon begin putting everything we learned from day 1 together with shooting on the move, multiple targets, targets at different ranges and firing from different positions. We learned about shooting from the prone, kneeling, seated, and supine. We also learned how to safely move from one position to the other while engaging our target.
When we learned a new technique our instructor demonstrated it first then had us practice it dry (without firing) several to make sure we were all able to do it safely.
We then learned about transitioning our weapon from the strong side to the weak side of the body. Once we had that down we worked on drills on the move requiring us to transition on command. Later in the day we put it all together running a course of fire requiring us to use everything we had learned so far. The course started off at 50 yards shooting prone, the moving up to cover and kneeling shooting 2 rounds from different sides of cover. Than we moved forward and had to shoot under a barricade using a modified prone position. As we moved on the next set of cover we had to crouch behind cover to engage the next set of targets. The last part of the course of fire required shooting at targets on the move as the Instructor called them out either on your left or right.
We also did several more malfunction drills where we would leave our rifles with our classmates and they would set up a malfunction for us. Then when hearing the buzzer return to rifle engage our targets try to fire then have to address the malfunction that we had.
In summary I found it to be an excellent class for all levels of rifle shooters. I talked with other students who had previously taken the course and found it so beneficial to go back over the basics they were talking of coming and taking it again. I found the course to be great balance of marksmanship, weapons handling, safety, and real world techniques. When I left I felt much more comfortable and confident with my rifle and already looking forward to my next day on the range.