Here is my take on some of this. Keep in mind, I am merely relaying my experience/perspective, which in no way comes close being authoritative on the matter.
Class rules: SouthNarc could address that best, but in general you could say keep in mind that everyone should be there to learn and to facilitate the learning process for others. You should not be there to bolster your ego or show everyone how cool or skilled you are. My class had an former SEAL team member and an active Army SF soldier in it. Both had been in the class at least once before (maybe more) and they both were helping everyone learn as much as they could (quiet professionals - yep, that phrase fit them perfectly). Their mere presence in the course as repeat students should be indicative of the value this class has. Conversely, you are not there to give anything less than all you have or to shrink from a challenge. My impression was that safety of all the participants was always a primary consideration for both fellow students and the instructor.
- I saw a submission in my class. My buddy (a MMA/BJJ fellow) was able to get to to the rear of his opponent and applied a choke. SouthNarc ended it very quickly once the choke materialized. Keep in mind, this was not necessarily a “desired outcome” and I believe my buddy did this almost out of reflex associated with his training and background.
In the video of the event, SouthNarc can be heard saying “No, no (insert name here)…” or something to that effect because this evol is essentially a deadly force encounter and the basic idea is to get the hell away from the attacker(s) or to end it as decisively as possible (obtain proper position, acquire weapon and end the threat). You can argue that my buddy could have terminated the threat using the choke, but it would also be possible the bad guy could have successfully defended/countered or otherwise accessed an edged weapon, which would have either dragged on the fight or taken it to another level.
In this particular case, my guess was SouthNarc did not want my buddy treating this like it was an MMA match. This is not the same thing as saying MMA skills are not extraordinarily useful in this context. They absolutely are invaluable, but you do not want to treat a life-threatening encounter like an MMA match. There are some critical points where they diverge from each other. SouthNarc points out all of this in the class.
Striking is allowed, but participants are reminded why they are there and to essentially not be an idiot with them. One thing I noticed about striking that may be peculiar to me as one not-so-skilled in the fighting arts, I did not see near as much striking as I thought I would. In fact, there are times I forgot about striking completely until I was struck. That brings you to your senses fairly quickly. Head strikes are allowed if they are done with good discretion. You wear a FIST helmet and mouthguard. SouthNarc breaks the action immediately if he sees a problem (helmet coming off etc) or if someone is ramping it up into “psycho” territory.
To allay your fears, prior to taking this class I had a basal skull fracture from a fall a couple years earlier. It was significant enough to cause leak cerebral-spinal fluid out my nose. Luckily, I recovered without surgery, but it scared me quite a bit and made me paranoid about head-injury. The leak recurred one time since then due to some Def-Tac training I was doing with my buddies without decent protective gear. I was worried about getting struck in the head at this class because of this prior injury. I made up my mind to suck it up and take the class. I took a couple bops to the head, but nothing that would cause concern while wearing the appropriate protective gear.
From what I experienced, striking was a means-to-an-end, not an end in and of itself. I suppose if you were very skilled (or even lucky) you could knock a guy out early on (assuming real-life encounter - the class is not a place to be trying to knock out someone), but once you get entangled you become consumed with trying to control your opponent, protect/retain your weapon and achieve a dominant position. Any strikes that can help you achieve those things are fine, but it is not like a fight at high school or the bar. The presence of weapons (disproportionate armament) and the fact the scenario is posited as a life/death struggle changes the game considerably.
In many of these scenarios (especially two-on-one), you don’t know “it’s on” until “it’s on” and you’re getting assaulted (unequal initiative). Sure, you realize you are in a class where people are going to assault you, but in trying to keep with the principles of training for real-life, you cannot just pull your handgun and start blazing because some guy came up to you and asked you for a cigarette. You’ll quickly learn how much of a liability it is to draw a handgun prematurely.
Lethal force - Is it emphasized? In my opinion, no. The first four hours of the class is MUC or Managing Unknown Contacts. It contains extremely useful information on how to avoid confrontations and gives you techniques/strategies for dealing with these encounters. So, it is fair to say the class is not biased towards solving the problem with lethal force. Beyond that, this class does very effectively allow you to experience learning how to operate in the following context:
“You are up to your neck in it, how are you going to survive this encounter?”
Appropriately, you do spend time learning when and how to deploy your lethal force option. After all, the course is designed to prepare you for “Extreme close-quarters” encounters. However, there is no pre-determined outcome for the scenarios and your judgement and decision-making can have a major impact on the use-of-force deployment and ultimate outcomes. No one strips you of the flexibility to respond in creative ways and possibly to defuse or escape a dire situation. interestingly, I did see at least two scenarios play out many times. People fall back on deploying their handgun when 1) The threat may not justify it, or 2) When they are not in the proper position to do so (and lose the gun or at least struggle to retain it). Knives can also be in play for these scenarios.
In my case, I ran the 2-1 scenario as an LEO. Even though I was up against two people, my initial contact was a single person who was hysterically reporting their daughter had been injured. This person continually encroached upon me setting off all the alarms it should have. I responded as best I could, but did not draw my sidearm. I simply could not justify drawing down on the guy at that time (could not articulate a threat requiring deadly force as a response). I certainly was not going to play it like a game and draw on him because I knew I was in ECQC and likely to be attacked.
Before long, I was so cognitively overloaded and hyper-focused on this guy (thinking he was gonna jump me) that I did not see the second attacker who blinded me from the right side. I went down hard with two guys on me - which can be very disorienting. At that point, I am “in it” and am concerned with retaining my weapon. I was never able to recover to get a good position from which to act offensively. In fact, the FIST helmet pressed up against my face tightly and blacked out my vision. Breathing was very difficult, so I focused on not panicking. It was a very good learning experience. I can see where the stress-inoculation aspect of doing this can be valuable in and of itself.
This class changed my perspective on what I need to do to ensure my safety and prevail in a similar encounter. It also opened my eyes up to the reality of deploying a firearm in a truly close-quarters (I can reach out and touch you-distance) encounter. Not many folks really understand that, even fewer get to experience it.
Hope this helps. Take the class.
