AAR - Combat Pistol Marksmanship with Randy Harris

[TFA303]

BLUF: Fantastic class for shooters of all skill levels.



This class began on a chilly Saturday morning in the beautiful environs of Knoxville. I was attending as a birthday present from my Lovely Wife. I've had quite a bit of formal and informal pistol instruction over the years, and she's had almost none, so we were a good representative sample of the shooting population.

After a few administrative notes, Randy started going over the PESTS EAT FAST methodology, which formed the foundation for the day's instruction. We covered situational awareness, body mechanics and attitude before we even got close to working on our drawstroke and dry-firing.

After lunch, we moved to the live fire portion, where we built on the concepts we'd covered earlier. The first step was firing One Perfect Shot, getting trigger and grip just right. From there, we moved on to shooting from the draw, then multiple shots, stepping off the X to shoot, headshots, and after-action drills.

Throughout the course, Randy was exceptionally helpful, patient and professional (despite his tendency to digress into ...creative... analogies). My LW was sick that day, and had to rest in the car some, but he was happy to give her individual instruction to get her back up to speed when she returned.

Lessons Learned:
- Pistol shooting is a perishable skill. Last October, I scored Expert on both the target and reactive courses before heading to Afghanistan. After a year behind a computer with no practice, my accuracy was nowhere near Expert.

- Things I need to work on: Overextending my shooting arm dips the muzzle; slide fingers around the grip when starting the draw; keep thumb flagged on the draw

- Bring lunch; don't count on easy access to fast food

- Don't bring a new gun to a class.

- No, really. Don't bring a new gun to class.

- Bring more ammo than the minimum required

- Mag loaders are worth every penny; time spent loading is time spent not training

- You don't know what you don't know. LW couldn't stop talking about this all the way home. There's a lot more to defense than just putting holes in the paper, and it's exciting and fun to have so much to learn.

- The SIG 556 is a FANTASTIC weapon. I tried to steal Randy's after he let us shoot it, but he caught me before I got it into my car.

[TattooedGunner]

Great AAR. Randy is a great instructor and a good guy to boot.


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[Randy Harris]

Thanks for the review TFA303! I really enjoyed teaching this class too.

You mentioned the mindset lecture before we get to the shooting....there is a reason for that. The HOW is a lot easier to comprehend when we cover the WHY first. After we lay the foundation it makes the goal more clear and attaining the goal easier. If we just launch into the shooting dry work with no clear reason for WHAT we are preparing for then we might as well just be learning to shoot a bullseye match. A lot of places cover how to shoot....but not much on context of how you will really be using it. The boy scouts can teach people how to shoot. We teach them to fight.

This class is a good introduction to who we are and what we do . Obviously there is only so much you can cover in 8 hours and I hope to see all you guys back in another 2 day class sometime down the road!

[TFA303]

... I hope to see all you guys back in another 2 day class sometime down the road!

Oh, you will!

[TattooedGunner]

PESTS EAT FAST is great for anyone that hasn't read it.


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[Indy]

Nice review. I enjoyed the class as well. The material covered in one day was on point in my opinion. I really cleaned up my draw stroke as well. Going to do my best to make Tunica, Randy.