Who -
Who attended? I attended, along with my friend, "Butler."
Who taught? Instructors were Bryan and Jay.
Who could take this and benefit from it? Most people. Have a little experience with your rifle, first.
Who did I like and who did I want to punch? I liked all of the instructors and participants. One non-participant observer was just a tad annoying, and only a couple of times. Jay shut him down before he could make too much of an idiot of himself.
What -
What class? Fighting Rifle
What did I do? All of the drills as guided by the instructors.
What did I learn that I expected? Virtually all aspects of fighting with a rifle in relatively close quarters.
What did I see? A very well put-together syllabus executed for students of most skill levels.
What did I hear? This is the fun part. The instruction was good. The correction was, occasionally, misplaced. On occasion, the primary instructor would issue a correction when that "issue" was not being performed incorrectly. Example: on many exercises, the primary instructor would say "keep your head up... while the participant had his head *up*.
What gear did I use? A home-built M4A1 SOPMOD Block II - ish clone with an Aimpoint. My pistol was a S&W M&P 2.0 C.
What gear did everyone else use? Mostly AR15's - one or two AK47's.
What was I good at and what did I work on? As expected, I was among the best marksmen on the line, as was Butler. This allowed me to work on adding material and presentation concepts for my classes.
What class will I take next? Sniper Basics from Tactical Response.
What did I learn from other students? I could fill a novel with this as I had the luxury of not having massive amounts of pressure to reload, nor having to take notes on any new material. I learned most how the students absorbed the material, and reacted to the cold, incorrect suggestions (see above), and getting tired.
What did I learn at dinner with the instructors? Jay has lots of "war stories" - actual war, as well as instructor funny stories.
What did I learn from the lectures? There were no real lectures.
Where -
Where did you come from and where did you attend? I came from Mt. Juliet, and attended at Camden.
Where did you hear about Tactical Response? Internet, years ago. I own several of their DVDs.
Where will you train next? Not sure. Perhaps back to Valor Ridge with my wife. I also have my eye on a few certifications. Those may come next.
When -
When did you hear about the class? Years ago.
When did you decide it was right for you? Right after Fighting Pistol.
When did you attend? March 19 & 20.
When did you know you made the right choice (defining moment)? When doing the drill to "race" to mag empty. I had a full mag. Was the first empty. That was cool.
Why -
Why do you train? Because I like to train. Because it is needed. Because I want to train others more effectively.
Why did you choose Tactical Response? In short - because some people said do not go there. And I've been there. And they boil the topics down to "stupid-simple."
Additional Thoughts
We started with the pistol draw. quickly did FAST, and transitions from rifle to pistol. Day 1 was about individual skills. Day 2 was a dive into teamwork. I figured out a lot when doing things their way, and they have been incorporated into my Urban Rifleman class.
Run this class with a clean, lubricated, AR15 using a red dot. Magpul PMAGs are the way to go. Zero your rifle ahead of time.
We shot out to *maybe* 75 yards. There was an emphasis on marksmanship, but like Fighting Pistol, a "combat effective" marksmanship was stressed.
AKs fail more often than good AR15s.
I'm really not a fan of jacking a round onto the ground during reloads. My class structure will resemble that doctrine.
The assistant instructors I have helping me are the best around.
I need to get back out and train some more myself. It's been far too long since I've taken a class. One thing I need to focus on starting now is better physical health! That's a huge part of training.
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