AAR: TigerSwan 2-Day Tactical Pistol - Aug 27-28, 2011 - Pittsburgh PA

[offshorebear]

Previous Training Experience:
VSM basic pistol and carbine
Kyle Defoor intro Carbine
Tom Kier edged weapons/combatives

Class description: TigerSwan 2-Day Tactical Pistol Course.
Instructor: David Borresen
AI: Matt
Location: Pitcairn Monroeville Sportsman’s Club, Pittsburgh PA
Cost: $575
16 hours on the range, about 800 rounds fired

I know I have left out some parts of the class - my notes were incomplete. I apologize for forgetting or confusing the order of events.

Day 1: After intros and safety prayer, we began with a cold accuracy standards test, including freestyle, SHO, OSHO, kneeling, and prone shooting. This and all other drills in the morning we done on NRA B8 bulls at 25 yards. We scored our targets and began working on the fundamentals of marksmanship - stance, grip, SHO, OSHO, partner ball and dummy, presentation, sight picture, and follow through. One concept was presented at a time followed by a string of fire to test that concept. David and Matt would look at each target and give shooters advice and possible reasons why their group was the way it was.
Shooting bulls at 25 yards really requires “Brilliance in the Basics”. At that range and size of target, it’s much easier to separate your marksmanship flaws. David and Matt were helpful in diagnosing these flaws – you can tell they do this all the time with many different types of students.

After working on marksmanship, we did a walk back drill before lunch for a TigerSwan hat.

After lunch we moved up to the 10 yard line with IPSC targets. We worked on timed presentations under stress and multiple shots on one target. We then worked on target transitions. Tempo was incorporated into these drills, both constant tempo forcing you to transition between targets quickly, as well as changing tempo to make body and accurate headshots.

We then changed from a line of students to one at time. We did a rapid transition drill, which forces you to transition back and forth over ~120 degree arc. Each student did two timed runs, one where only A hits counted, and one where only A and C hits counted. The point of this was to show you the two extremes of slow and accurate and quick and inaccurate. Somewhere in-between would be an optimal time for the student.

We did a target ID drill that was very beneficial that incorporated accuracy, transitions, scanning, etc. These types of set ups were not repeated to the point that students were "gaming them" just for better score.

We finished the day with a variation of El Pres without the turn, and on really spread out steel targets. This combined transitions with accuracy, as well as stress from the timer and other students.


Day 2 began with more fundamentals of marksmanship again on the NRA bulls at 25 yards. We added kneeling and prone, as well some time constraints. SHO and OSHO slow fire, and timed SHO shooting was covered.

We did another walk back drill, but this time it was OSHO. Awesome.

We then went back to IPSC targets at 10 yards. We did time to first shot drills from the holster, and more tempo drills going between small and large targets.
After lunch we covered moving with the gun. How to run with a gun and how to stop running with a gun. We then did shooting on the move up and down range, as well as left and right.

While we were down at the 10 yard line we worked on SHO draws and reloads, as well as OSHO draws and reloads.

TD2 finished with what looked like a USPSA stage, but was well laid out to combine nearly everything that was covered over the course. Again, each student made two runs, one where all hits had to be A’s and one where C’s were also acceptable. Drop a shot and your run doesn’t count.

Positive/Negatives:
We spent nearly half the class shooting at tiny bulls at 25 yards. This seems imposing, and I heard some grumbles on the line, but this is a quick way to learn or polish the fundamentals. You can’t get away with much, but when you do have a problem it’s easy to diagnose. The gradual presentation of techniques with a constant high accuracy standard worked very well for me. You can tell that this is what TS does; their refined teaching approach was more than the sum of its parts. Many drills were presented for students to use for their own practice.

This class seemed to be a little more expensive and a little more ammo intensive than some others. Its still well worth it for the level of instruction you are receiving. The advertised 1200 round count was a little hard to swallow, but I’m glad I manned up and did it. I ended up having extra ammo, so what, it doesn’t go bad. This class was extremely high value. I was also concerned that my previous training wasn't up to par for this course. I scraped by ok!

This was also my second Grey Group hosted class. They make it so freaking easy. I love their 20% down payment system. Communication and organization was exactly what you would want.

[dunsho]

safety prayer??

I like higher rd count in a class. but if it asked for 1200 and only shot 800, it probably the case that the class wasn't....the class was slow.

[offshorebear]

Range safety rules. Sorry, habit from the monthly pafoa shoots.

[Shawn.L]

safety prayer??

I like higher rd count in a class. but if it asked for 1200 and only shot 800, it probably the case that the class wasn't....the class was slow.

Very few classes Ive ever been in hit the called for round count. Normally if you expect 800 you ask them to bring 1000. The last thing you want is to hit a hard stop when everyone runs out of ammo. And while a majority of this class was spent at the 25 yard line there are quite a few ?ammo intensive" drills that have the ability to run much more rounds if they need repeated if the students arent getting it. Beyond that on some drills such as "sustained fire shooting on the move" where you are to shoot as much as you can while holding on to an accuracy standard an experianced shooter may be able to empty out 17 rounds while another shooter only can get 4 or 5 hits , so over 3 itterations one has shot pver 50 rounds while the other has shot under 15. Repeat that a few times and not everyone shoots the same round count.

By my count I shot just over 900 rounds.

Either way, one cannt judge a class by how much ammo is burned, only by what is learned, the applicability of those skills presented, and wether or not the students are taught in such a way as to be able to absorb and then practice that information.

IMO this class was one of the best I have attended, and I have taken many.

I scraped by ok.

You did fuckin great.

Ive talked to a few guys about this class already and I just cant tell them enough how excellent it was.

There was constant meaningful personal attention for every shooter, and every shooter got challenged to the level of their performance and was either being introduced into new techniques or having existing techniques tweeked.

I have never had someone pay so much attention to me while I was shooting, and with 2 instructors it was consistant. There was no "good enough", or letting things slip, just tons of feedback and improvements.

It was also clear that they where following a well designed lesson plan full of discreet units that built upon one another. And while there was a lot of time spent shooting bulls at 25 there was also time spent doing exaggrated speed shooting as well. They pushed us on all sides of the coin.

I saw quite a few lightbulb moments for many in the class and had a few myself.

As an example I learned why the kneeling I was trying practice from Kyle Defoor wasnt working for me ( I took in the original info incorectly ) and with some hands on help got the same technique to work and realized what I had been doing wrong. I also got enough instruction on the "golf grip" in prone to make it usable for me and am planning on trying that out.

OH! And dont forget the target ID drills ! I wont do them justice here, and you really need to go into them cold for class, but lets just say I got some great stuff for us to do on the range ........ in the dark

Id recomend this class highly to both the novice and experianced shooter.

First thing I heard on the line on TD1 "This is not a feel good shooting class"

[Shawn.L]

TigerSwan
www.tigerswan.biz



Grey Group Training:
www.greygrouptraining.com