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Last night’s episode was certainly an intriguing one!
My special guest, Aaron Israel of Fundamental Defense, and I had an interesting talk about the parallels between poker and self defense. Aaron uses those parallels to explain self defense principles in a way that I don’t think you’ve heard before, and his explanations may resonate strongly with a lot of ...
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I recently posted about the need for instructors to teach, and for students to learn, how to think during a defensive incident. Everyone agrees that it’s a necessary thing to do.
The problem is that many of the people agreeing don’t really know what it means.
Case in point: someone sent me a link to yet another video of a shooting drill. In it, ...
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A couple of weeks ago someone posted an interesting video on social media. It wasn’t the video itself which was interesting, but rather the reactions to it.
The video was of an exercise from a defensive shooting class. The exercise was a good example of forcing cognitive processing rather than a Pavlovian draw-and-fire response, which is good; a defensive encounter requires far more information processing ...
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Last night was the final episode of 2016 for my Personal Defense Network show, Training Talk. I thought it might be fun to gather as many of my guest experts as Google would allow for a big roundtable discussion about self defense and personal preparedness in 2016, and where we’d like to see it go in 2017.
If you missed the awesome live show, not to worry — you can watch the replay by clicking on this link!
Many thanks to ...
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My apologies if you’re not a fan of the show South Park, but an old episode has a training lesson for us.
On that episode, some little people known as Underpants Gnomes presented their 3-part success plan:
Phase 1: Steal underpants.
Phase 2: ???
Phase 3: Profit!
The joke, of course, isn’t that there’s nothing in Phase 2; it’s that you can’t ...
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A cryptic name for an episode? Maybe, but then again maybe it’s perfect!
My Special Guest Experts were Andy Loeffler and Joshua Gideon. Andy and I talked about a long-running experiment he did with some students and their ability to see when under stress. It was — if you’ll pardon the pun — an eye-opening discussion!
Joshua and I talked ...
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A really interesting List this week! We start with geese as a defensive tool (no, I’m not kidding); considerations to make before deciding to engage an active killer; a woman is dead because of an irresponsible and untrained gun owner; women shopping for defensive handguns; what to do and what not to do at a drive-through; how to secure private information on your smartphone; and how to use that phone to deal with 9-1-1.
I’ll admit ...
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I had a couple of great discussions with Rob Pincus and Caleb Causey on last night’s Training Talk show!
Rob talked about reality based training, force-on-force, and scenario training. Lots of people in the business use those terms interchangeably, but as Rob points out they’re not synonymous. It’s completely possible to have reality based training without running scenarios, and ...
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Lots of people have standards they steadfastly defend, even when those standards have no integrity. What does that mean?
I was recently told of a defensive shooting “standard” for draw-to-first-shot time, one a lot of instructors apparently use in their classes: 1.5 seconds if the gun is carried openly, or 2 seconds from concealment.
That seems quite odd to me. Not the times themselves, mind you — the fact there are two of them.
If you have a draw-to-first-shot standard for a defensive ...
Continue Reading →Last night’s Training Talk episode was a great one!
My special guest was Klint Macro with The Trigger Presser’s Union, and we had an in-depth discussion about defensive preparations for gun owners. He recently wrote an article for PDN about the topic, but in our discussion we went further into the topic — and then he gave me a teaching idea I’d never heard (and never would have thought of on my own.)
No, I’m not going to tell ...
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Just a month from now I’ll be teaching my Threat-Centered Revolver class in sunny Phoenix, and if you want to attend you need to book now!
December 3 & 4 I’ll be at Phoenix Firearms Training, basking in the warm sun and teaching responsible revolver owners how to defend themselves with the classic double action revolver. Whether you’ve got a snubnose you use as a backup gun or a full-size revolver you keep for home defense, this is the ...
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If your goal is to make you and your family safer, to learn how to survive dangerous events, you need a generalist’s perspective.
That’s because there are a wide range of things you need to know to make safety happen consistently, which means that you need to study and prepare in many different areas — most of which have little overlap. Most importantly, you need to know how everything works together to protect you.
In order to learn about each of those ...
Continue Reading →If you missed last night’s episode of Training Talk, you missed some great information!
My first guest was Tyler Grant of Dynamic Training Strategies, and we discussed continuing goals in defensive fitness: how to plan for success no matter where you’re starting your journey.
Then, Julie Loeffler from Mid-Ohio IMB came on and talked about how people new to the idea of self defense can take those initial and sometimes confusing steps into the training world.
In addition, I talked about clown sightings, ...
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One of my recurring nightmares (probably influenced by television) is being in a critical, terrifyingly dangerous situation with my wife. In every episode of this nightmare she can’t see the danger coming and I’m forced to yell instructions to her — instructions on either what do do (“run!”) or what not to do (“stay still!”) Instead of trusting my judgement, she uncharacteristically turns around and starts arguing! She’s then promptly swallowed by the expanding chasm, or eaten by the devilish apparition, or ...
Continue Reading →Is it Wednesday already? Well, no fear — I have information for you! Today: a look at the problems with secure areas, especially when they’re really secure; an article explaining striker-fired pistols; a civil suit can be worse than the criminal trial; Greg Ellifritz shares how NOT to take care of your carry gun; Sheriff Jim Wilson looks at “scanning”; what training overload is and how to avoid it; some information about kidnappings; if you’re at work when a disaster ...
Continue Reading →Last night’s Training Talk episode was full of great information about less-lethal self defense tools!
My special guest, Jarrod Needs, and I discussed the various kinds of less-lethal defensive options: their strengths, weaknesses, along with the silly and the useless. If you missed it, don’t worry — you can watch the replay just by clicking on this link!
– Grant Cunningham
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I received quite a number of emails, blog comments and social media interaction about Friday’s topic, “Meaningless increments of precision.”
A large percentage of them asked questions or made statements which revealed that the person was fixated on the notion that becoming a better shooter makes or keeps someone safer. This is going to sound strange coming from a “gun guy”, and it’s going to make a lot of gun guys (and gals) mad, but that’s a really bad notion.
Because ...
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When we talk about self defense (and particularly when gun people talk about self defense), the topic of measurement will eventually come up. In the gun world we love to measure things, and we can measure just about anything. The problem is that the measurements we make may not be important.
I use the term “meaningless increments of precision” to refer to those measurements which don’t add to our self protection knowledge or to our ability to defend ourselves. The measurement ...
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The world of self defense seems to be full of polarizing opinions. While it can be said that any field of specialization has its strong opinions (and adherents to them), my observation is that this one is by far the most Balkanized. It doesn’t matter how you look at it, someone else will see it very differently and be ready with a quick retort to your point of view. The disagreements are almost religious in nature, with all the trappings ...
Continue Reading →More great self defense articles this week, including: Julie Loeffler takes a look at common concealment methods for women; a realistic approach to defending schools; Greg Ellifritz shows you what to do if your attacker has pepper spray; the Taurus Judge is a joke for self defense; how to tell if the place you’re in is about to get dangerous; why you should carry more than one trauma kit; and dissecting the post-shooting “scan”. As always, you’ll find something you ...
Continue Reading →If you’re not watching my Training Talk show on Personal Defense network, you’re missing out on some great self defense and personal security information!
Take last night’s show, for instance. My guests were Barret Kendrick from Bearco Training, who showed us how to properly and safely draw and re-holster a gun carried in the appendix position, and Julie Loeffler of Mid-Ohio IMB who talked about how women can cut through the nonsense and get started in self defense training. ...
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“I think the late 90’s is where things started to shift because of dash/surveillance cameras becoming much more common and force-on-force scenario training taking huge leaps forward. The ramifications of those evolutionary forces are starting to be seen much more commonly. I hope in 10 years we look back and realize that right now we were only just scratching the surface of getting away from the isolated skill (marksmanship) and choreography (competition) based approaches.” – Rob Pincus
Those who ...
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Every once in a while I see the tired old cliché “we face the same criminals the police do!” It’s usually used to justify some particular type of defensive firearms training, too often centered around the trainer’s police experience.
The idea, of course, is that we need to adopt the attitudes, tactics, and armament of law enforcement. (If you know anything about typical police training, it’s usually substandard — so much so that cops themselves joke about it. With rare exceptions, ...
Continue Reading →More great self defense reading for this week! First, why you need to include a dog in your defensive planning; Greg Ellifritz considers what you should do after you’ve stopped the active killer; why you need a practice tourniquet in your kit; how to carry spare revolver ammunition; dealing with the spontaneous fight; how to properly analyze incident video; and dispelling some pervasive shotgun myths. Be sure to share with all of your friends!
Last night’s episode of Training Talk was great! I had a long conversation with one of the true experts in trauma response, Caleb Causey of Lone Star Medics.
We talked about tourniquets, pressure bandages, when to teach kids advanced first aid skills, the kinds of injuries that can cause massive trauma, how to carry a trauma kit no matter how you’re dressed, and a whole lot more. This is an episode that could save your life or the life of a ...
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In the last couple of years I’ve had a somewhat radical change in my thinking about self defense. Rather, a change in thinking about teaching self defense. I’ve always focused on helping that half-percent* of gun owners who are interested in taking shooting classes to improve their gunhandling skills. In that respect I’ve been like everyone else in this business. We all want the “serious” students, those people who will sign up for a 3-day weekend class and travel across the ...
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If you’re like most people who read this blog, you’ve already been through a CCW class of some sort. (CCW, of course, stands for Carrying a Concealed Weapon, which is a catch-all term for the practice, licensing and study to carry a handgun concealed on your person. The term ‘CCW class’ is generally applied to the courses which the law requires to be able to apply for a concealed handgun license.)
The CCW class is the first exposure many people have ...
Continue Reading →If you didn’t catch last night’s Training Talk episode, you missed some good information!
I covered gun safety from a slightly different point of view than you’ve probably heard before, as well as answering some viewer mail: one was about joining a gun club and the issues of cost; the other was about carrying a concealed weapon while high. I don’t mean at high altitude, either! With the number of states legalizing marijuana, this is becoming a potential issue and I thank ...
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Those of us in the defensive training world usually talk about bad guys as though they’re complete strangers. The rapist on the jogging trail, the masked home invaders, and the carjacker at the gas station are all anonymous. We don’t know them, they really don’t know us, but fate causes our paths to intersect.
When we talk about “situational awareness” it’s always about spotting bad guys in the crowd. When we train defensive shooting, we assume our attacker is someone from ...
Continue Reading →Did you catch the live broadcast of Training Talk on Personal Defense Network last night? If not, you missed a phenomenal show all about knife defense. Don’t worry, though, because you can still watch the replay!
My guest was Alessandro Padovani of Safer Faster Defense. I consider Alessandro to be THE master of the defensive use of the knife and one of the single best teachers I know in the defensive training world. He travels all over the ...
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