Curing the Tactical Turtle

[Rob377]

Learning how to use the sights at speed under time pressure is a pretty BFD, and generally appears to be a rather large hole in most peoples' training/practice regimen. Striking up a perfect weaver stance and punching slowfire groups at 7-10yds as a practice session isn't an especially useful exercise.

 

[cedartop]

Learning how to use the sights at speed under time pressure is a pretty BFD, and generally appears to be a rather large hole in most peoples' training/practice regimen. Striking up a perfect weaver stance and punching slowfire groups at 7-10yds as a practice session isn't an especially useful exercise.

Big agreement there.

 

[esrice]

Learning how to use the sights at speed under time pressure is a pretty BFD, and generally appears to be a rather large hole in most peoples' training/practice regimen. Striking up a perfect weaver stance and punching slowfire groups at 7-10yds as a practice session isn't an especially useful exercise.

Exactly. So imagine my surprise when I didn't use them under stress.

 

[cedartop]

Exactly. So imagine my surprise when I didn't use them under stress.

Do you see that changing as you do more FOF ?

 

[esrice]

Do you see that changing as you do more FOF ?

Yes.

At the Lab we use After Action sheets to help us mentally work though the scenario we were just involved in. On the sheet it asks "Did you see and use your sights?" Looking back at my sheets I can see the progression from "No" to "Yes". It's not every time, but at first it was never.

 

[45calibre]

Did you not see them because you just didnt think about using them? Did it slip your mind? I have often seem people post about how in a fight you will most likely not even see or use your sights but everyone trains with them.

 

[esrice]

Did you not see them because you just didnt think about using them? Did it slip your mind? I have often seem people post about how in a fight you will most likely not even see or use your sights but everyone trains with them.

One of the ways scenarios differ from more traditional training is that the stimulus to shoot comes from within, as opposed to a timer or a "FIGHT!" command. You mentally have to run through an OODA Loop and this takes time and processing power. Slip my mind? I guess that would be one way to put it. I was so mentally focused on "OH CRAP, SHOOT HIM! SHOOT HIM!" that I drew as quickly as I could and fired.

The more scenarios like that I've been involved in, however, the more things "slow down" and I feel like I have time to make the important decisions.

 

[jaschutz79]

I'm just jumping in on the last few pages...but something i've learned is that you don't need much of a sight picture at close distances. From shooting competition and training FoF there is such a thing as acceptable sight picture. Whether you index your slide or look over the front sight. Your draw to natural point of aim is all i've every needed up close.

 

[esrice]

I'm just jumping in on the last few pages...but something i've learned is that you don't need much of a sight picture at close distances.

This is true. At the distance I took my shot I made my hits, which were both centered, but they were low, around the belly region. Looking back I believe I had the time and opportunity to use my sights, and my shot placement would've been better for it.

 

[jaschutz79]

Hey in a fight i will take hits anywhere center of body. Something that Ron Avery taught me on draw is imagining ringing a door bell. Pointing that finger where you want to hit.

But in close contact, i expect my shots to be low due to drawing to retention. When i can create space i'll worry getting them centered if the threat continues.

 

[Rob377]

Rob, your experience is not unheard of. Some people involved in close personal combat say they never have any of the BAR symptoms. If numerous studies, interviews, and anecdotes are true, the majority of people do experience some degree of tunnel vision and or auditory exclusion.Whether or not CFS is the answer for this I am not commenting on, but it is pretty much commonly agreed on that these things do happen to many people faced with life or death situations.

This was another thing I wanted to touch on - What people actually see and do are very often quite different from what those people consciously remember seeing and doing. It would be mistaken to take their imperfect conscious recollection as the WHOLE story. That's the reason for the oft-repeated "I'll take circumstantial evidence over an eyewitness any day!" claim among litigators.

I very rarely have any conscious recollection of looking at and seeing the magwell when reloading - but my match videos tell me otherwise. Maybe more life and death-y -There's a whole bunch of things I don't remember doing/seeing when I was run over by a tanker truck (motorcycles will be the death of me), but the evidence indicates that I did. Same thing when racing.

The brain is a bit of a mystery in the way that it processes information and decides which pieces to hand up to the conscious mind and which ones to handle on its own without telling anyone. How many times have people, when their conscious mind is occupied with something else, been completely unable to recall where they just set their keys or cell phone and had to tear apart the house looking for them?

 

[HICKMAN]

Even in matches many don't find the front sights when targets are up close, point shooting all the way.

 

[rvb]

Rob,
thanks for sharing those experiences (and for your service!).

I like the motorcycle analogies. I would like to add that learning to "look where you want to go" (the mantra riders live by to avoid that target fixation which leads to crashes into mailboxes, etc) is something that is learned and applied, withOUT thousands of repitions in practice or "muscle memory." It's something that you decide ahead of time to do. I know remembering to look through a turn saved my ass a couple times when conciously I thought for sure there was no way the laws of physics were going to keep my wheels on the ground or me out of the gaurd rail. (perhaps some other interesting gun/MC vision parallels there). I didn't practice by crashing into gaurd rails 1000 times. And there's really no way to practice for the first time your rear tire decides to try to pass the front in the rain...

[sigh, I miss my R1]

I had a bit of a scary incident once. I do not believe weapons were involved, so perhaps the oh-stuff-o-meter wasn't pegged as high as it could have been... I was in college, before OH had carry permits (possibly before I even owned a gun). It was a nice day and I was sitting at an intersection, tunes playing, windows down, but doors were locked. Condition white, if you prefer. I'm looking left waiting for a break in traffic so I can make a right.

Suddenly there is a dude hanging all the way inside my passenger window yelling something and grabbing at me. I start wailing at him w/ my right hand (hard to hit solidily when sitting in a car), while verifying I wasn't going to T-bone anybody if I gassed it... hit the gas and forced my right-of-way turning right into traffic (driving w/ the LH, swinging away with the RH). Guy fell out or bailed at some point; I found a place to park and let the shakes die down.

Total suprise ["ambush", "CDI"]. BAM there's a dude in my face. then the adrenaline dump. There was no weapon that I saw. Had it been a gun/knife, would my reactions have been different? I dunno... It's possible there may have been a weapon I didn't notice. I remember seeing him attack at me, me starting to punch, looking left at traffic, making the decision I could pull out w/o killing someone else. vision might have tunneled, or I just don't recall my perifery, but I didn't fixate on what startled me, I made decisions. I will say it's possible my brain shut my hearing down as I don't know what he was yelling ("get out of the car," "give me your wallet," "can I buy you a cup of coffee," ?) but it was the yelling that initially got me to look right. Maybe my hearing was fine and he was just being loud/incoherent.

[I don't recall if I crouched my head down or kept it up for better driving visibility]

those aren't the best events for a group of gun folks to look at, I know, but they are my experiences that shape my opinion on how I will react to a suprise encounter.

My bigger lessons came in terms of awareness and avoidance... things like learning to be aware of who's around me even while watching traffic at an intersection and using the AC in town even if I prefer fresh air.

I think FoF type training can provide a lot of great lessons such as how to protect the gun or get to it while in a grapple, and even when to make that decision on when to draw/shoot, etc. I hope to do a little more of that. However, "startle response conversion," to me, is a lot like "look through the turn." Are you able to do what needs done as quickly as possible, even if it goes against your instinct? There are M/C riders that drive straight into mailboxes, parked cars, signs, etc all the time despite knowing better and no reason they couldn't have avoided the crash. Would more riding training change that?

I also think there is a point of being too ready/jumpy... as a civy/non-leo, I'm much more likely to be startled by a backfiring lawnmower or someone running up behind me to give me a hug (maybe..., ok probably not) than ambush gunfire or assault. Going to the gun cannot be my "instinctive" response when startled. It may be an appropriate conscious reponse once I've assessed whatever startled me (and that could only take miliseconds).



-rvb

 

[Rob377]

Rob,
thanks for sharing those experiences (and for your service!).

I like the motorcycle analogies. I would like to add that learning to "look where you want to go" (the mantra riders live by to avoid that target fixation which leads to crashes into mailboxes, etc) is something that is learned and applied, withOUT thousands of repitions in practice or "muscle memory." It's something that you decide ahead of time to do. I know remembering to look through a turn saved my ass a couple times when conciously I thought for sure there was no way the laws of physics were going to keep my wheels on the ground or me out of the gaurd rail. (perhaps some other interesting gun/MC vision parallels there). I didn't practice by crashing into gaurd rails 1000 times. And there's really no way to practice for the first time your rear tire decides to try to pass the front in the rain...

[sigh, I miss my R1]

....

Yep. Motorcycles are a wonderful way to get some first hand experience with a full on "oh-poop-I'm-gonna-die" startle response. That's why they're so much fun. Most of us will never be in a gunfight (quite thankfully), so these analogues are as close as we can get to a real startle response in which every neuron in your head instantly and intuitively understands it may have fired for the last time. You can't get the full weight of that from reading a book, you simply can't.

That's a very good point about the relative effort needed to short circuit the natural response. It does not huge amounts of "time and money to devote to training in all the latest tactics," just a bit of self-awareness. Which, bringing as back on topic, was exactly what Caleb was talking about with racers. Like most things that carry death or serious injury as a consequence for doing it wrong, it cannot be trained "regularly in context under stress with a real startle stimulus" You certainly don't jump on the bike, point it at a wall or oncoming traffic and pin it just to practice. It comes down to awareness - which shouldn't be too controversial. Be aware of where your head is at. Be aware of where your eyes are. If you catch yourself staring at something, or your right hand desperately reaching for that lever, just STOP IT.

If you start from the premise that you can't possibly retrain the natural response, you're already screwed. I'd strongly encourage you to never ever ever ever take up motorcycles, because I can say for certain that demonstrably incorrect belief will get you killed eventually. (and I can say it without the irony or sarcasm you've come to expect!)

 

[esrice]

Like most things that carry death or serious injury as a consequence for doing it wrong, it cannot be trained "regularly in context under stress with a real startle stimulus"

Perhaps this is the crux of where we disagree. I absolutely believe that such things can be trained "regularly in context under stress with a real startle stimulus". Just because many people do not doesn't mean that it's not possible.

You certainly don't jump on the bike, point it at a wall or oncoming traffic and pin it just to practice.

No, but fighter pilots of have been "losing" dogfights for years on high-tech simulators. They don't just jump in a plane and go at it.

It comes down to awareness - which shouldn't be too controversial. Be aware of where your head is at. Be aware of where your eyes are. If you catch yourself staring at something, or your right hand desperately reaching for that lever, just STOP IT.

I agree that awareness is one piece of the pie, but it isn't the only thing one needs.

This has turned into a much better thread than it started out. I appreciate everyone's involvement and sharing of experiences.

 

[esrice]

So here's a really basic example showing several different people's reactions to being startled. Watch their hands, shoulders, and heads. Any conclusions to be drawn from this?

[video=youtube;xskXwTbBBnA]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xskXwTbBBnA[/video]

 

[Rob377]

So here's a really basic example showing several different people's reactions to being startled. Watch their hands, shoulders, and heads. Any conclusions to be drawn from this?

I conclude it would have been far funnier had he tried that with this guy.
<br>[video=youtube;eQrGtdAGnZI]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQrGtdAGnZI[/video]

 

[esrice]

I conclude it would have been far funnier had he tried that with this guy.

So we see similar setups and two different reactions. Why do you think the gentleman in the 2nd video went immediately into fighting?

 

[Rob377]

Probably because he thought it'd be funny. He was right.

 

[esrice]

Probably because he thought it'd be funny. He was right.

And we lost Rob again.