I recently attended an outstanding carbine training course presented by Spartan Concepts and Consulting, the training company owned and operated by my friend and Police1 colleague, Ken Hardesty.
Suffice it to say, Rapid Deployment Carbine is tailored to suit the experienced rifle operator from police, military, and armed security disciplines — there were top-tier shooters up and down the line.
Ken was on assignment, so the daylong class was skillfully instructed by Kyle Gentry and Tom Liu, each man a top-tier law enforcement officer from a San Francisco Bay Area police agency.
Gentry and Liu covered myriad skills and techniques and featured a wide range of drills. We shot paper and steel. We shot the nine-hole drill. We used a vehicle, spare tires, and other debris to transform the square range into a simulated urban environment.
Naturally, the entire assembled group of coppers present was collectively outstanding at marksmanship, at shooting and moving, at communicating during bounding and overwatch, and a variety of other courses of fire we practiced that sunny Sunday in San Jose.
In time, I hope to write about much — if not all — of what we worked on, but today I want to focus in on one specific area that I determined to be an “opportunity for improvement.”
That’s not to say I only had one area in which my skills need to be sharpened — just that I only have enough time today to write about one of them!
Don’t Hug Your Cover
In most armed confrontations, you’re doing yourself no favors by getting too close to your cover. It’s an understandable (and almost visceral) urge to snug right up next to your cover, and on more than one occasion I did precisely that — I ended up too close to my cover to be completely effective in getting my rifle on target quickly and accurately.
Fortunately, the training range is where we identify — and more importantly, where we correct — those mistakes.
In the photo (above and right), I’m communicating with my partner — and I’m told my communications were loud and clear — and I’ve made an improvement over a previous cycle, but still I could have been better positioned. During the next set of drills involving movement from one position of cover to another, I stopped about one full arm’s length farther back than you see in this illustration, and found it to be a much better position.
Exceptions to Every Rule
There are two — that I can think of, and there may be more — exceptions to this “rule” about not hugging your cover.
1.) When your opponent has the high ground on you. If your opponent has high ground, he will have greater visibility of your position the farther back you are and/or the higher above you he is.
2.) When your opponent is two or more in number, and at positioned at (or approaching) your flanks. The same geometry is true here, and need not be explained further.
“If either of those two things is true,” Hardesty said when I last spoke with him, “then you should probably be fighting your way to a better position.”
Many thanks to Ken, Kyle, Tom, and every single attendee present for an outstanding day of training and camaraderie on the range.
See you guys next time. Stay safe.
