Firearms Training

Student continues to learn new skills

October 10th, 2006  

Here is a letter from a student:

Dr. Piazza,

First of all the class is incredible. Like all your classes, I wasn’t sure what to expect and it ended up outreaching my furthest expectation.

Also like all your classes I come into them thinking I will probably just take it once and then work on it at home and not bother retaking it.

Once I get into each of your classes, I realize that no matter how much I work on the material at home nothing can beat having your world class instructors refine my techniques and so usually around the first half-hour of the classes I come to the realization that I am going to want to come back on a regular basis to further my education/technique/mindset/etc.

Luckily I have so many Gray Certificates and so many friends who want to join me at Front Sight that I don’t need to think twice about it.

The instruction, like always was great. The instructor has a great sense of humor and is very encouraging especially when we are working hard. All.

He is also very in tune with the class and can tell when we are exhausted to point where we are having a hard time learning and are starting to practice our techniques sloppily. And like most of your staff he is always open to questions and suggestions.

My main reason for taking this class was two-fold. First, I am legal to carry a concealed weapon in 30-35 states (depending on current reciprocity agreements) and have become quite uncomfortable when I am forced to go into sterile areas like court houses and airplanes. For this reason I decided that I wanted to learn some martial arts. You could say carrying concealed on a daily basis took me from being a UI* to a CI* in regards to my level of knowledge on unarmed self defense. My first thought was to take classes locally but then I realized that I wanted usable skills immediately and I knew that Front Sight would be the place to find those.

The skills I gained this weekend far surpassed what I thought I would get.

Although the number of bad situation that I could run into are numerous it quickly became apparent that what your instructors taught us this weekend will cover about 99% of them quite effectively. The lesson plan was simple and techniques were worked enough to have put them in the front of my memory which has made them very easy to practice since I returned home.

Most attackers aren’t learned in how to handle a knife or a gun so coupled with the Color Code of Mental Awareness* you teach this training is going to save me a lot of anguish and possibly my life and my loved one’s lives if ever I have to use it when I am unarmed.

My second reason for wanting to take the class was that I felt there was a void between defusing a heated situation with someone who is not intent on causing harm and dealing with someone who is so intent that it justifies my use of deadly force with my concealed weapon. As you well know, living in California means dealing with a political and social climate that doesn’t encourage or often tolerate the use of weapons to defend one’s self. I wanted a way to deal with an attacker and hopefully either defuse the situation or escape the situation without getting hurt and without having to present my weapon from concealment and possibly escalate the situation and possibly have to deal with the legal ramifications of presenting and possibly using a weapon in a weapon unfriendly jury area.

The class did exactly that for me. I even found myself early on the first morning automatically going to the Count One of drawing my weapon after parrying off the attack of my partner and creating distance between him and I. I wasn’t sure how this was going to go over in a class that is focused on Empty Hand but your instructor was encouraging and even told us that if we want to go to Count Two and give our “STOP OR I WILL SHOOT” if we wanted.

He immediately asked how many people carried concealed and once he saw that the majority of the class did he rightly determined that this may be a useful part of our technique. He did warn us that we would have to make the move to Count One a conscious decision since not all Empty Hand situations are going to call for it, which is very sound advice.

Your instructors were great at reminding us that every situation will be different so we need to use whatever works and keep a combat mindset.

It was nice to see that we weren’t being forced into only using closed fists or only using jabs and crosses. Some classes are very rigid in that regard. They gave use just enough tools to be able to pick and choose what was most comfortable for us without giving us so many that it became confusing. They were also very persistent at mentioning that although some of the moves are offensive the whole technique is defensive and is meant to stop your attacker and that although we might be tempting to use our new tools to follow through and really put a beating on an attacker that was not was this class was about. It was about stopping an aggressor and creating distance from them in the hopes of getting out of the situation in the best shape we can. Many people (non-shooters) who hear that I attend Front Sight have the first impression that I am being trained to be aggressive. Not only do I correct their misconceptions but I offer them a chance to join us at Front Sight and inform them that there are even unarmed defensive classes for them to attend if they do not want to learn how to handle a weapon. Even an ardent pacifist could not find fault with this class especially the way that John and Wade emphasis this as defensive. There is no chance someone is going to mistake this class as a UFC training course, although many of the techniques are the same.

So, once again, I am thrilled with the training I have received and have put together a whole new list of friends that I am going to try to bring out to Front Sight with my Gray Certificates. I can’t think of a better way to easy someone into the idea that the Second Amendment is a legitimate cause then to bring an anti-gunner to an Empty Hand Defense class. Once they see that being training is important, the folks who take the time to train aren’t wackos and get a sprinkle of pro-gun ideas through your lectures I will bet they will want to come back for some firearms classes.

Thanks again for all your hard work. It has made a difference in my life on a daily basis.

Samuel Houston Porter

This letter speaks for itself.

To join Samuel and many others at Front Sight, contact us.

* To find out what Samuel means here, please subscribe to the 15 Free Gun Training Reports, where these terms are completely explained.

Entry Filed under: Dr. Ignatius Piazza,From the Mail Bag,Front Sight.