With Great Skill Comes Great Responsibility
In Texas, as in most states, there are minimum requirements you have to meet in order to carry a firearm whether concealed or open. Usually, you sit in a classroom for several hours discussing legal issues associated with carrying a firearm such as where you cannot carry. The classroom portion is usually followed by a written test as well as a shooting qualification. You stand in a lane and shoot at a paper target at various distances. If you do well on the written test and have sufficient accuracy, you pass. After completing some administrative matters you get your carry license and you can now carry a handgun in public. You are ready to defend yourself or others in a life threatening situation. But . . .
DO YOU REALLY KNOW WHAT TO DO IN AN ACTIVE SHOOTER SITUATION?
For example, do you know the most effective way to draw your weapon? Do you even know the right way to grip, draw, present, aim and shoot your weapon with accuracy, even under stress? Do you know the most effective way to get on target if the threat is not right in front of you? What if you empty the ammo in your first magazine and still have to engage the threat? Do you know the most effective way to fix your gun in the case of a malfunction or how and when to quickly re-load your gun? In most LTC classes, you don’t learn any of this. At VX Marksmanship, you are taught all of this.
As a student in the first course of VX’s LTC curriculum, you will learn the mechanics of firearm manipulation for a fast, smooth and accurate response to a threat. In the second course, you learn how to effectively turn to engage an enemy from any angle. After all, bad guys do not stand right in front of you like a paper target. We teach our students how to turret and pivot as they find the enemy and present their weapon. We will also teach you how to remove jammed bullets from your gun and how to re-load your gun quickly with a fresh magazine. In the third and fourth courses, we train our
“. . . bad guys do not stand right in front of you like a paper target. We teach our students how to turret and pivot as they find the enemy and present their weapon.”
You will not learn these basic tactics in a classroom. You will not learn these tactics at a typical multi-lane shooting facility. You will learn these tactics at VX Marksmanship. In addition to the State-required LTC classroom and shooting qualification course, our LTC Program includes the first 4 three-hour courses from our regular pistol curriculum for a total of 12 hours of actual range time covering the basics described above. You may also purchase at a discounted rate an additional three hour introductory course to shooting at night. Bad guys attack at night too, so it is important to learn how to use your gun in low-light and no-light situations.
HOW OUR LTC PROGRAM IS DIFFERENT
Our lead LTC Instructor, Jessica Logan, says it best.
“In our Program, you will learn to load, download and re-load your pistol like a pro and regardless if you are on the move, in the dark or using one hand. You will experience growth in your marksmanship and your situational awareness, yourself and potential threats. You will be ready for an attack with an immediate response. Through continued training, you will build a mindset for more definitive decision making under duress. You will have the confidence to stay in the fight!”
HONESTLY, GETTING YOUR LTC IS JUST THE BEGINNING OF YOUR JOURNEY
Yes, it is essential to get instruction on these basic tactics. With our Program, your accuracy will improve immensely. Like any skill, however, shooting is a perishable skill requiring regular practice. Moreover, there is so much more to using your gun in self defense, particularly in an active shooter situation. At VX, our LTC students can continue their quest to become highly trained shooters through the more advanced levels of our combat-tested curriculum.
Prone Shooting and Behind Cover Shooting. Chances are you may want to engage the threat from the ground or from behind cover. If you are wounded and can’t walk or you otherwise choose to go to the ground, we teach the proper way to shoot from prone and kneeling positions. Shooting from behind cover presents risks, including difficulty keeping track of the threat, ricochets and coming out from behind cover to shoot. We train how to use barricades, terrain and even vehicles for cover.
Shooting While Wounded. What if you are wounded? Do you know how to continue to shoot with one hand? It is one thing to have a two-handed grip on your weapon, but you may be shot in one arm or using one arm to help someone. We train our students to shoot with either their strong arm or support arm.
Instinctive Shooting. Bad guys attack at close range without warning, giving you no time to line up your sights. We use the orientation of our body and presentation of our firearm to make accurate shots without using our sights AND while turreting, pivoting, and shooting on the move. Our goal is for our students to make fast, accurate shots at close range threats from any direction and while moving.
“Bad guys attack at close range without warning, giving you no time to line up your sights. . . . Our goal is for our students to make fast, accurate shots at close range threats from any direction and while moving.”
Shooting at Night. Home invasions are too commonplace, especially at night. Using a flashlight can reveal your position. We teach our students how to use a flashlight to minimize the risk of being an easy target. In addition to our introductory night shoot course you may purchase as a supplement to our LTC package, at VX we offer more advanced night shoot classes.
Close Quarter Training (CQB). Training at VX includes close quarter combat drills and room/house clearing, both as an individual and as a team. Our training also includes this exercise at night, again with minimal use of your flashlight. These tactics are an important part of any shooters skill set for protection against home invasions.
Moving Targets. Bad guys don’t stand still. They move to cause as much harm as possible while running away. At our range, we have moving targets that are an integral part of our training.
THESE SKILLS ARE SECONDARY TO HAVING THE RIGHT MINDSET TO DEAL WITH CHAOS
An active shooter situation is chaos. Shots are being fired without warning. Where the shots are coming from may not be clear. People are screaming, running and falling over each other or being shot right in front of you. You want to respond with your carry weapon but your survival instinct tells you to run or hide. You might overcome this fear and seek to engage the threat. But you haven’t learned how to move while shooting or how to use cover to shoot. Then the active shooter is moving. But you haven’t trained in shooting at moving targets. You think you see the bad guy, but there are innocent bystanders all around. Do you take the shot?
“An active shooter situation is chaos. . . . The chaos is multiplied if there is more than one shooter. . . . The possible scenarios are endless.”
Do you risk hitting an innocent person who is just trying to escape? The chaos is multiplied if there is more than one shooter. If there are other responders joining in the fight, it may be difficult to distinguish the good guys from the bad guys. The possible scenarios are endless.
You will not come close to learning how to respond to this type of threat through your normal LTC Program. While our expanded program described above is a good start, there is so much more to learn and train on.
You may say that you don’t intend to engage an active shooter in public. Indeed, the odds are low you will ever have to. You just want to be able to protect your home and family. Putting aside the possibility that an active shooter situation may threaten you AND your family in public . . .
DO YOU REALLY KNOW HOW TO PROTECT YOUR HOME AND FAMILY?
The scenarios for a home invasion or a burglary are just as endless as an active shooter situation in public. The break-in could be at night. Your kids could be on the other side of the house. Maybe there are multiple bad guys. Then, the break-in could be simultaneous at the front and back door of the house. Maybe you are not at home when the break-in occurs but you get home while the bad guy is still there.
Are you confident that you can engage the threat without risking your family with your own shots? Have you even shot your weapon at night with or without a flashlight? Do you know how to pie off corners of the walls to make yourself a difficult target while sighting up the bad guy? Do you even know if the walls in your house will protect you from bullets? Just in case they don’t, do you know how to shoot while staying low and less of a target?
Of course, we cannot train for every possible threat. But we can train to use our brain to adapt and use our skills to stop the threat. THAT IS WHAT WE TEACH AT VX MARKSMANSHIP. Our instructors teach a multi-level curriculum designed to provide our students with the shooting skills and mindset necessary to effectively respond to violent attacks. At VX, we train not just how to shoot but when to shoot.
In short, in order to be effective, your training must be consistent and practical. To be practical, your training must include more than just the fundamentals of good marksmanship. It must push you both mentally and physically so that you are prepared to respond quickly and decisively to even the most chaotic attack.
OUR FACILITY IS DESIGNED FOR REAL-WORD TACTICAL TRAINING
VX Marksmanship is a private training facility between Denton and Decatur, with three 180 degree pistol/carbine bays (including a covered bay), a 1,000 yard rifle range and a connex building village. This design allows for firearm training at multiple targets from all angles, while on the move, on the ground, from behind barriers, and within close quarters.
OUR OTHER SELF DEFENSE PLATFORMS
For home defense, tactical carbine and/or shotgun are weapons of choice for many. Just like our pistol program, we have a five level/ten course curriculum for carbine and we incorporate shotgun into our training. Our multi-level carbine curriculum includes the same type of tactics taught in our pistol curriculum. And, our program would not be complete without training in field trauma care which we also incorporate into our pistol and carbine training.