TO all the NES shooters. This is a review of an LMS Defense Carbine course that I organized and attended on 19 June 2010. I don't know if there is an option for anyone ever attending a class like this but if there is I highly recommend it:
First let me start off saying thank you to Kevin. This was my second course with LMS and Kevin and as usual it was top notch course. If you have not trained with Kevin at LMS and are in the Washington area I can’t express enough how much you are missing out- you need this!
We had a total of 10 students from different backgrounds and this is how they broke down. Mind you some fall into several categories:
3 students were prior LMS graduates
3 students were Magpul Dynamic graduates
3 students are current .mil and one was prior service
5 students had never had any formal training- only flat range shooting and were generally new to shooting
I am going to break this down into several catagories:
Equipment, Zeroing, Fixed Distance shooting, Dynamic shooting, Positional shooting and Malfunctions.
Equipment:
The common denominator was the 16” carbine and that is about where it ended. Rifles varied from carbine to mid length and all were 5.56 except for one that was shooting a 5.45x39. For manufacturers there was Noveske, LMT, Bravo Company, Smith and Wesson, Bushmaster and Olympic Arms. Several were running Aimpoint H-1s, a couple EO-Techs and 3 Primary Arms Micros. Most guns were running .mil spec parts but there were a few running commercial grade parts.
I am going to highlight one issue right now, commercial parts work just fine for a range plinker but for a gun that you expect to run hard you need to build it right. Most of the guys that were in this class are part of a local Jeep club and know this well as it applies to both Jeeps and good rifles: Buy once and Cry once. One student in the course who was running an almost all commercial gun show built Olympic and it shit out early. I will discuss that in a moment. The only other two guns that had issues were the S&W that was a new gun but had some issues with chrome lining and a receiver tube that fell victim to being mortared during malfunctions. I will explain those issues later.
Zeroing:
We started off the day with a lecture on equipment and gear then moved on to zeroing. Kevin started us off on the 25 yard line to get everyone doped in before moving back to the 50. As a .mil guy I have been doing 25 meter zeros for as long as I can remember but I am now reconsidering that and moving all of mine to the 50. Kevin explains the pros and cons of both and it just seems that the 50 has more pros. Right off the bat the student with the Olympic gun began to have short stroke issues with his gun. I helped to initially diagnose but needed to concentrate on my own shooting and Kevin quickly got onboard and took over. At first he thought it may be a mag issue as he was running old GI steel magazines. Quickly Kevin assessed that it was something deeper in the gun and offered the student his own gun to run for the class. For the rest of the class he ran Kevin’s gun and was completely amazed.
This student is a long time friend of mine and an old school Soldier. He has believed that a gun is a gun is a gun. On the ride home we talked and he could not believe how amazing running a quality gun with a PWS FSC 556 and a micro was. Learning occurred and he has been energized and wants me to help get his gun built right. He is hell bent on training with Kevin at LMS with his own rifle that will run reliably and prove that he can do this well. Thank you Kevin for your patience in taking care of such a good friend. You showed him the light and he could not stop talking about how professional you were and your knowledge base. Gordon will be back.
Fixed Distance Shooting:
We covered fixed distance shooting from 25 yards all the way out to 100. This was done in prone, sitting, kneeling and standing. We constantly changed distance and position and began to getting into timed events. It was a completely dynamic event where we kept switching distances and positions. Kevin later revealed this was not a random act but rather a calculated on to keep students from getting to comfortable and static in one position or distance. It worked well! Students began to really get comfortable with the changes and settled into the groove of ‘there is no constant except for change’ and adapted well. Yet again, learning had occurred.
One funny caveat: While on the 100 meter line with 10 guys blasting away we had a deer walk out of the wood line about 25 meters in front of us. Kevin called an immediate cease fire and said ‘Do not shoot the deer!!!’. When he yelled this he locked eyes with me as if I was going to be the one ass who would have done this! Most likely he was right but who would have ever thought that Kevin was such a bunny hugger.
Dynamic Shooting:
By dynamic I am talking about shooting on the move (SOM). Most of this was done from 20 meters or closer. About half of the students had never done SOM drills and quickly found how intense it can be and how much focus it takes. He began to incorporate shoot, run, shoot, run, shoot. Then after everyone got comfortable the shot timer came out again. This made students feel that pressure of the clock, instructor scrutiny and the pressure to be better than your peers. Stress makes you test. As we ran through this students started to become a lot more proficient with Kevin’s constant critique of how they could improve.
The same process was done for the multiple target engagement scenarios while executing Roadhouse Rules drills. From a personal standpoint I got faster on the gun and Kevin pointed out that I was dropping the guns during target transitions. I didn’t even know I was doing this so I slowed it down, found a rhythm and got it working well. More learning that made my day.
Positional Shooting:
Aside from the prone, sit, kneel and standing positions we went into others like supine, fetal and broke-back. These were great as very few of the students had ever done any shooting like this. Shooting from awkward positions may suck but it can possibly be a necessary evil that saves your life in a gun fight. The reason I like these drills as they force you to know how your gun will shoot. But you also need to know how to shoot your weapon with your support hand. We had one lefty who was heaving a bitch of a time trying to make certain positions work left handed rather then switch to his right hand. I think it’s important that a shooter knows how to manipulate the gun with both hands effectively. Transitions are an important thing and if you can’t do them well then something will give. Even if you are not the greatest shooter with your weak side you can hope your enemy is worse and will favor his strong side and expose himself as a better target. Know how to do both and learn to adapt, you have the rest of your life in a gun fight to figure it out.
Malfunction Drills:
During lunch Kevin gave his verbal block and walk through on the different malfunction types and clearing procedures. Many of the students had minimal exposure to malfunction drills at best. Having been through an LMS course not too long ago I figured I would not learn anything new. As usual, Kevin proved me wrong. He had refined his bag of tricks and fixing problems-especially in the catastrophic department.
After lunch we headed back onto the range and began the Blue Falcon Drill (BFD). The BFD is simple: you work in pairs and one student faces away as the other places one of the malfunctions in your gun. Student turns around, attempts to shoot the gun and then goes into problem solving mode. Like most new things it started slow but as students worked on it they started to clear the guns faster.
Once confidence was gained the shot timer came out again. Kevin would take your gun, perform his mischief and then hand you back the gun. Timer would start and it stopped when you cleared it and got one shot on steel at 50 meters. Again the pressure of time, instructor and peers loomed. One gun fell prey doing these drills as the student tried to mortar the gun and bent his receiver extension which was a commercial model. Again guys, it pays to have good stuff. I could spend a day doing this stuff so long as it wasn’t Kevin setting up my gun. I swear to all that is Bacon he takes some personal joy in f***ing with me.
Conclusion:
At the end of the day students were wet, tired and well instructed. Learning had occurred throughout and everyone had a lot more confidence in their systems and abilities due to Kevin’s guidance. The big things taken away were GI mags suck, quality guns are important, old dogs can learn new tricks and Kevin is a top notch instructor. I am already in the process of organizing another course for many of the same people who were in this one except it will be a pistol course. Then it’s on to the two day courses.
Train with Kevin at LMS, it’s worth it’s weight in a gun fight.
-Op4
First let me start off saying thank you to Kevin. This was my second course with LMS and Kevin and as usual it was top notch course. If you have not trained with Kevin at LMS and are in the Washington area I can’t express enough how much you are missing out- you need this!
We had a total of 10 students from different backgrounds and this is how they broke down. Mind you some fall into several categories:
3 students were prior LMS graduates
3 students were Magpul Dynamic graduates
3 students are current .mil and one was prior service
5 students had never had any formal training- only flat range shooting and were generally new to shooting
I am going to break this down into several catagories:
Equipment, Zeroing, Fixed Distance shooting, Dynamic shooting, Positional shooting and Malfunctions.
Equipment:
The common denominator was the 16” carbine and that is about where it ended. Rifles varied from carbine to mid length and all were 5.56 except for one that was shooting a 5.45x39. For manufacturers there was Noveske, LMT, Bravo Company, Smith and Wesson, Bushmaster and Olympic Arms. Several were running Aimpoint H-1s, a couple EO-Techs and 3 Primary Arms Micros. Most guns were running .mil spec parts but there were a few running commercial grade parts.
I am going to highlight one issue right now, commercial parts work just fine for a range plinker but for a gun that you expect to run hard you need to build it right. Most of the guys that were in this class are part of a local Jeep club and know this well as it applies to both Jeeps and good rifles: Buy once and Cry once. One student in the course who was running an almost all commercial gun show built Olympic and it shit out early. I will discuss that in a moment. The only other two guns that had issues were the S&W that was a new gun but had some issues with chrome lining and a receiver tube that fell victim to being mortared during malfunctions. I will explain those issues later.
Zeroing:
We started off the day with a lecture on equipment and gear then moved on to zeroing. Kevin started us off on the 25 yard line to get everyone doped in before moving back to the 50. As a .mil guy I have been doing 25 meter zeros for as long as I can remember but I am now reconsidering that and moving all of mine to the 50. Kevin explains the pros and cons of both and it just seems that the 50 has more pros. Right off the bat the student with the Olympic gun began to have short stroke issues with his gun. I helped to initially diagnose but needed to concentrate on my own shooting and Kevin quickly got onboard and took over. At first he thought it may be a mag issue as he was running old GI steel magazines. Quickly Kevin assessed that it was something deeper in the gun and offered the student his own gun to run for the class. For the rest of the class he ran Kevin’s gun and was completely amazed.
This student is a long time friend of mine and an old school Soldier. He has believed that a gun is a gun is a gun. On the ride home we talked and he could not believe how amazing running a quality gun with a PWS FSC 556 and a micro was. Learning occurred and he has been energized and wants me to help get his gun built right. He is hell bent on training with Kevin at LMS with his own rifle that will run reliably and prove that he can do this well. Thank you Kevin for your patience in taking care of such a good friend. You showed him the light and he could not stop talking about how professional you were and your knowledge base. Gordon will be back.
Fixed Distance Shooting:
We covered fixed distance shooting from 25 yards all the way out to 100. This was done in prone, sitting, kneeling and standing. We constantly changed distance and position and began to getting into timed events. It was a completely dynamic event where we kept switching distances and positions. Kevin later revealed this was not a random act but rather a calculated on to keep students from getting to comfortable and static in one position or distance. It worked well! Students began to really get comfortable with the changes and settled into the groove of ‘there is no constant except for change’ and adapted well. Yet again, learning had occurred.
One funny caveat: While on the 100 meter line with 10 guys blasting away we had a deer walk out of the wood line about 25 meters in front of us. Kevin called an immediate cease fire and said ‘Do not shoot the deer!!!’. When he yelled this he locked eyes with me as if I was going to be the one ass who would have done this! Most likely he was right but who would have ever thought that Kevin was such a bunny hugger.
Dynamic Shooting:
By dynamic I am talking about shooting on the move (SOM). Most of this was done from 20 meters or closer. About half of the students had never done SOM drills and quickly found how intense it can be and how much focus it takes. He began to incorporate shoot, run, shoot, run, shoot. Then after everyone got comfortable the shot timer came out again. This made students feel that pressure of the clock, instructor scrutiny and the pressure to be better than your peers. Stress makes you test. As we ran through this students started to become a lot more proficient with Kevin’s constant critique of how they could improve.
The same process was done for the multiple target engagement scenarios while executing Roadhouse Rules drills. From a personal standpoint I got faster on the gun and Kevin pointed out that I was dropping the guns during target transitions. I didn’t even know I was doing this so I slowed it down, found a rhythm and got it working well. More learning that made my day.
Positional Shooting:
Aside from the prone, sit, kneel and standing positions we went into others like supine, fetal and broke-back. These were great as very few of the students had ever done any shooting like this. Shooting from awkward positions may suck but it can possibly be a necessary evil that saves your life in a gun fight. The reason I like these drills as they force you to know how your gun will shoot. But you also need to know how to shoot your weapon with your support hand. We had one lefty who was heaving a bitch of a time trying to make certain positions work left handed rather then switch to his right hand. I think it’s important that a shooter knows how to manipulate the gun with both hands effectively. Transitions are an important thing and if you can’t do them well then something will give. Even if you are not the greatest shooter with your weak side you can hope your enemy is worse and will favor his strong side and expose himself as a better target. Know how to do both and learn to adapt, you have the rest of your life in a gun fight to figure it out.
Malfunction Drills:
During lunch Kevin gave his verbal block and walk through on the different malfunction types and clearing procedures. Many of the students had minimal exposure to malfunction drills at best. Having been through an LMS course not too long ago I figured I would not learn anything new. As usual, Kevin proved me wrong. He had refined his bag of tricks and fixing problems-especially in the catastrophic department.
After lunch we headed back onto the range and began the Blue Falcon Drill (BFD). The BFD is simple: you work in pairs and one student faces away as the other places one of the malfunctions in your gun. Student turns around, attempts to shoot the gun and then goes into problem solving mode. Like most new things it started slow but as students worked on it they started to clear the guns faster.
Once confidence was gained the shot timer came out again. Kevin would take your gun, perform his mischief and then hand you back the gun. Timer would start and it stopped when you cleared it and got one shot on steel at 50 meters. Again the pressure of time, instructor and peers loomed. One gun fell prey doing these drills as the student tried to mortar the gun and bent his receiver extension which was a commercial model. Again guys, it pays to have good stuff. I could spend a day doing this stuff so long as it wasn’t Kevin setting up my gun. I swear to all that is Bacon he takes some personal joy in f***ing with me.
Conclusion:
At the end of the day students were wet, tired and well instructed. Learning had occurred throughout and everyone had a lot more confidence in their systems and abilities due to Kevin’s guidance. The big things taken away were GI mags suck, quality guns are important, old dogs can learn new tricks and Kevin is a top notch instructor. I am already in the process of organizing another course for many of the same people who were in this one except it will be a pistol course. Then it’s on to the two day courses.
Train with Kevin at LMS, it’s worth it’s weight in a gun fight.
-Op4
