Aim Fast Hit Fast Class Review

The Aim Fast Hit Fast Class is designed for experienced shooters to improve their shooting ability. Taught by Todd Louis Green. A description of the class can be read at his website.

In short, it is an intensive and challenging class over two days with multiple shooting drills that help you increase your speed and accuracy as well as give you the tools to continue to improve after the class is over.

To The Range

So Murphy's Law and I pulled in Saturday morning nice and early onto the CCF&SA range in Wilmington, Ohio.

After running into some rather unfriendly people at the club, We figured out where and who Todd was, introduced ourselves, did the necessary paperwork and then the course began with a safety briefing and then on to some instruction and then the shooting. The day started out overcast with a weather forecast of heavy rains all day but quickly turned into sunshine and scorching hot temperatures requiring lots of water, sunscreen, and shade breaks.

Please Don't Let Me Be "That Guy"

You know, in every class there's That Guy, the one who: isn't ready for a drill, or who isn't paying attention, or drags the class down in multiple ways through incompetence.

Of course, luck had it that Todd made the order of the class so that I would go first on each of the individual drills after he had demonstrated them. I was number 1 in squad 1 so our squad shot first on the group drills as well.

So I was uniquely positioned to be able to demonstrate to the class how not to do a technique after Todd had demonstrated it correctly.

Without the opportunity to see others do the drill, I often at times felt and probably looked like a retarded monkey. At times, a retarded monkey could have shot better too.

Thankfully, while I wasn't the fastest shooter, I was one of the cleanest, meaning hitting the target with all shots, no misses. I did a 30 second yet clean barrel drill (I can't recall the real name for it - there's two barrels and you weave a figure 8 between and around them firing a shot at a designated target each time your either are at the outer side of the each barrel or in the center - much harder than it sounds) and my other events were pretty clean with the occasional frustrating miss, generally due to anticipating the shot, which Todd helped me work on fixing, more on that later.

In short, I wasn't the class "That Guy".

The FAST Drill:

This is Todd's signature drill. A test of speed and accuracy - 2 shots into a 3x5 "head" above an 8 inch circle "body" in which you reload and fire into it 4 shots, all at 7 yards. On the FAST Drill, I shot the first two clean, getting my best score on the drill Saturday afternoon shooting with a score of 7.66 making Intermediate, but missing Advanced by a long 1.67 seconds. I was the only one that had shot clean on both FAST drills that day if memory serves.

On Sunday morning, just before I got ready to shoot the third FAST, Todd said, "You know, very few people in a class shoot all four FAST Drills clean...." So I got the two head shots, made 3 body shots and on the final shot I jerked the trigger putting it just outside the circle. Jinxed! But it's my fault for thinking too much for about a 10+ second run plus penalty for the miss. Try to think or decide to go fast in your head and you'll end up going slow in reality.

On the fourth FAST, all tired out, I shot clean but with a 9.13 second time, too slow and messing up the mag change.

Other Drills

I scored a 45 out of 50 on the dot torture drill, showing I need to work on my trigger control. First time I've ever done that drill and it is very useful indeed, and worth practicing.

In the weak hand drills I learned I need to practice weak hand only shooting more. 'Nuff said.

My best draw from a holster was on the second Triple Nickel Drill at the end of Sunday. It was 1.4 seconds from beep to shot and everyone said it looked very smooth.

The first Triple Nickel drill started off funny however: On the beep, I drew, the gun went click (I had not chambered a round after the last Fast drill, just loaded the magazine with the amount of rounds instructed) I said "S..t!" very loudly and clearly, and proceeded to rack the slide and get to shooting. I shot a clean run but was over the five second "win" time.

There were lots more drills, all of which showed techniques to enhance one's shooting ability.

Things Learned

If the Class was solely about putting 1000+ rounds downrange, I could do that a lot closer to home. Instead, the course was about learning new skills to improve your technique and shooting faster and more accurately than you had before.

Keeping an open mind, I tried all of his suggested techniques, often with difficulty, but finding adopting them a marked improvement over how I had previously done things. The Press-Out, while I couldn't quite grasp it from his good description on his website, became understandable with his in person instruction, demonstration and then practicing it all weekend under his observation and tutelage made it a must-use technique.

Todd was able to give individual instruction to each of the 12 students and he helped me immeasurably with my grip, fixing a problem I didn't even realize I had, and my shooting got measurably better.

He also diagnosed a trigger control issue where I was squeezing the trigger but then crunching it down when I wanted to break the shot, anticipating it and causing it to go low. Again, my shooting improved a lot in a very short time.

In other words, those two corrections and the instruction in the use of the press-out alone were worth the price of admission, but I learned lots more. The side manipulation technique for reloads that he teaches is itself so simple yet much more effective than any technique I've done before.

Todd is an excellent and capable instructor and very able to demonstrate and communicate how to improve your shooting. His demonstrating and explaining the Press-Out really improved both my shooting time and accuracy. He has an approachable manner with a good sense of humor and excellent instructional skills.

Conclusion

If you're looking to seriously improve your shooting abilities, and be able to leave a weekend class with new techniques that you can continue to practice and perfect to make your shooting even better, Todd Green's Aim Fast Hit Fast is a fantastic class to take.

I will continue to practice the techniques learned and I'll keep on improving thanks to this great class and instructor.