Everyone Has A Plan 'Til They Get Punched in The Face

This is Fight Sim week at the jitsu training center I attend.  Fight Sim week is done at the end of each chapter in the training cycle and is about the most exhausting week you get to enjoy.

The general program at the center begins with basics that are applicable to street defense through getting your Combatives belt.  Then the next phase, Master Cycle, which is Combatives belts and up, adds both advanced self-defense techniques and advanced sport jitsu moves as well, and it adds Fight Sim for high intensity self-defense.  

Fight Sim is where the combative and other techniques get put to use in a simulated street-type encounter. Fight Sim deals with jitsu being used to defend yourself in a street fight and the attacker is throwing punches.  Lots of punches. Happily, they are at least wearing 5.5oz gloves that cover the hand fully but you can get your fingers out to do grips and other techniques (or accidentally stab someone in the eye, but more on that later).

At lot of Fight Sim is learning to get through the attackers punches safely to close and effect a take-down, and also learn to be able to reduce the effectiveness of punches an attacker is throwing when they're on the ground. Because they're going to be throwing a lot of punches. 

Punches tend to get your attention.  Knowing how to handle incoming punches matters quite a lot.

Even at 10-20% power (the limit we use for training in this class), a shot to the face makes you eager to want to sharpen your defenses.  Occasionally your attacker gets a little overenthusiastic in the melee and you receive a little more than a 20% hit.  Stings a tad.  Generally Fight Sim is set so the "bad guy"  is not supposed to use jitsu techniques but instead acts as either be an untrained puncher (think wild swings trying to knock you out) or more of a skilled striker with jabs, crosses, hooks, etc.

Jitsu can be for both sport and self-defense.  For example, a Butterfly guard is great for sport jitsu v jitsu, but if you try to use a butterfly guard in a real fight, you will get you bell rung with punches.  Knowing what techniques to use where matters quite a bit and our center always wants us to stay sharp on the self-defense side of the equation.

Very good training, and a 5 minute round defending yourself from someone intent on punching you is rather exhausting.  

You need to close the distance through  punches, or in anticipation of a punch, execute a take-down, maintain control of someone who is using all their weight to buck or throw you off and who keeps trying to punch you even when down, and then get a submission if possible. Like I said, it is pretty darn exhausting but good training.

Unfortunately, I had one session yesterday with someone who got a tad overenthusiastic and his hand did a nice ricochet off my blocking hand and then went on to smack me right at the right eye with a finger poking out of his glove,  so I have a rather impressive shiner right now.   Not intentional at all, but minor injuries do happen.   I've iced it and its overall ok, just doesn't look great.

Aside from that it went well, but I can say that being paired up with someone stronger and bigger than me as a bad guy makes for an exhausting bout. 

Of course, this is good training as it is unlikely that someone smaller and weaker than you is going to pick a fight and attack you in real life. 

But, it got hairy and I had to work hard to avoid getting pounded even at 10-20%, especially when in one case my bad guy started in mount position as part of the scenario.  Being mounted when punches are flying just plain sucks. Managed to get out of it and establish a good defense, and then control him, but I was pretty much spent after that 5 minute round.

The class then ended and we then spent 15 minutes doing standard jitsu rolls afterwards which felt pretty easy by comparison as no punches were flying.

Heckuva good class and great training.

A Sure(Dry)Fire Course Of Improvement

So I've decided to work on improving my shooting skills.

Since time constraints prevent me from going to the range daily or even weekly, the solution is a dedicated course of dry-firing in addition to range trips whenever I can fit them in.

Two tools are going to help me with this.

The first is this:

Yes, it's the Pocket Pro II timer. It's been great on the range but it's really shining as a dry fire aid. You may think you're fast and smooth, the timer will tell you differently.

With the help a random start setting (or the world's cutest RO pressing the button) and the par time option, you can use it for dry-firing by setting the interval to perform whatever drill you're doing and try to accomplish it within the par time, before the second beep sounds. The timer does the job very well indeed, and it doesn't lie.

Now you shouldn't just dry fire aimlessly, though there's nothing wrong with some un-structured dry-firing from time to time, but you should have a plan for improvement and use it to work on your skills. Dry firing needn't be boring, and it should be challenging.

That's where tool #2 comes in:

It's a book: Champion Shooting: Guaranteed Results in 15 Minutes A Day by Jay Hirshberg and Ben Stoeger, both champion shooters.

This book is awesome - a comprehensive dry firing course that when done for 15 minutes a day will help you improve.

Each page has a different dry-firing routine, and each routine has variations to work on specific skills like drawing, sight-picture, reloads etc. Each variation has suggested beginner, intermediate and advanced times, and they're not easy. On most I can do the task in the intermediate time, but a few I'm stuck at beginner and for a very, very few so far, I can make it in the advanced times.

For example, a dry fire El-Presidente (3 targets, facing up-range on beep turn and two shots each target, reload, two shots each target) has the following suggested times: Beginner 5 seconds, Intermediate 4 seconds, and Advanced 3.5 seconds. That's pretty darn fast.

In four days I've gone through 6 of the exercises, and I'm going through the book in order. While you can pick and choose the drills as you wish, I figure I need improvement in everything so I might as well start from the beginning and make my way through to the end.

We'll see how well a dedicated course of dry firing helps out at the next match.

Dryfire Training With SIRTanty

I was first introduced to the SIRT produced by Next Level Training by Todd Green at his Aim Fast Hit Fast Class (if you get an opportunity to take his class btw, do so).

The SIRT, the Shot Indicating Resetting Trigger, is an excellent dryfire training tool. It comes with a dual indicator lasers, one that goes off as you engage the rigger and a second as the trigger is fully pulled and the "shot" fired. This helps you work immensely on your trigger control and accuracy. The lasers can be toggled on and off so if you only want a laser on at the shot let-off and not on take-up than that can be easily done.

I just picked one of the Pro models that comes with both the green and red lasers and I am quite impressed. The workmanship is solid and it rather perfectly replicates the Glock for training. The SIRT comes in a padded hard plastic case for easy transport.

The green laser is very bright and easy to detect across a room.

Benefits of using the SIRT for dry fire training:

1 Same size, shape and trigger feel as the Glock 17/22.

2. Fits in the same holster as the Glock and you can practice your mag changes as it accepts Glock magazines and also has weighted training mags available.

3. The Trigger is adjustable and resets after each pull so that you can practice multiple shots, unlike a standard Glock where you would need to reset the slide after each shot.

4. It's not a real gun and cannot fire ammunition so it is safer for use at home for training and avoids any unpleasant loaded/unloaded mistakes you might make with a real gun.

5. The laser shows where the shot would actually go at the time the trigger is depressed, something an actual firearm can't do during dry fire.

6. The SIRT will be very useful when I teach my next CPL class to safely demonstrate in the classroom.

67. I can also see this being a really useful tool for force on force drills, especially the next time Murphy's Law comes to town.

The SIRT is a really useful training tool for dryfire practice and I'd certainly recommend it. I expect to use it as part of my new training program and we'll see if it helps.