Range: Deer Creek Conservation Club in Jonesboro, IN. Conditions were...hot. Very hot. 90+ with high humidity.
Instructor: Scott "Jedi" Jedlinski of Modern Samurai Project
Rounds: I didn't keep exact count, but roughly 1000 rounds of 9mm Magtech 115gr.
Gear used: CZ P-10 C with Trijicon RMR06 type 2 and Parker Mountain Machine compensator, drawing from a TI Defense Type 2 holster. 4 mags were enough for this class without slowing anyone down.
AIWB class began with intros and safety brief - we had a great mix of students from all walks of life. Two LE, one other trainer, a writer/photographer, and plain ol' every day carriers. Scott went over the strengths of AIWB and we began by working on our draw stroke "backwards" - and by that I mean we started working on our presentation, then back to the grip, then back to the actual draw stroke itself, of which he covered three varieties: Hands down/relaxed, "fig leaf", and hand's up/high thoracic. The "fig leaf" draw is a modified hands-down draw where you pre-grab your shirt. It's very interesting and proves to be extremely fast and completely removes the likelihood of getting tangled in your shirt at speed. It's obviously contentious as even by his own admission he's had instructors refuse to let him use it for timed contests/events, however his explanation of it looking more natural in some real-life situations is apt. Regardless, he asks that you pick one method of draw and continue on with the class. I stuck with high-thoracic as that's the most consistently quick for me.
The key to Scott's instruction on draw/presentation is that everyone moves too much. Wasted movement is wasted time. Rolling shoulders, ducking/turtling your head, over-extending, leaning forward, and so-on is inefficient and unnecessary and detrimental. After working one-on-one with several students their times greatly improved, as well as their ability to manage recoil.
We then moved on to some drills and contests, the first of which was just a draw and single shot under the timer. There was a shoot-off as two students hit 0.95's from concealment and both had to do it again.
We then worked on reloads from concealment, where we were instructed on using your previous magazine as a visual guide to insert your new magazine. This was a new method for me and took getting used to, as I'm used to dropping my mag immediately on slide-lock, this method involves waiting until after you've grabbed your fresh magazine, then watching your old magazine fall from the well and following it with your eyes to guide your new magazine in. I had a lot of success with it when I did it correctly, but old habits die hard and I probably only nailed it 50% of the time.
Then we did a "FAST-ish" drill contest where we did two rounds to the head, slide-lock reload, then 4 to the chest from a distance of 7y. I say "FAST-ish" because we were using only an IPSC target, no 3x5 card, no 8" circle. The winner shot in 4.98.
We reloaded then walked to another bay to practice shooting at 25y from concealment. Draw and fire onto steel targets (roughly 2/3 ipsc or C-zone maybe?) at 25y. We were split into two groups and another contest was held where shooters fired "against" each other on time. Only one shot was allowed, if you missed you failed, if you both missed you did it again. A winners and losers bracket was formed, with the overall winner shooting a 1.27 from concealment in the final round.
Scott then, in front of the entire class with another student running the timer, hit the steel in 0.88 From 25 yards. From concealment. Cold.
We wrapped up the first day and had a team dinner and got some rest.
Day two was the Red Dot Performance section.
We did several accuracy measures where Scott covers the importance of zero, dot manufacturers, and dot zero. Scott taught a 10y zero and we then confirmed all students zeros by shooting a 2" square from 10y. I believe two students had to make adjustments and then we moved on.
Scott had us shoot rapid fire into the berm to examine our dots pattern under recoil, and he also used this as a diagnostic tool to correct our grip for recoil management. This was extremely helpful and all students were able to see the benefits of shooting with Scott's instructed stance and grip, as the dot would "bounce" predictably up and down without leaving the window of the optic.
From there we entered a "gross sight picture" block because everybody knows red dots are trash up-close. This was demonstrably wrong, as he showed three methods of using your RDS pistol at 3y with three different methods. The first was as simple as putting your back plate in the center of what you're aiming at. The second was just aiming through your window, whether you saw the dot or not. The third method was using the "owl ears" of the RMR to cut the target in half and fire. Using all three of these methods, no students had anything close to an errant round or unacceptable hits. From there we did a "3x2" competition - 3 rounds to the chest, two to the head from 3 yards. The winner shot in 1.76.
Then we moved on to "shooting the dot" on transitioning between targets. Originally we began with numbered dots on paper from 5-6 yards, working all the way up to walking towards two steel targets from 25 and bouncing back and forth between them on the move. Scott really drilled us on trusting the process, seeing what you needed to see and taking the appropriate action. We then went to the plate rack and had a plate rack competition to shoot 6 plates from a draw. The winners time was just south of 4.00 if I remember correctly. From a holster with 9 levels of retention.
We took a break from the heat for a few minutes, then loaded mags and started a discussion block on the Bill Drill (6 rounds to A-zone on IPSC target from 7 yards). Scott's black belt standard on this is 2.00 or less from concealment. We did four bill drills each. Scott then stapled 3x5 cards onto each target for the class to take an attempt at his Black Belt patch (currently only 4 people hold this award). To earn the patch you must do 4 drills, consecutively, without fail, at a black-belt time constraint. The standards are a 3x2 drill in under 2 seconds, a single shot from 7 yards A-zone in under 1 second, a bill drill in under 2 seconds, and a 25y A-zone hit in under 1.5. Sadly nobody was able to accomplish it, but it was a great time.
We then did a debrief, cleaned up the range, and everyone went home!
All in all, Scott is a very gifted instructor. He jokes around like he's known you for years, while at the same time providing excellent guidance on how to better yourself both physically and mentally to accomplish your goals. This was a smaller class so every single student received a generous amount of 1 on 1 instruction time with him, and I can't think of a single student that didn't show tremendous improvement. I would not hesitate to take another class with Scott as he truly understands the way of the dot, efficiency in movement, and is able to break down the lessons on both in an easy-to-digest way that shows immediate results.
Thanks to all that came out, can't wait for the next one. I believe Scott is going to work with the host to try and get out again in 2020.
