03-07-2012, 06:14 PM
The most important ingredients missing from every practical firearms course or competition I have attended are:
1) Fear of imminent bodily harm or death
2) Pain from injury
They are extremely difficult to produce in a training environment, although the Wermacht did a "good" job of it by allowing a certain percentage of casualty losses in training.
One of the best training experiences I had in my military career was when a guy who was a Mogadishu vet came up behind me on one of the rare instances that we were shooting on a KD range. I was in the prone, shooting slow-fire for groups with my M4, and all of a sudden, I felt the tip of his jungle boot just above my family jewels, ready to crush them if he wanted with ease. He slowly applied slight pressure every time he saw me getting ready to break the shot, but I just chose not to flinch and drive on, as there was nothing else to do. That would be an extremely unnerving experience for most people, since you couldn't move or do anything other than continue to shoot. Cool heads prevail in those situations.
Most courses or competitions settle for getting your cardiovascular system pumping to simulate stress, but there is night and day difference between adrenal response stress, and cardiovascular stress, while they can be combined of course.
1) Fear of imminent bodily harm or death
2) Pain from injury
They are extremely difficult to produce in a training environment, although the Wermacht did a "good" job of it by allowing a certain percentage of casualty losses in training.
One of the best training experiences I had in my military career was when a guy who was a Mogadishu vet came up behind me on one of the rare instances that we were shooting on a KD range. I was in the prone, shooting slow-fire for groups with my M4, and all of a sudden, I felt the tip of his jungle boot just above my family jewels, ready to crush them if he wanted with ease. He slowly applied slight pressure every time he saw me getting ready to break the shot, but I just chose not to flinch and drive on, as there was nothing else to do. That would be an extremely unnerving experience for most people, since you couldn't move or do anything other than continue to shoot. Cool heads prevail in those situations.
Most courses or competitions settle for getting your cardiovascular system pumping to simulate stress, but there is night and day difference between adrenal response stress, and cardiovascular stress, while they can be combined of course.