Rob Pincus Combat Focus/Adv. Handgun review

[Fast351]

It was a long 3 day training weekend, but well worth it. We spoke with Rob after this class, and it looks like there will be some opportunities in October for training with Rob here in town. It's not on the calendar yet, but if you're interested in it, keep an eye on the ICE training website http://www.icetraining.us/ for calendar updates.

For those of you who don't know who Rob Pincus is, he used to be the training coordinator for Valhalla training center. At the end of last year when Valhalla decided to make the access to their programs more exclusive, Rob decided to move on and start his own company based on the training system called "Combat Focus" that he developed.

I have taken several different advanced handgun tactics classes from both local and national instructors. Some were very well done, others I was disappointed with what I got for the money. This class definitely fell in the former.

I have been shooting pistols for about 20 years. I started getting pretty serious about it around 2000 when it looked like the carry permit thing was going to happen, and have been training and shooting competition action pistol since then. I consider myself a pretty good pistol shooter, but you always have to approach every training class with an open mind. I am of the opinion that you try everything the instructor brings to you, and if it works, you incorporate it. Some of the concepts Rob presented were tactics I've already trained with, but quite a few new tactics were presented, and they make a lot of sense to me.

Students that show up for this type of training are expected to already have a good grounding in safe gun handling, always being aware of muzzle control, not needing to be reminded of keeping the finger off the trigger, drawing from a holster safely, etc. This isn't an intro to shooting. Interestingly, the shooting skill has very little to do with the concepts of this class, an IDPA master shooter would do just as well in this class as an IDPA marksman shooter, for example. Marksmanship skill has very little to do with it.

The first day we covered the concept of Combat Focus. In a nutshell, the combat focus concept is that you have to find your balance between speed and accuracy at different ranges commonly found in defensive combat. Rob teaches all concepts while giving you the background, explaining along the way the thinking behind the concepts. We were instructed that since history shows us that most gun battles take place inside of 15 yards, we would be working at 15 yards and in (we did do a little bit longer distance shooting in the class). The second part of the concept is that you do not need to put all the rounds through a ragged hole. Combat accurate hits are an 8" box in the upper chest area, and you should be using the entire box from all distances, otherwise you're either shooting too slow, or shooting too fast (misses outside the box). This shows either underconfidence or overconfidence in you ability to make the hits. We shot at various distances, shooting with both hands, strong hand and weak hand to understand how fast we were able to shoot, and how much of a sight picture you needed to get the hits. It kind of goes against the front sight-trigger press method many instructors teach, but it allows you to place combat accurate hits much faster at short distances.

The second part of day one we spent on holster presentation. Rob teaches a slightly modified but fairly standard draw technique of drawing up, orienting the weapon, bringing it to high ready, and punching the weapon out to fire. We went through the physiology of why this works, having the elbow behind the weapon and the stability it provides. We were introduced to the startle response, which we used from that point forward to start all engagements. In short, when you are presented with a threat (or in Combat Focus speak, a Dynamic Critical Incident), your bodies' natural reaction is to bring the hands up in front of the chest, and crouch slightly to prepare for fight or flight. Historical evidence shows that you cannot train this away. Even hard core SpecOps guys working in hazardous environments with 1000s of hours of training still have a startle response. Noone goes directly for their gun, unless they're in a controlled environment. So from this point forward, on command, the first step of the engagement was to simulate a startle response, or bring the hands up, and flinch, while crouching, then drawing, and engaging. We were also introduced to the concept of lateral movement from the threat while drawing to throw off their axis of attack.

The next day we worked on positional shooting (from seated, etc). It was interesting to see how the draw system Rob teaches where all manipulations, and the high ready position work in all body positions, and provides superior weapons retention. In addition, the orientation of the gun from just above the holster while the gun is tucked in tight provides not only a safe way to orient the gun, but also works in all positions. We started on some one handed weapons manipulations, including reloading and malfunction clearing. It started pouring after lunch, and despite the canopy, we were basically working in the mud. We did a bit more classroom stuff understanding how time perception distorts during a Dynamic Critical Incident, why you cannot untrain the startle response, why you get tunnel vision and why gross motor skills take over and you lose fine motor skills. All of it stems from survival instincts of the human body. After the classroom stuff, we headed back out on the range and did more malfunction clearing, and did a "shooting from unrealistic distances" demo from 50 or so yards. My Glock 17 did amazingly well despite being set on the muddy ground, and repeatedly having muddy magazines inserted. We were rinsing out the magazines in mud puddles when the rounds wouldn't come out, and I rinsed my Glock out in a mud puddle when it had it's only malfunction. There was sand stuck under the slide release that caused the slide to lock back every round fired because it was being pushed up. I took it apart that night and was surprised it ran at all. The slide sounded like it was grinding when it moved back and forth, and the inside looked just nasty. But the thing ran like a swiss watch. It was my goal to run the entire class without touching it, but I couldn't let it be. I hosed it out with brake cleaner and relubed it before the third day of class.

The last day was much nicer outside. We did our only shooting while moving this day, moving away and laterally from a contact distance encounter (Rob runs a completely separate 2 day class that deals with contact fighting). We found that unless you HAVE to move while shooting, it is much better to move while drawing, then plant while you shoot and get 2-3 solid "combat accurate" hits, instead of shooting while moving (which really works much better in a controlled range environment than in the real world when you're fighting for your life) and getting 2-3 peripheral hits that may not stop the threat. We then did some "figure eight" drills where you walk in a figure eight, the instructor calls out a number of a target to shoot, you simulate a startle response, and incorporate all the skills learned to this point, including lateral movement while drawing, punching out from a high ready, etc. One other topic that was covered earlier is that the overwhelming majority of shootings where a reload is performed the reload is done at slidelock, so the entire class was run without tactical reloads. (This was actually covered on day one). Reloads are perfomed without looking, at high ready.

The last part of the day we spent doing more unconventional shooting positions simulating shooting after falling down. This was interesting because the instructor pushed you down in a random direction, then you had to shoot the target from that position. Finally, we did another figure eight drill that incorporated the unconventional shooting positions as well as all the other skills.

My comments on the class:

-Rob teaches the entire class from a defensive perspective. Many training classes I've taken in the past have tried to cater to the defensive carry people, but come from a law enforcement background. Some of the tactics in those classes probably work really well for law enforcement, but may not necessarily work for concealed carry. Not so with this class. Everything was taught as a reaction to a Dynamic Critical Incident, not as an offensive tactic.

-Drills were not repeated more than two or three times. People naturally look for ways to "game" a drill if it's repeated too often. Choreography works fine on a range in a controlled environment, but doesn't work well in the real world.

-Robs teaching style is more cerebral than most classes I've attended. It's not "because it works for such and such group" or "because that's what specops does", it's "because we've studied historical shooting incidents, and found this works", or "the body reacts this way, therefore you must work with your natural reaction to solve the problem".

What worked for me:

-The startle reaction is a fantastic training tool. Training yourself to respond to the startle reaction by evaluating, then solving the problem, is much more realistic than getting the "gun" command and immediately going for the gun, because that's not what's going to happen in the real world. Knowing your hands will start in front of your chest or face instead of at your side when you begin your draw makes a big difference in the way you draw, especially if drawing from concealment.

-The high ready position for doing blind reloads sounds weird, but works really well. It allows you to keep your eyes on the target, and holding the gun against the body. It doesn't seem natural at first, but it's very easy to train your body to do it. Reloading with the gun away from your body not only creates a weapons retention problem, but inserting a magazine into the gun from 18" off your body is much harder to do than when it's tucked in.

-Don't shoot on the move. It's much faster to get accurate hits while planted.

-Don't swing the gun from target to target. Bring the gun back in to high ready and assess, then engage the second target. Due to tunnel vision, you likely won't see the second target anyway, and swinging the gun and timing the slowdown and stopping on target works great on a range, but due to time distortion doesn't work in real life.

Things I have previously trained for that worked:

-Lateral movement while drawing, reloading, etc. Getting "off the X" is important in survival.

-Scanning and assessing after shooting.

Things that didn't work for me:

-Clearing complex malfunctions without examining the gun. I understand why it might work for some, but at some point you have to "figure it out". I had an induced malfunction where a case was backwards in the chamber. We ended up having to drive the case out, but in a real world encounter, valuable time would have been wasted trying to procedurally fix the problem before realizing the gun was out of the fight.

In conclusion, Rob Pincus is a world class trainer, with a course that is specifically targetted to defensive carry, more so than any other course I've ever taken. He's a great instructor with a teaching style that allows the students to understand the concepts and why they work. If you get the chance this fall, I highly recommend his class.

[cmj685]

Thanks for the review! There has been some controversy with Rob (as with anyone who actually has an original thought) and I just wasn't sure what to think. I was disappointed in how thin his book Combat Focus Shooting was (though he emailed me to tell me he is writing another, longer and more extensive book) so I decided not to go. With this nice recommendation I won't be hesitant next time.

[Don L]

"Cross Training" whenever you can is a great idea. You may not agree with everything being taught in a class, yet if you pick up a few "new tools for the toolbox", it's worth it.

[Pat]

Thanks Don, for such a detailed review. I really enjoyed reading about Rob's approach. It is a little different from the training I've had in the past, and I like that. Rob's emphasis on the "startle response" is something I have not come across before.

[Fast351]

Thanks Don, for such a detailed review. I really enjoyed reading about Rob's approach. It is a little different from the training I've had in the past, and I like that. Rob's emphasis on the "startle response" is something I have not come across before.

My name's not Don, but that's OK

I realize not everyone can afford this kind of training (both in money and in time) but if you can and you're at all interested in improving your skillset, classes like this are worth their weight in gold should you ever get into a lethal force encounter. Not to mention they're a hell of a lot of fun.

Not everyone will want to train at this level and that's OK. But it is out there and that's pretty cool.

One of the things that was really nice is that everyone was safe and you weren't worried about people doing stupid stuff with their guns and endangering the entire line. I never saw one gross violation that came even close to putting anyone in danger (and I watch for that stuff, being that I'm an SO while shooting IDPA).

It was interesting at the different skill levels in the class and how easily everyone worked together. We had a couple cops that have been shooting and doing cop training for over 15 years, and then we had a younger guy who had been around guns a while, but just got his carry permit and this was the first formal training he had gotten. It was fun to watch how quickly he got the concepts and how fast he became a better shooter. I was actually kind of jealous I never got a clean slate start like that

Anyone do a review of Farnams class last weekend up nort? Curious how that went.

[westberg]

Fast, the first time I read your review I also thought DonL was doing the review. I wonder what happened and why it showed like that.
I did attend John's class and thought it was a great class. I'm hoping someone else will jump in with the review.

[Ironbear]

Rob's emphasis on the "startle response" is something I have not come across before.

While I've not heard it called the "startle response", I have encountered the idea in some Karate training. The idea is to train to try and continue the natural reaction into some useful response. ie. to block, protect the face, punch....

[BRIT_in_the_weeds]

I think it's more of a hunched shoulders/lower centre of gravity............to grip/draw/rotate/extend

[David]

Rob sounds like a good guy to take a class from. I like that he's non-traditional. I've done so many 5-day traditional classes now that it's really just range time at this point (although still educational and a lot of fun).

I didn't take the Farnam class recently, but I took one from him in Memphis a few years ago, and I had a similar reaction to him. He's got some unique ideas about retention, disarming, and so forth, and I learned a few important things from him. I even got the gold pin!

Thanks for the detailed review.

[Fast351]

Rob's emphasis on the "startle response" is something I have not come across before.

While I've not heard it called the "startle response", I have encountered the idea in some Karate training. The idea is to train to try and continue the natural reaction into some useful response. ie. to block, protect the face, punch....

Interesting video from Tony Blauer on the subject:

[Rob Pincus]

Hey, I was there when we shot that video!

Tony and I just did a video together for the PDV series. S.P.E.A.R. System and CFS work very well together before both systems stress being intuitive and efficient.

One of the CFS Instructors just submitted an Article for the I.C.E. Newsletter explaining the Synergy between SPEAR, CFS and Crossfit. He is the only person on the planet certified in CF, CFS and SPEAR. ( I have participated in a few Crossfit workouts and even participated in one of their events, but have not tried for certification yet.... hopefully, I'll get it done this year.)


Thanks for the thorough AAR, Fast351...... and all other comments.


-RJP

[Fast351]

I know there's some people here on the forum that are in the Southwest part of the state. Rob just scheduled a 3 day class (the same one I reviewed above) in Souix Falls, SD. The info is here: http://www.icetraining.us/training_calendar.php.

Sept 26-28.

Don't wait too long to sign up, slots are usually limited and I am fairly certain that some are already filled.