TGO only Fighting Pistol course in Camden TN (May 26-27)

[wareagle]

Due to a family emergency that will take me out of town starting today, I must withdraw from the TR Fighting Pistol class this weekend. I will reschedule and pay as soon as I can. Sorry for the late notice, I hope the class goes well. I Hope to be at a TR class soon.

Thanks.

-Len

I hope family situation improves.

BTW, let me know if you reschedule. I had to back out, so my brother in law are hoping to attend a future course.

[Guest 0down]

Anyone going tonight? I am leaving after work from Memphis.

[Donnie]

Yep. I'm probably going to leave around 6ish. It's a 3 hour drive for me, so around 9 I'll be there.

[TGO David]

You guys have fun and be safe!

[Guest Len]

Thanks for the kind words guys. I just got back into town and I am happy to say everyone is safe and sound. Typical family drama/bs that in the end turned out to be no biggie. And people wonder why I moved 800 miles away from these people...

Anyway, back home is NJ, land of "don't even think about bringing your guns here." Felt a little nekkid w/out the Glock. I love my home state, as I guess we all do, but it feels nice to be back in a place where the gun laws are more reasonable. NJ is a state with Philly on one side, NYC on the other, Newark in the north and Camden in the south. Considering that, its not surprising that a legislature dominated by scared suburbanites would enact all sorts of crazy laws. Sad, but not surprising.

VERY SAD to have missed the class. YES, I am going to re-schedule and will advise when I do. This will be the summer with the most free time in probably a decade for me, so I plan on using some of that time sending lead down range.

Anyway, glad to be home.

[Donnie]

We shot our asses off, not literally of course, and had a great time. I learned a lot in this class and highly recommend it. All of the instructors there are top notch and a good group of guys. I am definately going to take more classes there. I've drank from the Tactical Response cool aid, and now I'm addicted.

[Donnie]

0 Down, it was nice to meet you. As far as I know, we were the only two from this board there, well at least in the team room.

If anyone else was there, speak up. I'm the fat guy on this end, without a glock.

[Guest WingedSnake]

AWESOME time. Excellent class. Impressive group of shooters. HIGHLY recommend Tactical Response!

WingedSnake = Fawn, 2nd one up in the picture, next to the fat guy on the end without a glock (grin).

It was great meeting you all!

[molonlabetn]

Nice!

Glad ya'll had a good time. I'm looking forward to pictures and reviews...

[Guest 0down]

I have recovered enough from this class to start on a review. All I can say is WOW! Every second of this class was well organized and thought out. This is not a class about shooting, it is a class about fighting, with a gun. Tactical Response's motto is "Mindset Tactics Skill Gear" and that is what they teach.

Every lecture and drill was designed to instill a warrior mindset in each student. The lessons on tactics were heavily reinforced by drills on the range. Each drill built on skills learned on the last one. Here is an example. Malfunction clearing skills were taught early on. Dummy rounds were passed out and every magazine for the rest of class was expected to have at least one dummy round.

A tremendous amount of material is covered in this class. Everything was covered from mindset to legal issues, from physiological effects of stress to dealing with the aftermath of a fight, and shooting from every conceivable position with ranges of 5 inches to about 50 yards.

Did I say there was a lot of shooting? The round count was about 1000 rounds for the class. The class is hard on gear. I broke two guns (a GLOCK and a Kimber - no flame wars). Luckily, the Gear Shop had the parts to get me up and going. The class is hard on students. I actually had a small blister on my trigger finger from shooting. Bring some knee pads and bandaids.

The instructors were very knowledgeable and wanted to see each student thrive. Everybody I met went out of their way to make you a better shooter.

One of the best parts about the class is the Team Room. Anyone who takes a class from Tactical Response gets free lodging. It is actually Yeager's basement. Do not let that scare you. It is huge and comfortably furnished with an astonishing array of books and movies. You will meet interesting people and will really get to know your classmates. James Yeager is a great guy and will treat you like family.

I would have no problem recommending this class to anyone regardless of skill level. It will keep everyone challenged.

[Donnie]

Ok, here's how my weekend went in a little more depth. I forgot my camera, so unfortunately no pics.

Friday evening: I left the house at around 6pm and got to Camden at around 9pm. Pleasant drive. Get into Camden and it reminds me of home - nice small town feel. Get to James' house and make my way down to the team room. There are quite a few people in there and come to find out, they are there from a full week's training for an instructor level class. The Team Room is in James' basement and includes 12 bunks and a common area where there were all kinds of manly activities going on. The Team Room was a good thing. We all talked and watched movies and got to know each other.

Saturday Morning: We got up and went with Sherman House (one of the instructors) to the Catfish Place for breakfast. This restaurant serves the biggest breakfasts for the least amout of money that I've seen. Breakfast was good and then we left to go to the Tactical Response shop. Shop was well stocked with all kinds of goodies and the training was to go on in the rear of the shop. We met the rest of the class that didn't show up in the Team Room. James gave us an intro and introduced us to the trainers. The lectures were interesting and informative. You didn't have to ask many questions, as the info that you probably wanted to know about was to be covered in a couple minutes. After the classroom portion of the day, we all proceded to the range. We started off with dry drills to get proper draw stroke, stance, movement, verbilization, and grip. We started on Live Fire and that's where all the real fun started for me. They incorporate all aspects of the draw and movement into each drill with everything progressively getting more advanced. We worked on trigger control and sight alignment for a while then incorporated it into movement. We shot while moving back, foreward, left, and right. I would say that I shot approx 650 rounds the first day. Good Day. Long Day. At lunch, a couple of us that stayed at the range got to shoot a nice little toy, a Barrett .50 that one of the students from the instructor class had just purchased. That thing was incredible. We headed back to the team room and some of us got showers and others had to wait till we got back from Dinner. I cleaned up my gun and waited for the others to get ready. We ate at Raphael's and I had a delicious steak. After dinner, we retired back to the team room to clean up and rest our weary bodies.

Sunday morning: I was kinda tired so I slept a little late and barely had enough time to pack up my stuff and get my gas guzzler out of everyone's way. We all went back to The Catfish Place and had another good breakfast. Again, we all headed off to the shop. This morning the lecture was on mindset and legal ramifacations. Sherman House did an excellent job with the mindset portion and James Yeager blew me away with his lethal force and legal teachings. This mornings classes took a bit longer than saturday's classes did, but were well worth it. At lunch, we headed back out to the range. Day 2 at the range was even better than the first. We ran drills about using cover, changing positions, more and faster movement. We also covered close retention shooting in a manner that I've never done before. This was an excellent day.

The next day, Monday, I was sore for a few hours but it was definately worth it. James and crew puts on a high quality class that I guarantee will satisfy you. This is only the start of my training with them. I was highly impressed with the care that the instructors gave the students. For James to open up his house to us just gives you a hint of the kind of man he is.

I'll be back, I've drank the Tactical Response cool-aid and I think that I'm addicted.

[Donnie]

Did it turn out to be your extractor spring on your Glock???

[molonlabetn]

Demon,

How'd your 226 do? Ran like a top, I bet...

Excellent reviews, guys!

[Guest 0down]

[Guest 0down]

It was actually the extractor itself. I love how GLOCK parts are cheap and common. Allen opened the shop up for me after class and installed it for me. Cant beat that service. Kimber has a new slide stop on the way. Luckily that broke after class.

[Donnie]

Wonder what happened to it to make it do that all of a sudden. You probably put 900 rounds through it before it did what it did.

The 226 ran and ran. The only malfunctions were manually induced by myself by either snap cap or simulating a stovepipe or a type 3 malfunction. The only thing that was happening with it was that I didn't put any locktite on the grip screws and I had to tighten them about every 400 rounds or so. I did a quickie clean job on it (took all of 5 minutes) after the first day and forgot to clean my magazines. It didn't matter though, they still preformed as needed. It far exceeded my expectations. It should be good and broken in now.

[Guest 0down]

Closer to 30000 and it was used when I bought it 12 years ago! Even after the $15 repair I still feel I have gotten my moneys worth.

[saintsfanbrian]

Last edited by molonlabetn : Today at 01:58 PM. Reason: adjust picture layout

Thanks Molon

[shaftbass]

I'm trying to decide if I want to use my 5" Kimber 1911 .45 when I take the class or my XD-9 Service.

XD-9:

-5 x 16 rd mags so less time reloading

-Cheaper ammo

-In brand new condition and I don't want to mess it up.

Kimber:

-I just love to shoot it

-As much as I know it could handle the class, the fact remains that it is a $700 dollar gun that is pretty much brand new. I'd hate to beat it like that because I do like my guns to stay nice and keep their value.

Maybe I will just buy a beater G17 or G19 just for stuff like this, a rugged gun with some wear on it (police trade-in?) that I don't have to worry about marring if I drop it, slide it across some rocks, or what have you. KY Imports always has good deals on used and factory rebuilt Glocks.

Does TR have guns available for rent?

[Guest Allen Webb]

We have Glocks, AR's, and AK's for rent for our Camden classes.

[TGO David]

I'd use the XD9. Sooner or later the crap finish that Springfield / HS puts on those guns will start to wear and you can get it done up by someone else in a much more resilient finish.

9mm = far cheaper to shoot at classes like this. I don't buy into the idea that you have to train exclusively with the gun or caliber that you're going to carry. I shoot the hell out of my .40SW and will shoot the hell out of my 9mm when it returns from Robar (unless I sell it and buy an M&P 9mm instead). But neither of those things screw me over when I take my 1911 out and shoot it. I'm just as accurate and somehow my brain still manages to find the safeties without any hesitation or problems.

I'll wait for the pro's to flame me now... then politely tell them to STFU on the basis that my personal experience trumps their armchair pontification.

[shaftbass]

I'd use the XD9. Sooner or later the crap finish that Springfield / HS puts on those guns will start to wear and you can get it done up by someone else in a much more resilient finish.

My XD is a bi-tone

[molonlabetn]

I'd use the XD9. Sooner or later the crap finish that Springfield / HS puts on those guns will start to wear and you can get it done up by someone else in a much more resilient finish.

9mm = far cheaper to shoot at classes like this. I don't buy into the idea that you have to train exclusively with the gun or caliber that you're going to carry. I shoot the hell out of my .40SW and will shoot the hell out of my 9mm when it returns from Robar (unless I sell it and buy an M&P 9mm instead). But neither of those things screw me over when I take my 1911 out and shoot it. I'm just as accurate and somehow my brain still manages to find the safeties without any hesitation or problems.

I'll wait for the pro's to flame me now... then politely tell them to STFU on the basis that my personal experience trumps their armchair pontification.

Very true... for all but the most basic, or dedicated failure training specific to one's firearm, it would even make alot more sense to invest in .22lr conversions for the pistols and ARs when shooting in such high volumes.

Just my take though.

[TGO David]

My XD is a bi-tone

You'll poke yer eye out!

Very true... for all but the most basic, or dedicated failure training specific to one's firearm, it would even make alot more sense to invest in .22lr conversions for the pistols and ARs when shooting in such high volumes.

Just my take though.

Agreed. I would love to get a 22LR conversion for my 1911s. Maybe even one for the AR... but I do love the way it pops right now.

[Guest Shay VanVlymen]

I'm glad a few TGO forum members were able to take advantage of this class. Now that you have one class under your belts I hope you understand why I believe training is critical if you are going to own or carry a gun for defense.