We had a wonderful time taking Daniel Richardson’s Combat Handgun Marksmanship class at Point Blank Range in Matthews, NC. It is highly recommend for anyone that wants to become more proficient in the shooting sports, and firearms training in general.
On Saturday (Day-1)
We started off in the classroom with a safety briefing, and then moved into a quick recap of the shooting fundamentals. Grip, Trigger, Sight Alignment, Stance etc. We then covered off on range awareness, class agenda, restrooms, extra ammo if needed, as well the four rules to firearms and their safe gun handling.
Let’s get to it shall we?! Out on the range we started a series of drills that sequentially built on-top of one another and it was fantastic. Drills spanned warmup drills, slow fire, drawing from holster, 5 yard close in, and progressively accelerated from there. My fellow students knew what they were doing, which allowed Daniel to adjust and tweak based upon a “Performance” Driven vs. “Outcome based” training methodology. That’s an important distinction that I just made. Take the class to understand more on that concept.
During lunch the entire class stayed together and invited even the new guys to join us as we went out as a team to foster kinship and camaraderie. One of our classmates was from a local PD so it was awesome picking his brain as well as Daniel’s on current happenings in the world. How their police department trains, CCW questions, etc. It was fun to compare and take many notes. After lunch and back on the range that first afternoon of Day-1 things picked up! We ran drills called the “Gauntlet”, “Wobble Zone”, and we did other drills from strong hand only as well as traditional two hand and of course lots of practice coming out of the holster. At the conclusion of the day we had a lot to review and reflect upon as we left the range and transitioned back into the classroom.
On Sunday (Day-2)
Drills: Right from the range we did warm up drills and then kicked off the start of the final day with drills called “Modified Grinder” and more where were tied into now movement, with more offhand drills, and one handed drills. Throughout the class we would track our time and accuracy in the training room on the white board for each person, on each drill, and rerun them so that each student could see their learning and skills development along with progression. Some would speed up, some got to fast and needed to dial it back find that balance and sweet spot, etc.
Then…
Role Play: We did some fantastic role play which was fantastic. We loved the flow of the class. These were scenarios of what people would do as a bad guy as well as good guy. The scenarios covered Bank Lobby, Bank ATM, Getting off the “X”, etc. Having never done this before something like this was on my bucket list so this was great for me to experience.
Then…
Low Light: Just Fantastic. If you’ve never done it and you are worried about things that go bump in the night then this class and set of drills and training is for you. Take Daniel’s class in order to learn more.
Bonus…
ShotGun Work: As a special bonus we got to shoot some Shotgun thanks for our classmate and now friend in the PD. Powerful and Awesome… Nothing like getting an opportunity to through some slugs 30 feet down range into a target. Awesome!
In Summary, The flow of the 2-Day Combat Handgun Marksmanship class was fantastic. One of the smoothest running classes that I have ever been in. We didn’t learn “BS”, I’m at the point where I don’t like learning dangerous, wacky, or internet commando stuff. I like the value for my training dollars and more importantly I like to learn from qualified instructors that i believe in and can trust.
I would say that the class is one of the Top-5 classes that I’ve ever taken, and believe me over the past 2.5 years now I’ve put a lot of rounds down range and have taken many training classes and workshops. I loved the mixture of drills, the performance based classroom training and tracking work, as well as the role play and low light. It made for the perfect blend of tactical handgun work along with Marksmanship. I highly recommended this class for the person that is looking to learn a lot, and that wants to improve their martial gun handling skills. To the ownership of Point Blank Range Matthews. You have a good thing going here with this class and also with Daniel’s person. He is pound for pound one of the best firearms instructors out there and we are lucky to have him in our neck of the woods. For new students he is “easy going”, “knows his stuff”, and I promise you has a class that’s for you! In conclusion please stop by PBR and sign up for a class. I am sure that you won’t regret it.
PBR is my go to training provider! Love their classes and Highly Recommended!