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KinnyLee wrote:Kythas, it looks like you did 90% of the write up for me since I was there the same week you were in. Which class and range were you in? I was on Wayne Walker's class at Range 7/18. There was 4 distinguish graduates with my niece's BF and me being one of them and another 4 graduates. The instructor said we are probably his best class where we are on top of the game schedule wise. I made it to the final 2 on the 1 on 1 challenge only beaten by another 1911 guy. You get no complains from me there.
A couple of things I want to add though.
They have a "brown comfort station" which is basically an A/Ced restroom outside of range 4. That pretty much replaced those porta-potties a few years back. Those are still around at the new ranges pass the Monster's INC and shoot houses.

They've streamlined registration quite a bit compared to a few years back. Job well done on that part!

On Day 2, they offer you a chance to shoot one magazine on an Uzi for $20 or M16 for $30. I did the Uzi and it was fun.

Onsite lunch is available now for $12.95 per day. We brought our own lunch but they look pretty good.

Front Sight teaches the Weaver stance which may not agree with a lot of other shooters out there who uses the Isosceles but when they explained it, it makes good sense to me.

Shoot house was great and hearing my partner really double tapping gets me wonder if he got really that good or he's not looking at his front sight. It turns out he wasn't looking at his front sight but he made it at the top of his class anyway with 0 pts down on the shooting portion. He even beat me and I only had 6 pts down. I'm very impressed and proud of him given that he has only shot a pistol once about a year ago.

The only time I felt an adrenaline dump was during the 1 on 1. After the 3rd round I got very jittery. I got to the final but didn't win. I'm very happy to be #2 in class though.

Do you mind if I post some pics here? If not I will go start a pic thread.

I was in Steve Campbell's class on range 1F on the first two days and 14 on the second two.

I won the 1 on 1 by default. All my opponents shot the hostage. I'm convinced it had nothing to do with my psyching them out, though. Before each round, I'd tell my opponent "Whatever you do, don't think about how HUGE the hostage target is and how tiny the hostage taker target is, or how it's impossible to miss the hostage." So when I saw that they shot the hostage, I had all the time in the world to squeeze off that perfect shot on the hostage taker target.

McKnife, we had no distinguished graduates in my class and only three graduates. I was not among them, even though I was the last man standing on the metal target "man on man" shoot. The instructor in the kill house told me that he'd put me in the top third of all students he's taken through that, so I felt good about that.

I used an XD-40.

The wind started to really gust just before the final skills test. By gust, I mean about 10 miles per hour sustained and 15-20 gusts. It was blowing in from our backs and made it next to impossible to cleanly draw from concealment or to get a spare mag during the tactical reloads or the malfunction drills. In fact, as I was putting my mag into my pocket during the tactical reload portion of the test, my shirt tail blew in front of my mag as I was inserting it into my pocket, causing it to fall to the ground which gave me a procedural. I had similar issues with my concealment garment blocking access to my spare mags due to the wind during other parts of the test which caused me to not complete them in time. Almost everyone else had the same issues, and the instructors even said they believe the wind hampered us all. However, as they said, we can't choose conditions in the real world and may have to deal with those things if we ever get in a fire fight, also.

I went to take the 4-day defensive handgun course at Front Sight in Pahrump, Nevada this past week. A few observations in case anyone was thinking of going.

The instructors are very professional and knowledgable. The level of instruction was excellent and the course was very intense. Most of the instructors were former military and many were former law enforcement. That said, they are very patient and do not behave as drill sergeants. We had two people in the class who had never fired a gun before. They took their time working with those people, encouraged them, and did their best to make them comfortable. In one case, one instructor was basically assigned to shadow one of the people (a 60 year old woman) for almost the entire course to help her.

I drove so I could take my own ammo, figuring they would gouge you on ammo prices if you bought ammo there. They don't. Their ammo was actually cheaper than the same ammo at Wal-Mart.

Both on the drive there and the drive back, open carry is legal in every state once you leave Texas. Nevada does not recognize the Texas CHL but open carry without a license is legal. On both the drive there and the drive back, I saw numerous people in New Mexico, Arizona, and Nevada open carrying. At one gas station in Arizona, there were two gas station employees and three customers open carrying. People seemed to accept it.

I decided to open carry while I was in Nevada. I had no problems (other than feeling self conscious). Nobody looked at me strangely, and nobody asked me to leave their place of business. I did not carry in the casinos in Pahrump. On a side note, when passing through Clark County (where Las Vegas is) you want to unload and lock up your gun, as the Clark County Sheriff's Office and Las Vegas Metropolitan Police believe they have the authority to ban both open and concealed carry in that county, despite State law.

Some of the course also deals with the moral/ethical issues involved in self defense use of lethal force. There were several things discussed there that I hadn't thought of, and caused me to revise my list of circumstances when I will use deadly force to fewer.

While people tell me I'm a very good shot, this class taught me that I'm not as good as I thought I was. I learned lots of things and have much to work on to become better.

Overall, I highly recommend the classes there. On a side note, I heard they are planning to expand and build a training facility in Texas, probably outside of the Houston area. It'll probably be a few years before that happens, though.