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AndyC wrote:For the scariest heart-pounding experience, do it Man vs. Man style.

An old pic but here's my victory thumbs-up after taking on 40 guys and advancing to beat the top-shooter in the finals (who had a compensated Caspian 1911 race-gun with red-dot vs. me with my stock Rock Island 1911) in New Mexico 2008:



He was actually the faster and better shooter - we shot 3 sequences (I won the first, he won the second so we did a tie-breaker) but he folded under the pressure of the last one. That's the lesson right there: great gear and great skills mean zip if you can't hold it together when it counts, as evidenced by his final plate still standing at the left. As Bill Jordan put it in his book - "No Second Place Winner".

AndyC wrote:I've seen the real thing a number of times and haven't frozen yet, but I can confirm that tunnel-vision, tachypsychia and auditory exclusion are very real effects - and that countering those can be partly learned shooting steel under match pressure, particularly in real-time man vs man events.

mojo84 wrote:

AndyC wrote:I've seen the real thing a number of times and haven't frozen yet, but I can confirm that tunnel-vision, tachypsychia and auditory exclusion are very real effects - and that countering those can be partly learned shooting steel under match pressure, particularly in real-time man vs man events.

I'm sure shooting steel in competition is better than shooting paper. However. Nothing prepares a person better than the real deal. Also, no one knows for sure how they would respond until they are faced with the real deal. I'll take a guy that's been there and done that for my team.

puma guy wrote:

mojo84 wrote:

AndyC wrote:I've seen the real thing a number of times and haven't frozen yet, but I can confirm that tunnel-vision, tachypsychia and auditory exclusion are very real effects - and that countering those can be partly learned shooting steel under match pressure, particularly in real-time man vs man events.

I'm sure shooting steel in competition is better than shooting paper. However. Nothing prepares a person better than the real deal. Also, no one knows for sure how they would respond until they are faced with the real deal. I'll take a guy that's been there and done that for my team.

Exactly why I'll take Andy on my side!

AndyC wrote:

mojo84 wrote:

AndyC wrote:I've seen the real thing a number of times and haven't frozen yet, but I can confirm that tunnel-vision, tachypsychia and auditory exclusion are very real effects - and that countering those can be partly learned shooting steel under match pressure, particularly in real-time man vs man events.

I'm sure shooting steel in competition is better than shooting paper. However. Nothing prepares a person better than the real deal.

To an extent yes, but some people won't survive the real deal so it's not a practical training tool ;)

I'm not claiming this will make you an unstoppable gun-fighter by any means - but if someone can't control their anxiety doing this, they're definitely not ready for a gunfight unless they're very lucky. Other than (hugely expensive) training in high-speed, 360-deg kill-houses, I can't think of anything else that's a simple and efficient way to replicate to a large degree a good number of those symptoms for the everyday civilian on an everyday range. It has to be against another human being in real time, though.

AndyC wrote:

mojo84 wrote:I agree with you. Training is better than nothing or just shooting paper. I get the impression some think that shooting competitive matches makes them ready for combat. There is no substitute for pulling a gun on someone that is intent on doing you harm. As you know, no one really knows how or how well they will respond until in the situation.

You're correct, of course - nobody knows, but we can prepare people better for the pressures of that first encounter so it's not overwhelming.

Competitive matches aren't the same thing at all, yes - but they are good for making sure stuff works and getting people familiar with their equipment so they don't have to dither and wonder how to use the stuff at speed; they can then focus all their attention on solving the problem if they can keep their head together.