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The Dangerous Difference Between Confidence and Competence · Making Shooters Better

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Which w which one was the most challenging?
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's team weakened selection, maybe one of the hardest things I've ever done.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_01: Then there's parts that I felt man super strong.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: I'm seeing other guys struggle around me and I'm feeling great.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_01: And then there was moments where I was thought my spine was just gonna snap in half and you know, I I'm looking around like, how are some of these people doing it?
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_01: And but each of those things and and Ranger School, I mean the the sleep and and food deprivation, I I've never hallucinated like this out of lack of sleep and nourishment.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: I was seeing so many things in the woods, buildings and that faces, and you get up there and there's nothing there, it's just the woods.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: That's difficult in it in its own way.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um welcome to Making Shooters Better, brought to you by Laser Ammo.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: Some people have warrior credentials, others have the character that makes you want to be standing next to them shoulder to shoulder when things get ugly.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: Kyle Johnston of Unit Solutions has both.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: He's a former Marine, Ranger, still serving as an Army Green Beret with the 19th Special Forces group, as well as husband, father, and someone who has deliberately chosen hard paths more than once in his life.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: But what struck me most in this conversation wasn't the resume, it was the humility behind it.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: Carl talks openly about being humbled in training, discovering weaknesses he didn't know he had, and learning that confidence means very little if it isn't backed by a lot of preparation.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: He also speaks about his wife and family with the kind of perspective that reminds you that service is rarely carried by just one person.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: He's the kind of bloke who doesn't need to tell you he won't quit.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: His choices have already done that for him.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_00: And that mindset runs throughout this entire episode.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to talk about why simply going shooting is not the same as training, why pressure exposes the truth about your abilities, why good training should constantly reveal what still needs work, and why the firearms community you meet in person is often very different from the one shouting at each other online.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: So with that, let's roll the episode.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: Kyle, hello, and welcome to Making Shooters Better.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for joining me, mate.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, happy to be here.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: So I ask every guest the same question at the very beginning.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: How old were you when you first started shooting?
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: I was probably about eleven or twelve.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_01: Uh started out just a summer camp, you know, with archery and shooting twenty-two rifles.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_01: Um and then my dad would would take me to the range a little bit.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: He was uh in law enforcement and then moved on to uh the nuclear security world.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: So kind of grew up around guns and uh especially I I believe there was a a few years there he was ahead of the rifle pistol team for for their plant and would would travel around compete with other law enforcement agencies uh and just kind of smaller low-level shooting competitions, but you know, by proxy, uh I had the opportunity to start start shooting young.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: So did you enjoy the experience when you first started?
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_01: I did, yeah.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_01: I think uh I was um one of those boys I was super into cowboys and Indians and you know the whole nine and and wanted to watch all the action movies and I pretended in the backyard with sticks, so that the first chance I got to start shooting an actual gun, I think I I was very excited as a as a boy.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: Great.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's funny.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: I got to cross-train with the QRF at one of the nuclear plants.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: I actually uh when I first took my concealed carry class, two of the people that worked QRF for the nuclear power plant were on the the instructor squad or whatever you call them for taking that class.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: And so when I was shooting, you know, I had a line of shooters up to get my concealed carry, you have the the shots you have to take to qualify.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: And they had said, you know, center mass is fine, headshots are fine, whatever.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I put all my shots right underneath the tip of the target's nose.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, bored.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm like, why not?
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the guys came off at the end and he was watching me shoot and he came back down.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: He says, You and I, at the end of this class, we gotta talk.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, I got along with these guys really well and was lucky enough.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: They were like, okay, we're doing this type of training.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: Do you want to join us and come for a few like training sessions?
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I did.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: And the guys that worked those nuclear power plants, these are the guys that if something happens, they're on their way.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: And these guys could shoot.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: It was an amazing experience.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: So was your dad uh sort of part of that security kind of detail if he was working nuclear power?
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_01: Not not the QRF side.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um he worked at a specific nuclear power plant um in in security within that.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_01: But he was he was definitely a a better shot than me for a very long time.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you know, he held on to that for as long as he could, I think.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: But that's aspirational, I think, for a son, isn't it?
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: My son can shoot really very well.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: But again, he's you know, it took him a while to get there.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I I wouldn't want to go up against him, but what a great experience to shoot with your dad.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it was it it was awesome.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: Even uh kind of a funny side story.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh my now wife at the at the time I first started dating her, uh, and my parents realized it was getting serious.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_01: My dad uh kind of took her took her out shooting.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_01: He just thought that was a normal thing for like a first time to meet my at the time girlfriend took her to the range to to get to know her.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: That's funny.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: And how did that go?
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: It was kidding.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_01: You know, she uh my wife was very nervous.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_01: She had never been around guns, they weren't in her household.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: So totally understandable.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: That's a very intimidating thing when you don't grow up around it.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but my dad said you know, once the nerves kind of went away, she was shooting really, really well.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_01: So that's funny.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: And does she still shoot now?
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_01: Not really.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: She's uh she's been expressing wanting to start uh to potentially get her her CCW here.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: I've always kind of encouraged it, but I never push it on somebody who doesn't uh want to pursue that themselves.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: I th I think it's a big responsibility and you have to fully understand what comes with that.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_01: And and I think she's kind of getting to that point.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: So we'll probably start doing a little shooting together a little bit more.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, one of the problems I've run into with trying to gently do the same thing as you, encourage my wife to shoot.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_00: It can be difficult because you go to an indoor range or an outdoor range for that matter, where there are a lot of other people, the noise is overwhelming, right?
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_00: There's something about, okay, when I'm shooting and my ear protection is on and she is engaging in shooting, she does fine.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: But when other people are blasting, you know, potentially on either side of her, it's overwhelming.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: She doesn't like it.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_00: So one of the compromises we found is we will go, we have a couple of friends with some land, and we'll go shoot on their land, so it's just us when we go.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: But also using the smokeless range, she'll shoot that all day.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: So we do a lot of simulator uh shooting at home with the recall pistols or dry fire mags and stuff, and that will at least allow her to continue keeping those skills sharp.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's an it's one of the reasons that you know I've managed to sort of gently support her into continuing to keep her shooting skills up.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's awesome.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, same same thing with just you know filming content and doing stuff with our our Unit 9.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's kind of help encourage her because she's less intimidated by it.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_01: She starts doing it and it's it's almost that crawl, walk, run.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_01: I think she's she's getting a bug for it because now she can enjoy a little bit of the challenge and competition without you know that kind of hate to call it a violent recoil, but for somebody who doesn't shoot at all, that's I think what it feels like to her, the loud noises.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: So it's it's been a stepping stone, I think, getting her involved and into the shooting.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: No, and I think that's important to meet your other half, whether that's, you know, because I have a number of friends that are female competitive shooters whose husbands don't shoot and they don't particularly enjoy it.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: And so you know, it can go either way.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: But one of the things I think for us for us as shooters is meeting that person where they are, doing everything you can to encourage and support, never forcing the issue.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: But when that enthusiasm starts, you just cultivate it.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: Because what's better, I don't I don't know if there's anything better than a husband and wife team that can shoot together and know that, you know, if worst-case situation were to occur, the two of you together, what a bloody formidable force that would be.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I agree.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_00: First shot accuracy from a holster, whether that's outside the waistband or carrying concealed inside, comes down to one thing: reps.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_00: How many reps are you putting in each week?
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: If you can't draw from either concealed or especially outside the waistband in less than a second and hit your target every single time, you have work to do.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: And when it matters most, you're not going to get a warm-up rep.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: Laser ammo gives law enforcement and responsibly armed citizens the tools they need to train consistently, safely, at home or at the department.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: Five, ten, fifteen minutes a day could make all the difference in building your draw speed, building your first shot accuracy, and building your confidence that your performance will be there every single time.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: Train more, train smarter, train with laser ammo.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: Go to laser ammo.com to find out more.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_00: And now back to the episode.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_00: So you have an extremely interesting bio, and I can't wait to dive into this because you served with US Marines.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_00: Then you left, built an entirely different career, media photography.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: You can sort of fill me in on that, but then went back, but this time to Army SF.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_00: You you've got to talk us through that.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_01: So I I uh join joined the Marine Corps in early 2006.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um after high school, I got one more.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: I went to college, didn't know what I want to do.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't really care to stay in school, but I I played soccer growing up, so I got to play soccer for a semester in college, and then the plan was immediately going into the Marine Corps.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um, like I said, it was I was younger, I just I knew that was always the path for me.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_01: I just I I really loved, you know, GI Joe and any of the military movies or books I could get my hands on.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_01: So joined the Marine Corps, uh, did four years, uh a couple deployments, and then uh got out, used the GI Bill uh to go to school, and initially started going to school for uh mobile app development and hated it, didn't like that either.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_01: It was it was okay, but um the the major I was in was integrated media, so it kind of encompassed web design, mobile app development, and then we had done some uh editing classes, and that's what I fell in love with.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_01: And where it really kicked off was I did my junior year of college in London, England at University of the Arts London.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_01: So I started out at Chelsea College of Art and Design doing fine art, which was not I didn't understand that I was going there for fine art.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_01: I thought it was going to be more of like a film sort of class.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_01: So it was very interesting.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and funny side note, that's when I was in the Marine Corps, you know, I was always the guy who was waiting for the weekend to go surf out at Surf City or Wilmington and uh didn't quite fit in with all the the other infantry marines.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I loved the physicality of it, but I I was always trying to do other things as well and and into film and arts.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_01: And then when I was studying fine art in London, I was like, I also didn't fit in there.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_01: I wasn't quite the artist, you know, that I was surrounded by and just didn't think the same way.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_01: So it was like I never quite fit into either of those groups, but I but I loved it.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_01: I loved both.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah um and then but and living in London is where I started uh freelancing because I think it was like$1.90 to the pound at the time.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_01: So it was expensive living in London for nearly a full year.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_01: Um so I started freelancing video and realized like, oh, I could make a career out of this.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: Like people will pay me to do this, and and I love it.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: I was having a ton of fun.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so I yeah, graduated school, got a job uh right out of college in in Los Angeles uh for a company called Tumbleweed Entertainment, and it was a lot of documentary work and cinematic or uh animatics, kind of animated storyboard stuff.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um and then eventually ultimately started my own studio in in Cleveland, Ohio.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: And during this whole time, my my goal was always to go back into the Marine Corps on the reserve side.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_01: I knew once I got my degree, I I always wanted to get back in and serve in the military, kind of have that uh foot half in, half out.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I missed it.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_01: I knew I enjoyed the military, but I also enjoyed, like I was saying, kind of the arts and film and what I was doing creatively on the civilian side.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_01: And for years I would I would go to the recruiter and uh Marine Corps recruiters would say, Can't take you.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_01: You have too many tattoos uh below the the t-shirt line.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_01: And I just kept thinking, well, I'll try again or tr try a different recruiter or give it six months.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_01: Like one of these recruiters will get me a tattoo waiver.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_01: You hear about waivers all the time, and it it was so strict, yeah.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_01: It was getting to a point where I was coming up on nine, ten years break in service from the time I got out of the Marine Corps, and I was like, I gotta I gotta figure out maybe going into another branch because my time's about to be up.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: I'm in my 30s now at this point.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: And uh just going to recruit different recruiters.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um I found out about uh SF in the National Guard.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't know that was a thing.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so that was kind of a a blessing in disguise that the Marine Corps didn't want me at that time.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh because I I got to learn about uh special forces in 19th and 20th group.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um and yeah, I I went to a a briefing with 19th group as a civilian where they just kind of tell you the different mission sets and outline what what it is to be a Green Beret, and I was hooked.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so I joined their their training team essentially and just enlisted as a 11 Bravo and then uh got an opportunity to go to the training team and uh yeah, until I got my selection date and the rest is history.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_01: Went to selection after I got selected.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_01: I had to figure out how to wrap up my studio because my wife and I were gonna have to now move down to Fort Bragg for the next potentially couple years uh to go through that special forces qualification course, that pipeline.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: And uh yeah, I I was able to find another um another video company in town that basically uh took over my lease for me so I didn't have to break break the lease and took over a lot of the equipment and stuff.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and then yeah, my wife and I moved down, went went through the the course and came back and it's it's been great.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_01: Uh getting exactly what I kind of one foot in, one foot out where you get to uh go play that role as a soldier and and serve my country, but also uh selfishly just being in that environment around uh kind of like-minded guys.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, it takes all all types in SF and there's all sorts of personalities, but at the core of just uh really loving to do hard things and constantly being checked, you know, you're you start to really learn a lot about yourself because guys on a team call out all your weaknesses, or if they don't, you're you'll you'll notice them quick quick enough.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_01: If uh so it it's it's been really uh good in that sense, and then also getting to uh work for unit solutions and that was nice because I I'm uh getting to do the marketing stuff and a lot of the video and photos and that creative side, but it's also in an industry that I love and am very connected to be because of the military.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: So I love that when you were talking about going through selection, you said we in reference to you and your wife, because as is unfortunately so often the case, we forget that when we, either one, goes and embarks on something like that, everybody's going through it, right?
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: And without the support of the people closest to us, those tasks can be significantly harder.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm not as familiar.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: I've listened to a couple of other podcasts with guests who have sort of gone through SF selection.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: But as far as going from what would have then been civilian street to qualification or Q course, is it a direct pipeline?
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, you literally step off the street as a civilian one day, enter the office, and then, you know, I don't know, Wednesday you show up and you're like, okay, you're you're into the training or the selection process.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: Is it is it that quick?
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_01: So it it it doesn't feel that quick, but it is, you know, one day you yeah, you'll you'll be at your civilian job the next day you could be at training.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_01: Uh for me it was being on that training team for about six or eight months, and it's almost like a mini selection uh here.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_01: They kind of run them, I think every other month.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: But it's about three or four days going through the events, and then once they feel like one, you're ready, and two I don't know this officially, but this is the the uh the vibe that it kind of has put out is that uh 19th group is also screening you at these events before they send you to selection.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_01: Because you might be somebody who's a physical stud and uh potentially could pass the uh selection.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: It might you might not be somebody that they want coming back to then serve in our company.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: So it's I wouldn't call it a selection, but they're kind of screening is what it seems like to make sure whoever they're sending who's potentially going to become a Green Beret is gonna be somebody that they want on one of the teams.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um so that that lasts about six to eight months because I they get a good idea of who you are.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_01: If you just show up one time, you you know, you could fake it and pretend to be a team player, pretend to be these qualities that they're looking for, but over a good period of time they they get a pretty good idea.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um and then of course selection, they're doing the same thing, they're weeding out guys, not just for physical, but um other other traits as well.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um so I went to selection and this was kind of during COVID time.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: So coming out of selection, I get a call from somebody at RU that says, Hey, congratulations, passing selection.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_01: Um bad news is you're gonna get orders for airborne school 14 months from now because it's so backed up from COVID, and the guard only gets so many slots allotted to them.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: So the the good news is though, you could volunteer to go to ranger school and then you get to walk on to airborne school.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_01: So I was super cocky.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_01: That's an interesting perspective.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I was super cocky.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_01: I was in great shape at the time.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_01: I go, oh yeah, I'll go to ranger school.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: That's fine.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_01: I just passed SFAS.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I'll do that.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so two and a half or three months later, I was going to pre-ranger, rolling right into ranger school, and I was I should have looked more into what this was.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so yeah, so for me, it was I would I left selection, went home, was with my wife and back to the business and trying to sort that stuff out.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_01: Three ish month about yeah, I think three months later, sent down to Benning for pre-ranger, rolling right into ranger school, then back home for a few months to then pack up all our stuff and move down to Bragg.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_01: So it's a little interesting, like I think active duty, like you're going back to whatever unit you're with until and and potentially some of those guys are going right from finishing selection over to the hold uh for the Q course.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but yeah, for me as a civilian side, it's like you go, you be a civilian for a while, then you go do the military school, and you go back and be a civilian.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_01: And so that that also could potentially kind of extend the time from selection to the by the time you're done with the Q course, because there could be time in between.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm I'm really trying to envision the amount of motivation that must have been present for you at the time to go back to civilian life temporarily and then back in to do the next phase.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_00: Because let's face it, right, US Marines they go through a you know, a decent amount of of tough training in what I imagine, having served with the raw Marines, similar to to to the what they go through.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: But then SF training and then Ranger I was I must admit, if I'm being honest with you, I would have gone back out on the Civvy Street and gone, Wow, okay, you want me to go through that shit again?
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Like somewhere else?
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_00: I really I would have had a hard time, I think, having the break and then having to go back in.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: Now, of course, it depends.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I'm fairly motivated and I'm also bloody stubborn, but it just I I'm trying to picture in my head leaving to relative comfort, Civilian Street being the example, and then coming back in to then go through doing ranger school.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: So comparatively, between the US Marines SF qualification and ranger school, do you call it?
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you call it Ranger School or Ranger Trainer.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, Ranger School.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: Which which one was the most challenging?
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_00: Or that were they all difficult but for different reasons?
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_01: They were all different they're all difficult for very different reasons.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um yeah, it's it's team weak in selection, maybe one of the hardest things I've ever done.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_01: Then there's there's parts that I felt, man, super strong.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_01: I'm seeing other guys struggle around me and I'm feeling great.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: And then there was moments where I was thought my spine was just gonna snap in half, and you know, I I'm looking around like, how are some of these people doing it?
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_01: And uh but each of those things and and Ranger School, I mean the the sleep and and food deprivation, I I've never hallucinated like this out of lack of sleep and nourishment.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: I I I was seeing so many things in the woods, buildings and that faces, and you get up there and there's nothing there.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's just the woods.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_01: That's difficult in it in its own way.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_01: Um and the Q course is just it's it's very long and it there's different phases of it that are are harder for different reasons, but kind of the overarching thing is by the time you get to uh the Q course, all of these guys were top 10, 15, 20 percent of their selection class.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so in selection, I was top 10% for a lot of the physical things, runs or rucks, um, and even just top 20 guys in some of those uh things on my good days.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_01: And then you get to the Q course and I'm middle of the pack on the on a run or a ruck, and it's like, oh yeah, it's because all of these guys were top 10% or 20%, you know, now you're in the mix of these kind of guys who are just really prepared or or just physical studs or both.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um so it's it's hard in that way, because then it's a good ego mental check, and you're like, oh, all right, I'm not as uh high a performer as I thought once you get around a pool of high performers.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um so that's that's humbling and it's it's hard in its own way.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um yeah, each of them, yeah, going back to exactly what you said, each each of them are hard in their own way.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_01: But the thing that would get me through all of them, which I think is there's some irony to it, is I would always tell myself, when it was getting hard, or it it just really sucked for lack of a better word, was I would tell myself, there's no way you're gonna go back to your wife and and have quit or or just didn't make it or or just didn't show up and give it your all.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_01: And the irony of it is my wife does not care at all.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_01: She doesn't care that I'm a green bridge.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, she would probably have preferred if I never went through this process, because like you said, she's she's home alone when I'm gone at these training things.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_01: She's holding down the the house and being essentially like a single mother to our daughter and trying to navigate all the stuff.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_01: So it's it's very difficult for her, and I think she recognized that early on better than I did.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, oh, it's gonna be fine, don't worry about it, because I was so blinded by this goal that I wanted to achieve by earning the Green Beret.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_01: And uh so yeah, she was my motivation for getting through it, but she she doesn't care one bit that that I do.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_01: She's proud of me, of course, and and was very proud when I graduated.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: But ultimately, like she wouldn't think anything less of me if I never went down this path.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: Because a great, supportive spouse doesn't.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_00: They're like, you you know, they support the decisions you've made to to try a thing.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: But if you don't make it, it's not there's they're not thinking less of you because of that.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_00: And in this particular case, it's quite probable that there's probably a small part of her that was a bit like if he does quit, I get him home, right?
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not in this piece of like our life together alone.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_00: So it does, it makes a difference, it really does, and that's support.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_00: So I am very curious about the psychological components of each of those training uh processes.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_00: I feel as if perhaps the US Marine training to get you, you know, through is more of a team event, and that SF tends to be a little bit more individualistic, and that ranger school then tends to be a little bit more okay, back to the group mentalities, everybody, you know, helping everybody else pulling their weight.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_00: Is that at all accurate or is that how you interpreted what you went through?
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_01: No, I I uh SF is very team team mindset, but um there's a lot of accountability on the individual to do their part.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um I wouldn't completely compare it to to wrestling because it is a team sport, you know, CQB is a team sport.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um teach teaching classes is a team sport, of course you can do that individually.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um but it's yeah, I wouldn't give it a one-on-one with wrestling, but wrestling, you know, you're you're competing individually but for the team.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_01: And I think you do have to have that mindset when you're going through the course for sure, is that I need to show up be my best because it's gonna make the team better.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um that that's the mentality, but but absolutely within SF, within uh an ODA, it is kind of the team first before the individual.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_01: But you also uh have to be up to par with with going and doing stuff by yourself, or maybe it's two guys are going out to do this this thing, this whatever, whether it's training, teaching a course, um you know, going to another country to to meet and advise or or whatever it is.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_01: You have to be able to uh be trusted that you're gonna get things done by yourself or with uh you know one or two other guys.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_01: But ultimately it's everything's about the team.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_01: So but same same in the Marine Corps.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you're 2006, 2010.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's you know, especially uh a young grunt.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: I was 19 when I went in to my early 20s, and it's you know, you're you're just uh a number, you know, it is all about the the squad, platoon, company, uh that's what matters.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_01: So it similar in that sense, and unfortunately, as a as a Marine infantry or a grunt, you're not getting a lot of trust uh imparted on you in those early days.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_01: Towards the end, uh before I was getting out of the Marine Corps, you you know, you get a little bit more trust as an NCO, but even even then it's a little bit more micromanaged, and I I understand why from a you know kind of thousand-yard up looking down, I understand the importance of that.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_01: Um but yeah, for us uh on an ODA, 12 guys, you know, we'll be the only team potentially in a country.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um there's not a a platoon or company worth of supporter guys so uh it's suit it's very important on individual and the uh the team side of things.
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so are you still in now?
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: How much longer are you gonna do the whole hog?
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think so.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_01: After uh uh probably as long as it'll let me, but it's especially after having a 10-year break in service.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um I'd I'd know what would happen again if I if I cut that any shorter, I'd be like, what?
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you'd miss it.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and going I was 35 when I went to selection.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_01: I don't I would I would be uh I'd be hurting.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_01: I'd get out and I'd try to come back in and I don't know what they'd make me do, but I'd probably try to do it.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_00: We just don't bounce like we used to.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: Like that recovery period, it's that's tough.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's very true.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_01: I I always had that when I was 35, I feel great, I'm keeping up with all these younger.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_01: I'm I was in great physical shape, but now I'm now I'm feeling it.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_01: Now I'm feeling all the pain.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I go and work out with my very different, but I go work out with my son every once in a while, and he's 20, about to turn 21, and uh, you know, he's a stud, and I I go work out with him, and I feel like in there, I'm like, I'm still the same guy.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_00: I was 20 going through getting myself, and I turn around sometimes and I'm like, I just cricked my neck getting out of this chair to go to the gym with him.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, no, you're not the same person.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_00: You may be there in spirit, but physically, yeah, it's gonna be a whole different ball game.
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_00: If you're enjoying the episode, don't forget to like, subscribe, and share.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_00: Your support means the world, and we appreciate you joining us for each of these episodes every week.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I it's fascinating to me with that journey and and the choices you made to kind of go back in.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_00: So now looking at it through the lens of wisdom that you've earned, because you've bloody earned it.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_00: What do you think that maybe special forces training has taught you about shooting and readiness that I that maybe civilians either get wrong or misunderstand?
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, a couple things.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_01: It was because I would had that 10-year gap in service, I remember coming in and I was and I had started shooting fairly young, like we talked about, and I would go to the range like a indoor flat range with my pistol, and you know, every month or a couple months, and I'd put a nice little grouping together.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_01: And then the first time I went through a course with SF, I everything fell apart because I'd get to those indoor flat ranges and I would just take a nice slow shot, and then I'd, you know, bring Mars back, reset another shot, and it's you could do that all day and have a nice tight group.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_01: But all of a sudden, when you're shooting and moving or doing quick pairs falling up, and you're realizing now that shot group is just spreading wider and wider.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_01: It's like it was a good gut check for me, thinking I'm a pretty good shot.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_01: I grew up around guns, and then day one it fell apart, and it was very humbling to be like, all right, I'm not that great of a shot.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_01: I got a lot of work to do.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um and that's just the reality of it.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_01: But uh I think that's applicable, you know, whether you're military, civilian, uh it you have to train.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I I think shooting and and training are two different things.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_01: Like I went and shot kind of regularly, but I wasn't training.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't have like a goal, and that was my downfall.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't uh have any prescribed kind of plan when I went to the range.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_01: I just showed up with you know a couple hundred rounds and just kept shooting at the center nice and slow, thinking I was doing good.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_01: And uh now uh you start putting it to a shot timer or uh doing something like an L press where you have a mag change and you're you're looking at times and you're now trying to push to go faster, or you're doing a drill that that focuses on accuracy or identifying maybe um issues you're having with with your grip or your trigger pull.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_01: Um yeah, I think yeah, just I'm going on a on a tangent here, but uh No, this is great.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_01: I think it it was great for me to see, and something kind of going to what you asked about uh is there something maybe civilians don't understand about the military?
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_01: That entire time from selection ranger school Q course, we shot one day of pistol and rifle live fire.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_01: The rest is all blanks in training, and it's more there's there's a lot of other things that we do in the military in general, but as Green Berets as well, it's it's we're not just shooting.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_01: There's there's a lot of there's a plethora of other stuff that that goes into that course that earns you your Green Beret, but you know, that that training never stops.
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_01: If you've heard it on a bunch of podcasts with with other guys in the military, uh other special operations uh groups, but it's true, it never stops.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_01: Like I said, I was I was a Green Beret showing up and shooting horribly on the range when it came to actual uh actual shooting, not just in my little bay in an indoor range, pulling the trigger once, nice and easy.
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um so it's it's not maybe what people think.
• 35:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's probably what the not what the movie's making out to be.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, oh, you graduate with your green beret and you're all you're this expert shooter, USPSA level shooter.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_01: It's just not the case.
• 35:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um it takes time and training, and uh, and of course, guys who've been in longer, they've been to more shooting courses, they uh they take it serious.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you you now know what you need to work on, especially for us in guard, is the active side, though they'll get range and work those together.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_01: Us it it it's on us uh in between those the training and drills.
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh if you want to get better, you can't just show up to the training in the guard and just expect to be any better or let alone even stay where you're at because they're perishable skills.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_01: You have to take it on yourself and uh get better.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_01: It just it takes practice and consistency like anything else.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I think there's a certain amount of humility that goes along with actually training, not just practice, not just going to the range and shooting the things you're comfortable with, but stretching yourself to find out where the weak areas are.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm going I'm backtracking here a little bit, but training with the uh the nuclear power QRF guys, right?
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_00: The the moment we got away from static, I immediately saw where I was falling short by far comparative to these guys.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_00: Now they were training on a consistent basis and they were training the way they would ultimately need to fight and move and communicate in that environment.
• 36:52
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, a lot of them had SF backgrounds or you know, similar.
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_00: And it was interesting that the first couple of times we went through, because they had, you know, the kind of a shoot house set up, just a you know, a range with the doorways and everything we can do entry through.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_00: It was for just for the first few times I went, I'm like, dude, you are awful.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you absolutely don't know what the hell you're doing.
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I was hitting targets, but these guys were moving so fast, so smooth.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_00: Their communication was amazing.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_00: When they needed to communicate, it just opened up how rusty I'd gotten since leaving the military on how to shoot and move, right?
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_00: So it was just as a world of difference.
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_00: And so I tried as much as possible to get back to the range to move as often as I could, because that is what you're going to have to do in a real fight anyway.
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, in your case, deploying overseas and doing those jobs.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_00: But there's a major difference, a chasm, a world of difference between static fire at the range and putting in those really nice tight groups and then moving and shooting, and potentially moving, shooting, and not hitting anything that you don't intend to hit.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, exactly.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's it it's very humbling.
• 38:04
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, these the shooting pistol, especially, is you know, it's it's not easy.
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_01: It's hard.
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_01: You know, talk about the the thing that'll drive me crazy and drives my wife crazy because we'll watch a movie and I'll be like, that's ridiculous.
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_01: That's insane.
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_01: And but now, you know, I don't know though.
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_01: Now there's there's some phenomenal shooters on uh on social media for some of these guys, I'm just blown away, like how how incredible they are.
• 38:30
  SPEAKER_01: And uh that could be daunting to potentially new shooters who see that and they think, wow, I gotta be that good.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_01: Like I'm so behind the curve if they've only gone to the range once or twice.
• 38:42
  SPEAKER_01: And it's it's like there's some there's there's a kind of elite group of guys that's shooting in an unbelievably fast, accurate, smooth way.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um and then there's the rest of us that uh we put in the training and we have some great days, and then we have some days that maybe you might want to hit record eight or nine times before you post something.
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_01: But correct.
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_01: But it's it's fun.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_01: The thing that I love too about the the shooting community is it's so welcoming.
• 39:12
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it it really is.
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_01: I've I have not been to a range yet where I didn't have a great time.
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_01: And and at various levels within my shooting skills, and you know, guys are oh here, I've got an extra mag, don't worry about oh here, I noticed you doing this.
• 39:28
  SPEAKER_01: And just try this, see what you think.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_01: And and it's very supportive and encouraging, um which not always the case uh on social media.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_01: I think the the veteran and shooting community can can be a kind of dog eat dog world.
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_01: And from the outside looking in, that might be again intimidating, but it's really not.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_00: I completely agree with you because let's face it, right, if you post a video on the on social media, you're gonna get 500 armchair warriors tell you everything you're doing wrong.
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_00: Everything.
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_00: And yet those same people, or at least potentially those same people, at the range might go, hey, I saw you doing X as you suggested.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_00: Try this, see if that helps with.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_00: And so you get it looks to me like a divided world.
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_00: You've got all the people that are just throwing nothing but criticism at everyone else and however they do things.
• 40:19
  SPEAKER_00: And then at the range, you get this camaraderie, and people really genuinely want to help you be better.
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_01: Well, yeah, because I mean, you think about uh if if shooting's a hobby of yours, how exciting when more people join your hobby that they you get to share with them and they share it with you.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's a it's awesome.
• 40:37
  SPEAKER_01: That's what you want.
• 40:38
  SPEAKER_01: You want more people to talk about the hobby with and more potential friends to like, hey, you want to go to the range, do some shooting?
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_01: Like it's very exciting.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_01: And then you know, sometimes on social media that it's lost somehow, or maybe because it's at such a distance, people think I don't know.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_01: I don't get it.
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know get it either.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_00: Because I would never gob off at somebody on social media.
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 40:59
  SPEAKER_01: Nah, me either.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_01: I I I don't understand.
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_01: It's uh especially when you do it enough in person, like like we're saying, the the community's great.
• 41:07
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know where how where do these people where do they come from at the range?
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_00: You get nothing but my experience, same very similar to yours, very supportive.
• 41:18
  SPEAKER_00: I've done it.
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_00: I've stood next to someone seeing them do a thing, and I I will make a suggestion.
• 41:23
  SPEAKER_00: I'll like, hey, have you tried X?
• 41:25
  SPEAKER_00: And it might give you Y.
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_00: And if it doesn't and doesn't work, no worries, but you know, just give this a try.
• 41:31
  SPEAKER_00: Like you want to impart that information, and it's coming from the best place possible.
• 41:35
  SPEAKER_00: You want that person to shoot better, right?
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_00: You want them to be better at the hobby that we all enjoy.
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_00: I've I've never run into I've run into a few idiots, but I've never run into someone who has set at the range, well, that's just bullshit.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're going to use that, then you know you can you can go on home and and you haven't done it the right way according to them, that doctrine.
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_00: That's never happened.
• 41:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 42:03
  SPEAKER_00: Like the duality of that's like two completely separate worlds.
• 42:06
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're a beginning shooter and you see all this criticism, you'll be like, well, I'm not getting involved with that.
• 42:11
  SPEAKER_00: That sounds like a right dog eat dog world.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_01: My suggestion, if you're new and you're interested in shooting, just look up some local uh range days or or a course or a class and and just jump full head into it.
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it'll be a good time.
• 42:28
  SPEAKER_01: You'll have a lot of fun.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_01: Don't look at social media.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_01: Just just go and have a good time and and be present in person.
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_00: No, I actually think that's probably good advice for everything across the board.
• 42:40
  SPEAKER_00: Just don't look at social media.
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_01: I've I've done that too, where I've I've posted a video like, oh, I'm gonna show you how to open the door uh in CQB or something, and I call a push door, a pull door, and uh as I'm editing the thing, I realized that I called it the reverse because I'm human.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_01: I just didn't think human wasn't on the tip of my brain when I was and uh I thought, you know what, I'm gonna leave it and somebody maybe it'll cause a little stir in the comments.
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_01: People be like, this idiot, he doesn't know what he's talking about.
• 43:17
  SPEAKER_01: And it it worked.
• 43:18
  SPEAKER_01: I got a couple comments out of that, and like so now it's kind of been my thing.
• 43:23
  SPEAKER_01: Like every now and then I'll throw a little what I'm calling a hairy hand in there where I know there's a little mistake, not nothing egregious or safety-wise, but but a thing like that where you're calling a pull a door, a push door, or vice versa, something little, and just let people run with it.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_01: Let get them all stirred up.
• 43:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's actually a great tactic in terms of distracting them with the thing you're like, yeah, that's fine.
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's not egregious, it's not something we can't all live with, but let them run off with the bit with the the baited hook, so to speak, that you've given them, direct them that way, and maybe they'll leave the other stuff alone.
• 43:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because I can't tell you how many times I've seen guys, you know.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, you run the rabbit, you let the door breathe, you fight from the doorway.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_00: No, you don't, you never do that.
• 44:04
  SPEAKER_00: You've got to make entry, you've got to do it dynamic.
• 44:07
  SPEAKER_00: Like, yeah, you guys, what the hell is wrong with you?
• 44:09
  SPEAKER_00: It tactics and the situation, the environment will dictate what tactics you end up using.
• 44:15
  SPEAKER_00: And why is it have to be one or the other?
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_00: Why can we not have adaptability depending on the environment and the circumstances?
• 44:22
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, it is funny to listen and read those comments, isn't it?
• 44:26
  SPEAKER_01: It really is.
• 44:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 44:27
  SPEAKER_01: And even fairly recently in the past year or so, our team did some stuff with some uh Force Recon Marine guys and got together and were just doing CQB, and we went through as a team, then they went through as a team and were looking at things that we did very differently.
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_01: They both were effective.
• 44:47
  SPEAKER_01: They both with we said, Hey, we like what you're doing here, and they were like, Hey, we like how you guys approach intersections out of hallway here.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_01: And there's a little bit of collaborative, but also if you would have posted those videos of us, our team going, then their team going, people online were that's not how you do it, you gotta do it this way, you gotta do it that way.
• 45:06
  SPEAKER_01: And it it was very clear we had some different SOPs and different ways of approaching certain problem sets.
• 45:14
  SPEAKER_01: I couldn't tell you if one necessarily was better than the other.
• 45:17
  SPEAKER_01: Like I said, we found things that we liked that the other team did, and maybe adapted those, but there's multiple ways to do things, and and and and the bigger, probably more important thing is that your team SOPs, everyone's on the same page with how you're gonna tackle a problem set, regardless of kind of what it looks like.
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_01: In my opinion, from from my my experience.
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um The keyboard warriors is just a fascinating thing to me.
• 45:46
  SPEAKER_00: I mean it's they are fascinating animals.
• 45:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but the the TCP is that everybody utilizes and the way they approach problems, to me, it's always it should always be evolving and it should always be something you're flexible in your thinking.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_00: Because I think the minute you decide this is the way it has to be, and then you engage that in a problem where that is absolutely not the best way to solve that problem, is the moment you actually in real life end up dead.
• 46:10
  SPEAKER_00: It's a self-correcting problem.
• 46:13
  SPEAKER_00: But it's it's funny how people get locked in on one, it should be this.
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_00: And I've always been, well, should it?
• 46:20
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what other ways could we solve this problem?
• 46:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it it it seems to be, you know, people watch whoever their favorite influencer is, who's you know, probably has an amazing background, very reputable, knows what they're doing, but they see them do it a certain way and assume that's the only way.
• 46:41
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah.
• 46:43
  SPEAKER_01: Like just like you said, it's it's a constantly evolving.
• 46:47
  SPEAKER_01: I know our our schoolhouse that teaches RCQB, every other class that they're running, it's hey, this thing changed, hey, these TTP changed, because we've this has come down from this data set, from this agency, from this thing.
• 47:03
  SPEAKER_01: And turns out this this wasn't the way for XYZ reason.
• 47:09
  SPEAKER_01: And it's con like you said, it's constantly evolving.
• 47:12
  SPEAKER_01: We're we're learning, and just the difference, even from when I was in in the Marine Corps, when we would do our CQB, it was straight flood the room strong wall with as many Marines as you could and just firepower boots down the throat, you know, and it and it was looking back now, it's like, whoa, that's crazy.
• 47:33
  SPEAKER_01: That's pretty wild we just like sprint into a room like that.
• 47:37
  SPEAKER_01: You know.
• 47:38
  SPEAKER_01: But I'll tell you what, when you've got speed, surprise, and violence of action, you can make up for maybe a best way, but there's a lot of other things we had going for us as a bunch of young strapping Marines.
• 47:52
  unknown: Yeah.
• 47:53
  SPEAKER_00: Which uh one of those is the feeling of invincibility.
• 47:57
  SPEAKER_00: You're like, I'm going in.
• 47:58
  SPEAKER_00: Like let's do it.
• 47:59
  SPEAKER_01: 19, 20-year-old.
• 48:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I didn't there's no way I was gonna die.
• 48:02
  SPEAKER_01: Correct.
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_00: So one of the things that we had sort of uh touched on before getting on for this interview is why training is so important, especially when you're talking about a skill that you know, you're talking about making decisions in uh a situation where you've got to make it very quickly and adapt to what the environment is giving you, and you're also under enormous stress.
• 48:22
  SPEAKER_00: So what is it that you think individually that that makes training so important?
• 48:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, going back to exactly what I was saying earlier with that 10-year gap in service, I I didn't do any sort of tactical training or any of it, whether it was like rucking or I had ran an ultra marathon during my time out.
• 48:42
  SPEAKER_01: I was really into bouldering.
• 48:43
  SPEAKER_01: I thought I was like physically like, oh, I'm gonna walk into this thing.
• 48:47
  SPEAKER_01: And it was a rude awakening.
• 48:49
  SPEAKER_01: Uh that first kind of SFRE or drill training, I had I was beat up.
• 48:56
  SPEAKER_01: I horrible at land nav, and I was shocked because I in the Marine Corps, I was like, I'm really good at land nav.
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_01: Ten years of not doing it, I didn't do any training.
• 49:05
  SPEAKER_01: It there's perishable skills.
• 49:08
  SPEAKER_01: So and and as a guard SF now, like I was saying, it's so much on the individual uh to do regularly because we're not active, we're not going to the range uh very often.
• 49:23
  SPEAKER_01: When we get together and train and drill, there's a lot of other things we do besides pull a trigger or shoot.
• 49:30
  SPEAKER_01: And so we're we're filling a lot of gaps and trying to cover as much as we can uh with the time that we have, and and training is so important because it still does matter just because we're a guard SF.
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_01: If we get deployed, we're deployed all the same as an active duty ODA, and you have to be prepared, you know, for X, Y, and Z.
• 49:50
  SPEAKER_01: And a lot of that comes down to the individual.
• 49:53
  SPEAKER_01: So the the training piece is just it's super important.
• 49:57
  SPEAKER_01: And it we're kind of going back to um there's a difference between uh shooting and and training and why it's so important as is having a goal.
• 50:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um if you if you set out to train for something, it it an end goal in mind, it's gonna lead to better training, right?
• 50:17
  SPEAKER_01: Like if the goal is I'm gonna run a marathon, then you back plan.
• 50:20
  SPEAKER_01: What do I need to be able to run 26.2 miles?
• 50:24
  SPEAKER_01: You work that plan.
• 50:25
  SPEAKER_01: I've got say six months to run a marathon.
• 50:28
  SPEAKER_01: All right, so today I need to go out and run three to four miles, and tomorrow I need to strength train this, and then maybe I'll do sprints.
• 50:36
  SPEAKER_01: You you come up with a training uh plan, a regiment, and and you work towards constantly refining that.
• 50:44
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe you're like, hey, my endurance is getting really better, but I'm not getting any better in speed.
• 50:48
  SPEAKER_01: Let me rework this so that I can work on some speed things, and maybe it's hill workouts, maybe it's time sprints or whatever it is.
• 50:56
  SPEAKER_01: You're constantly adjusting as you uh take that journey to running a marathon.
• 51:00
  SPEAKER_01: It's the same thing with with shooting, at least for me.
• 51:04
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not very good at anything.
• 51:06
  SPEAKER_01: Even working out, if I just show up to the gym to and just move some weights or walk, which I've I do plenty sometimes.
• 51:14
  SPEAKER_01: I don't show up with a plan, but when I have a plan or at least a goal or an objective, it's night and day difference.
• 51:22
  SPEAKER_01: The the training and the the speed at which I get to where I want to be.
• 51:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's the same thing with shooting.
• 51:29
  SPEAKER_01: So I know I need to to practice it reloads far more than I've than I've been doing, or shooting laterally.
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_01: I made a video recently where I just made this backyard range and I was just messing around afterwards shooting and laterally uh moving and engaging two separate targets.
• 51:47
  SPEAKER_01: It was either very slow or I went fast and I was throwing shots and it was like huge deficiency here.
• 51:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 51:53
  SPEAKER_01: And I'd done a lot of that in the past, but I hadn't trained any of that in the you know the months prior.
• 52:00
  SPEAKER_01: It was like, oh, all right, I really need to work on this because I've clearly gotten that much worse.
• 52:06
  SPEAKER_01: And it's been a blessing, like I said, working here at Unit Solutions, because I have access to you know, the Unit 4, the Unit 9, and and your guys' products, because you know, we do stuff with uh with you guys, which has been great.
• 52:19
  SPEAKER_01: I can train at home uh because it it's tough, you know.
• 52:23
  SPEAKER_01: You being being married with a kid and you get home from work, dinner, spend time with my wife and daughter, and then it's well, I've got maybe a couple hours before I have to go to bed and redo this, you know, it myself.
• 52:38
  SPEAKER_01: To be able to hop out in my backyard or go down to the garage and just get a couple drills in really makes a huge difference, and it's intentional and it's regimented.
• 52:50
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, just going and shooting or or just going to the gym to work out, like it's it's not totally lost.
• 52:58
  SPEAKER_01: There's there's something, but it's not gonna get you very far.
• 53:01
  SPEAKER_01: The plateau's gonna come very quick, and and if you want to see measurable uh difference, you have that regiment, and and for me being able to train at home has made a huge, huge difference for me.
• 53:14
  SPEAKER_01: And uh it's been very beneficial.
• 53:18
  SPEAKER_00: No, I think there's definitely huge benefits to not only having a specific goal that you're aiming to get better at, in your case, lateral movement.
• 53:27
  SPEAKER_00: Myself, lateral movement, my problem area always seemed to be my bloody feet and having the tank turret, you know, flexibility in spine.
• 53:35
  SPEAKER_00: So you could arguably say, okay, well, even my gym conditioning and my gym time could be spent working towards making, okay, spinal flexion or twisting or rotation could be a part of my workouts.
• 53:49
  SPEAKER_00: Now I'm doing two avenues of approach to solve the same problem: efficiency with movement and transitioning between targets, hand-eye coordination.
• 53:58
  SPEAKER_00: But how are you supposed to know that if you don't set a goal?
• 54:03
  SPEAKER_00: Because I got, I mean, exactly.
• 54:05
  SPEAKER_00: As is so often the case, people will go to the range, they'll go through 100, 150, 200 rounds of ammo in the pistol, probably more, in an hour, achieve absolutely nothing in terms of their total overall improvement, but they'll walk out of there going, yeah, I got it done today, right?
• 54:20
  SPEAKER_00: And that overconfidence to me is one of the indicators that if you get into a pickle, high pressure, stress like you've never felt, and movement, you're gonna screw it up.
• 54:33
  SPEAKER_00: And nothing you think that you do well is actually going to play out in the way that you've visualized in your head.
• 54:40
  SPEAKER_01: You're you're describing me before going uh back into the military and and going through our shooting school.
• 54:47
  SPEAKER_01: That is 100% me overly confident with my, you know, horrible training, my shooting, uh, thinking, oh, I'm great.
• 54:59
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna show up, and these guys are gonna be so impressed with me as a new guy.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_01: I learned quick.
• 55:05
  SPEAKER_01: I'm glad it was in a training environment and uh in there.
• 55:10
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah.
• 55:12
  SPEAKER_00: But that but that there's value in that humility.
• 55:15
  SPEAKER_00: There's value in discovering you're not as good, or going and shooting with someone who's exponentially better than you, and figuring out how to improve in those because one of the biggest challenges, I think, for most shooters is the consistency.
• 55:28
  SPEAKER_00: They might go to the range, if you're lucky, once a month, in most cases, once a quarter or once every six months, if they're honest.
• 55:36
  SPEAKER_00: But if you could pick up, as you do and I do, 10 minutes, 15 minutes, okay, I I have a little bit of time I can grab to myself that isn't going to take away from family time or time with my wife, and it and I'm still getting some of that in, I can do transitional drills and movement at home on the smokeless range and run that drill in very similar fashion with the recall guns.
• 55:59
  SPEAKER_00: That makes all the difference.
• 56:01
  SPEAKER_00: At least my next trip to the range, it doing that same drill, a transitional moving drill, isn't as embarrassing as it would otherwise been because I've been putting in those reps.
• 56:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 56:13
  SPEAKER_01: It it makes a huge difference.
• 56:15
  SPEAKER_01: And that's probably the the biggest thing I've told I have friends who who were like me before, like they'll shoot ex exactly like you're describing every couple months or few months, and they're they're how do I how do I get better?
• 56:29
  SPEAKER_01: I'm thinking about maybe signing up for my first USPSA match or or competition.
• 56:36
  SPEAKER_01: And it's it's dry fire.
• 56:38
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it there's there's kind of a I always say like a curve or net, like a a growth to to the training that you can do in your home outside of live fire.
• 56:48
  SPEAKER_01: Obviously, nothing's gonna replace live fire, but you can do a lot of things that will help and and increase I mean, just even your your pistol once it's cleared out, just doing that draw and finding the dot and pulling the trigger, just those reps.
• 57:06
  SPEAKER_01: It's gonna help like that saves you a lot of time.
• 57:08
  SPEAKER_01: A good draw, good grip presentation draw, like all that stuff it it you can do in your home.
• 57:16
  SPEAKER_01: You don't have to buy anything else new or fancy.
• 57:18
  SPEAKER_01: And then, you know, it it goes up from there with you know the smokeless range and all there's so many products out there, and it just you get a little bit closer, again, not to replace live fire, but you get a little bit closer to a point that you you can that time in between live fire, you're you're maximizing the benefits.
• 57:42
  SPEAKER_01: So no matter what you can do without spending any any more money, whether if all you have is your pistol, like at least drive fire.
• 57:49
  SPEAKER_01: At least you know, practice that.
• 57:51
  SPEAKER_01: And then if you're really getting into it, you're like, man, this is enjoyable, how do I get better?
• 57:55
  SPEAKER_01: Then you know, there's a lot of other stuff out there that uh you can just continue to to add to the mix and and work towards progress uh progressing and and and getting better.
• 58:06
  SPEAKER_01: But again, having that goal.
• 58:08
  SPEAKER_01: So whether it's go into a USPSA match or you just wanna you just wanna be a a better shooter, yeah.
• 58:17
  SPEAKER_01: There's a lot of stuff online out there.
• 58:18
  SPEAKER_01: You just gotta do a little bit of research, but but set a goal of some kind, whether it's I want to run El Pres in under X amount of time or uh any of the other, do a bill drill, um see see what's out there for time-wise in terms of what's an elite level, what's uh strong, what's intermediate, you know, and just say, hey, I want to hit this elite thing at at some point, make that your goal, and then you know, have uh some sort of training regimen, 10-15 minutes a day.
• 58:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 58:54
  SPEAKER_00: No, there's definitely said for the the goal setting, it is funny going back just for a second to the weekend warriors or the keyboard warriors that criticize dry fire as being somehow beneath them, and that the only shooting that's good shooting is at the range shooting.
• 59:10
  SPEAKER_00: And you're like, really?
• 59:11
  SPEAKER_00: I I've gone you know head to head with a lot of guys that only go to the range and do live fire.
• 59:16
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not that as I because I agree with you, you cannot replace time at the range shooting, like real shooting, good to go, brilliant.
• 59:23
  SPEAKER_00: What are you doing in the intermediary or that that middle ground when you're not able to get to the range?
• 59:29
  SPEAKER_00: And these guys will show up, you know, three months, four months, five months break from live fire.
• 59:34
  SPEAKER_00: Go, yeah, I don't need dry fire.
• 59:36
  SPEAKER_00: I'll just go to the range and you know send some lead down.
• 59:39
  SPEAKER_00: And I will have measurably improved both through goal setting, but also the data and tracking those improvements, even up to and including, I don't do this all the time, but I'll set up my phone in front of the screen for the smokeless range and film techniques.
• 59:56
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, if I bring my hand a little higher on the support side to marry up with the pistol before I, you know, coast out to the target, uh, could I could I be quicker if it was higher, or am I slower?
• 1:00:08
  SPEAKER_00: Am I slower if it's lower?
• 1:00:10
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like these little tweaks that you can make to how you present the firearm downrange.
• 1:00:15
  SPEAKER_00: Practice that for weeks, get that as efficient as possible, and then see, okay, so did I improve the next time I live fire, implementing that drill.
• 1:00:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, a hundred percent.
• 1:00:26
  SPEAKER_01: Like, like we said, just going back to it's all perishable skills to think that you can step away from anything and not do it.
• 1:00:32
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, the work working out kind of metaphor, it's like you could work out for a year and be in phenomenal shape and then take three months off.
• 1:00:42
  SPEAKER_01: Come back in, and that three months, you're not gonna do the same thing that you did.
• 1:00:45
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it doesn't take long.
• 1:00:47
  SPEAKER_01: You of course you'll be able to get back to where you were a little bit quicker than getting there the first time, but it it's just like working out.
• 1:00:56
  SPEAKER_01: You you have to be pretty consistent.
• 1:00:57
  SPEAKER_01: It's consistency is key.
• 1:00:59
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, you can have breaks and for whatever reason, life you might take some time off.
• 1:01:04
  SPEAKER_01: But if you're consistent enough, even that 10-15 minutes a day in between live fire shooting, it's gonna make a difference.
• 1:01:13
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it it just seems logical.
• 1:01:16
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know how people could think otherwise.
• 1:01:19
  SPEAKER_00: I know it perplexes me every time I see a comment that says, I would never spend my time in did a little and like, well, you know, everybody's got an opinion, like us, right?
• 1:01:28
  SPEAKER_00: So one of the things that I found that stuck with me for the entire time of after my military service was shoot, move, communicate.
• 1:01:35
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the things I took to heart from that, especially after the military, was if I am shooting and I am moving, but I am not communicating with the people in my house, they become potentially a danger to everything that I may have to do in protection of them.
• 1:01:53
  SPEAKER_00: So one of the things that I stressed, especially as our kids are younger, they're all grown now and out of the house.
• 1:01:58
  SPEAKER_00: But when they were younger, was I was always communicating there with them what I would want them to do if.
• 1:02:05
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know how old your daughter is.
• 1:02:07
  SPEAKER_00: I know that you do shoot with your wife periodically and she does, you know, use the smokeless range with you.
• 1:02:12
  SPEAKER_00: But have you, especially given your experience, have you had those conversations with her and with your daughter, depending age-dependent, where if I'm doing X, I really need you to do Y.
• 1:02:24
  SPEAKER_00: And then what has that conversation been like?
• 1:02:26
  SPEAKER_00: And if if so, how have you approached it?
• 1:02:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I remember the first time I uh brought this up with my wife, and it was actually I was down in North Carolina with Kyle Morgan uh from Bluebearing Solutions, and I was uh filming some content of his uh Protector Mindset course, and it was talking about exactly that.
• 1:02:50
  SPEAKER_01: Like, what are you gonna do if somebody breaks into your house?
• 1:02:55
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it's one thing if I say, well, I know how I would maybe move to that threat or maybe barricade myself around, but now that there's a family, not teammates, there's a family in this house and uh three, my daughter's three and a half, a three and a half year old, what does this look like now?
• 1:03:15
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and so I brought this up with my wife.
• 1:03:17
  SPEAKER_01: I I didn't honestly didn't think of that.
• 1:03:20
  SPEAKER_01: I I we live in a nicer neighborhood, and in my head, I'm like, hmm, I'm I'm a military guy, I'll take care of this, and that's you know, going back to the just arrogance and being naive.
• 1:03:33
  SPEAKER_01: And I I'm hearing Kyle Morgan talk about this, and it's everything's clicking, all the lights are going off.
• 1:03:38
  SPEAKER_01: And I brought this up with my wife, and it's it's taking a little bit of time because she um she's she's of the mindset she should get like high anxiety, she'd be like, I don't even want to run through this scenario because that means it could potentially happen and be real, so she doesn't want to think about it.
• 1:03:54
  SPEAKER_01: So it's I've had to guys, you know, we have to have these conversations like it's a reality, it's a possibility, and rather be prepared and then you know, the chances are very unlikely, but if something were to happen, we've just bettered the odds in our favor.
• 1:04:13
  SPEAKER_01: We've we've put ourselves in a better position.
• 1:04:16
  SPEAKER_01: And so it's something we've been discussing a little bit more now that our daughter's three and a half, she's she's run around, she's fully uh conversational and and and kind of aware of her surroundings, unlike when more when she was like two or or even younger.
• 1:04:35
  SPEAKER_01: And we talked about yeah, how do we how do we frame this in a way that also doesn't somehow strip her of her innocence that like, why am I practicing at home for uh this invasion is it, you know, as a three-year-old.
• 1:04:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um so that's a great question because we're we're trying to figure that out now.
• 1:04:54
  SPEAKER_01: But I I have now talked with my wife, like, hey, this you if in the middle of the night or or even the day, if something happens, and and she knows what I'm serious, I'm a pretty light-hearted guy.
• 1:05:07
  SPEAKER_01: I rarely you know get authoritative or or serious in in something.
• 1:05:12
  SPEAKER_01: And uh but she knows, hey, if this if something's happening and I'm telling her you need to go do this, she's not gonna say, well, well, why?
• 1:05:21
  SPEAKER_01: Or you know, hold on a second, let's talk about it.
• 1:05:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, no, no, no, I just need you to do exactly what I'm saying and follow my direction and trust me that I know what I'm doing in this scenario, or at least the most capable in this household to deal with this scenario, and you gotta you gotta trust my my judgment and my experience and and getting us through this.
• 1:05:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:05:47
  SPEAKER_01: But it's a great question, because it is something you you know like I said, I I didn't consider it until going down there and and kind of getting to listen in on Kyle Morgan's course.
• 1:05:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:05:58
  SPEAKER_00: And just for those who don't Know if I'm getting my people right, Carl Morgan's for the former Delta right.
• 1:06:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yes, correct.
• 1:06:05
  SPEAKER_01: He was uh he went from eighty-second to uh becoming a green beret, then green beret over to the to the unit.
• 1:06:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:06:14
  SPEAKER_00: So I think what this is important conversation for parents to decide to have, both with between themselves but also with the kids, age appropriate.
• 1:06:22
  SPEAKER_00: We always approached it as part of a broader conversation.
• 1:06:25
  SPEAKER_00: We didn't come straight out of the gate with it, but there's a home invasion, you know, dad's gonna be shooting some people and just, you know, wait until the screaming stops and I I'll have taken care of it.
• 1:06:35
  SPEAKER_00: It was part of I think of sort of a broader overarching arcing conversation where we started it with there are bad people, there are good people.
• 1:06:44
  SPEAKER_00: Do you know anyone at your school as they sort of uh get to that age?
• 1:06:48
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have mean people at school?
• 1:06:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, okay.
• 1:06:50
  SPEAKER_00: Well, there are also mean people that are adults, and sometimes mean people do this, that, and the other.
• 1:06:54
  SPEAKER_00: But we always made it, I always went out of my way to make awareness and scanning and safety in general, or even a response to instructions that I'm giving part of a a broad conversation that never stressed the consequences of what might be going on, but versus rather the this is what I need you to do in the middle of this, and we can talk about, you know, the decisions I made after the fact, but in the middle I need you to do this.
• 1:07:24
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 1:07:25
  SPEAKER_00: That now is not the time for a discussion.
• 1:07:27
  SPEAKER_00: But it's even prepping them to know that if you're suddenly to them out of the blue barking orders, it's not because dad got mean all of a sudden.
• 1:07:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:07:38
  SPEAKER_00: It's like I just need you to sort of do what I'm asking so that I can not have to worry necessarily about you doing something completely unplanned for, and I can go and take care of the problem if that's necessary.
• 1:07:49
  SPEAKER_00: Or as you said, barricade, right?
• 1:07:51
  SPEAKER_00: I I just need cognitively to be freed up to do other things other than worrying about whether you're following the instructions I've given you.
• 1:08:00
  SPEAKER_00: But we did that all the way through the kids' lives, up to the point where, as they were old enough to understand this concept, if there was a home invasion, and like you, we lived in a nice neighborhood where this was highly unlikely, but still, just like car insurance, I'd rather be prepared than not.
• 1:08:16
  SPEAKER_00: We had a if I say get down, I want you to get down.
• 1:08:20
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want you anywhere near me.
• 1:08:22
  SPEAKER_00: I want you to get as low as possible, cover your ears and your eyes, while I take care of whatever you know I can take care of.
• 1:08:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:08:31
  SPEAKER_00: And it was amazing.
• 1:08:32
  SPEAKER_00: I only did the drill with them maybe a couple of times over the entirety of their childhood.
• 1:08:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I tried to sort of do it at moments when they least expected it.
• 1:08:39
  SPEAKER_00: But having had those conversations prior, when those little experiments and those exercises occurred, I could not believe the efficiency with which they responded.
• 1:08:52
  SPEAKER_00: It was amazing.
• 1:08:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:08:54
  SPEAKER_00: And that was all three.
• 1:08:56
  SPEAKER_00: Even my wife, she's like, I know where I'm going.
• 1:08:58
  SPEAKER_00: Done.
• 1:08:59
  SPEAKER_00: She got out of the way.
• 1:09:01
  SPEAKER_00: She moved wherever she needed to move.
• 1:09:02
  SPEAKER_00: We sort of had these little staging areas where I'd like you to go here if we're there.
• 1:09:06
  SPEAKER_00: I want you to go over there if we're here.
• 1:09:08
  SPEAKER_00: And it worked brilliantly, but it was definitely part of a broader conversation.
• 1:09:12
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't just sort of linear, if it's a home invasion, then we do this.
• 1:09:16
  SPEAKER_00: And then no other conversation.
• 1:09:18
  SPEAKER_00: It was always part of a broader conversation about trust your instincts, trust the experience that I have.
• 1:09:24
  SPEAKER_00: I will do my best to get it right.
• 1:09:25
  SPEAKER_00: There's no guarantee that I will.
• 1:09:26
  SPEAKER_00: But if it goes wrong, I want your response following me going down to be this.
• 1:09:31
  SPEAKER_00: And so it put them all in a position to at least respond as effectively and as quickly as they can possibly be expected to do in a circumstance that would be incredibly frightening.
• 1:09:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's awesome.
• 1:09:44
  SPEAKER_01: That that's that's a good idea.
• 1:09:46
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna take that from you, actually.
• 1:09:48
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's great.
• 1:09:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:09:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:09:50
  SPEAKER_00: Because we the kids were never afraid.
• 1:09:53
  SPEAKER_00: If anything, and I tried to avoid this too, they were overconfident in my abilities.
• 1:09:58
  SPEAKER_00: I tried to very gently say, I'm gonna do my best, and yes, I have some skills, but there's also a a chance that this all goes to hell in a handbasket, and you're gonna have to deal with the aftermath, right?
• 1:10:09
  SPEAKER_00: And do the reality.
• 1:10:10
  SPEAKER_00: But they were always confident enough to follow the instructions, and hopefully, it never happened, of course.
• 1:10:18
  SPEAKER_00: So I couldn't I couldn't say for definitive it would, but they always responded very well to those exercises, and it was a giggle fest, honestly.
• 1:10:28
  SPEAKER_00: It really was.
• 1:10:29
  SPEAKER_00: We got off, we had a laugh about it.
• 1:10:30
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, did you see when dad tripped over the carpet?
• 1:10:33
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like and they were like, Yeah, we did.
• 1:10:36
  SPEAKER_00: It was but that's great.
• 1:10:37
  SPEAKER_00: That keeps the fear to a minimum and the response to a maximum, is how I kind of look at looked at it as being a win.
• 1:10:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's great.
• 1:10:50
  SPEAKER_01: That's awesome.
• 1:10:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:10:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:10:52
  SPEAKER_00: So if somebody listened to this wants to become a genuinely a better shooter, rather than somebody who simply wants to shoot more, what do you think they should train change about their training starting tomorrow?
• 1:11:03
  SPEAKER_00: This is my last question for you.
• 1:11:04
  SPEAKER_01: I think probably one of the biggest things, maybe two things, but one of the biggest things is getting a shot timer.
• 1:11:12
  SPEAKER_01: Shot timer, it just helps have some sort of measure to outside of um just where your your round placement is.
• 1:11:23
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, obviously that's very important.
• 1:11:25
  SPEAKER_01: But when you start racing yourself and things start falling apart, I think it allows you to kind of you can step back, slow it down and get really good, and then work progressively towards that faster time.
• 1:11:38
  SPEAKER_01: But also there I there is a benefit sometimes, I think, going very fast and seeing where things quickly fall apart.
• 1:11:44
  SPEAKER_01: It's usually one of your weakest.
• 1:11:46
  SPEAKER_01: You know, for me, uh it's a grip issue, and it really shows up if I'm trying to outrun my headlights.
• 1:11:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:11:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um and a shot timer, I think, helps with that.
• 1:11:57
  SPEAKER_01: It puts a little bit of stress and pressure, like we talked about, you know, doing some sort of stress shoot.
• 1:12:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um, there's a little bit of that stress, there's a little bit of that anxiety waiting for that beep to go off and and uh you know, rushing to pull that, not getting a great grip on the gun and all all the things.
• 1:12:14
  SPEAKER_01: They start falling apart when you're you're against the time, against the clock.
• 1:12:19
  SPEAKER_01: I think having a getting a shot timer, and I think there's some phone apps too.
• 1:12:22
  SPEAKER_01: So if it's something you're starting out doing, it's there's always options I think that are a little bit more budget friendly.
• 1:12:28
  SPEAKER_01: If yeah.
• 1:12:29
  SPEAKER_01: And if you're using that and it's it's you're getting really into it, then spend the money on a good shot timer.
• 1:12:35
  SPEAKER_01: It's worth it.
• 1:12:36
  SPEAKER_01: Um and then I think uh looking just looking up known drills so that you have a goal.
• 1:12:45
  SPEAKER_01: So you can you can see we keep talking El Prez or the Bill Drill or any any of these popular drills that you can go and look online to see what people's scores are, see how fast they're doing it.
• 1:12:58
  SPEAKER_01: You you now have a goal of I want to be uh as fast as this guy or or this girl or whatever the case is, and it's you're doing the exact same thing.
• 1:13:08
  SPEAKER_01: You there's the measurements from how far to the target, how how far between the targets are are they.
• 1:13:14
  SPEAKER_01: So you're doing this exact same thing and then chasing a potential time.
• 1:13:21
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's probably the the best and easiest out of the gate.
• 1:13:25
  SPEAKER_01: But the shot timer for sure, because it doesn't require going to a range.
• 1:13:29
  SPEAKER_01: You can do it with dry fire, even just how fast you're getting a draw.
• 1:13:32
  SPEAKER_01: And first, if you're doing a red dot, which hopefully nowadays everyone is, but that first draw, getting sight on target and a trigger squeeze.
• 1:13:43
  SPEAKER_01: How fast you're getting that.
• 1:13:44
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's I've seen guys who shoot really fast and they their draw is super slow.
• 1:13:48
  SPEAKER_01: I'm one of them.
• 1:13:49
  SPEAKER_01: I I constantly am working on the draw, but it's uh losing time on just the draw and getting that dot on target for the first shot.
• 1:13:59
  SPEAKER_01: And then you know, you could make maybe your fast uh shooter after that, but that's something you could work on that'll make you faster to that first shot without having to go to the range.
• 1:14:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:14:11
  SPEAKER_00: No, I love that because it gives you the pressure and it also gives you the data.
• 1:14:15
  SPEAKER_00: And those two things, along with the goals and understanding what you're specifically training for, is something that's often lacking for a lot of people.
• 1:14:23
  SPEAKER_00: Because they do, they'll go, they'll shoot a box of ammo or several, but they haven't had a goal in mind.
• 1:14:28
  SPEAKER_00: But I don't want to just go to the range and shoot ammo.
• 1:14:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not going there to just see how many holes I can put in the paper down range.
• 1:14:36
  SPEAKER_01: Especially now, it's so expensive.
• 1:14:38
  unknown: Right?
• 1:14:38
  SPEAKER_00: It costs so much bloody money.
• 1:14:40
  SPEAKER_00: I want to go and feel like, okay, I may have improved this one aspect of my shooting, half a percentage point, but that over the course of the next year, assuming I'm working the same goal, that is a good target, pun intended, for me to hit over the course of this next 12 months, six months, or just this weekend.
• 1:15:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 1:15:03
  SPEAKER_00: So I think one of the biggest takeaways from this conversation is simply owning a firearm or even shooting one regularly doesn't necessarily make you prepared.
• 1:15:12
  SPEAKER_00: I think real training has purpose, it exposes weaknesses, it builds judgment, and it gives us a better chance of performing when things are no longer comfortable or you are under immeasurable stress.
• 1:15:24
  SPEAKER_00: So for those that were interested in connecting with you, following you, where would you like them to go?
• 1:15:31
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, I I run Unit Solutions uh social media, so you can find me on unit uh solutions at unit uh solutions on Instagram, or uh you can also follow me at Kyle.unitSolutions.
• 1:15:45
  SPEAKER_01: Um those are probably the two best places.
• 1:15:48
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, we have uh YouTube, put some longer form stuff out there, that's a great place.
• 1:15:52
  SPEAKER_01: Same thing at Unit Solutions, uh, and and we have Twitter and X and all that.
• 1:15:57
  SPEAKER_01: Uh typically at Unit Solutions, I think maybe uh on X it might be at unit.solutions.
• 1:16:04
  SPEAKER_01: I'd have to double check.
• 1:16:05
  SPEAKER_01: But uh Instagram, YouTube, that's probably the two main places to check us out.
• 1:16:10
  SPEAKER_01: And then from there, there's links to other other platforms.
• 1:16:13
  SPEAKER_00: Great.
• 1:16:14
  SPEAKER_00: Well, take I want you to take this opportunity to tell us a little bit more about unit solutions.
• 1:16:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so like I said, bless blessed to be here is kind of this perfect fit for me as a guard SF guy because our products allow you to be able to train in places you normally couldn't, right?
• 1:16:31
  SPEAKER_01: So for the civilian, um, you can train in your backyard, you can train in your basement, you can you can pair it with uh the laser ammo.
• 1:16:39
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, we have the a barrel coming out for our unit nine, which is really cool.
• 1:16:43
  SPEAKER_01: So with our unit nine pistol, you'll get that uh really, really great recoil, kind of best in class recoil on a pistol, and paired with the laser ammo barrel and some of their targets.
• 1:16:54
  SPEAKER_01: You can see behind me, there's one of those.
• 1:16:56
  SPEAKER_01: We've got some of the uh the one-up targets.
• 1:16:59
  SPEAKER_01: You can practice transitions right in your living room and not worry about picking up BBs and stuff like that.
• 1:17:04
  SPEAKER_01: My wife loves that aspect of it.
• 1:17:07
  SPEAKER_01: I'll bet she's always yelling at me to get the vacuum out, and so now I've been uh running this laser ammo barrel in our Unit 9, and it's awesome.
• 1:17:14
  SPEAKER_01: But you can train in places like that, and for law enforcement military, uh a huge thing has been uh removing a lot of the red tape.
• 1:17:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh right.
• 1:17:22
  SPEAKER_01: So the ATF has classified this as a non-firearm.
• 1:17:26
  SPEAKER_01: It cannot be made to fire a real round in any way.
• 1:17:29
  SPEAKER_01: So inherently that much safer.
• 1:17:33
  SPEAKER_01: The issue where law enforcement, especially, they want to go train in a school, a church, places where um that board is saying, no, we do not want a live fire uh weapon on campus whatsoever, um, for whatever reason.
• 1:17:50
  SPEAKER_01: I've I've heard different stories that uh some of the UTM or SIM casings were left behind, and then a student finds uh one of those casings and takes a picture, puts it on social media, not knowing it's not a real live round casing.
• 1:18:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:18:04
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, but they don't know.
• 1:18:04
  SPEAKER_01: They're you know, a lot of them are you know, they're kids, and uh it's so it's just not feasible.
• 1:18:10
  SPEAKER_01: But with uh our platform they're able to go into those places they wouldn't otherwise be able to go, and and they can train with the same fidelity, the same touch points, get that felt recoil.
• 1:18:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and it's they're not introducing a live firearm into their training.
• 1:18:26
  SPEAKER_01: And and for us in the military, uh we use it for that reason too.
• 1:18:31
  SPEAKER_01: Just because you know it's it's SF and in the military.
• 1:18:35
  SPEAKER_01: There's still a decent amount of red tape when you want to go to uh a shoot house, even with Sims, because if we have to go draw all our firearms from the armory, you have to have a med plan.
• 1:18:46
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it it it gets you fill out the paperwork.
• 1:18:49
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, this is what we're gonna go do, here's how we're gonna get there, here's the med plan, the nearby hospitals, here's what we're gonna do if XYZ happens.
• 1:18:56
  SPEAKER_01: That all goes into any of our training.
• 1:18:59
  SPEAKER_01: And of course, we do do it because, like we said, you can't replace live fire training, but what this allows us to do is to get more time training CQB as a team, more time uh working fundamentals on say maybe we only have half a day or a day.
• 1:19:14
  SPEAKER_01: We don't have to put in all this paperwork and do all this stuff, we can get time together uh practicing these things.
• 1:19:20
  SPEAKER_01: So again, civilian military law enforcement, it's it's been a huge benefit to just be able to train in your home or train in places that you you couldn't otherwise.
• 1:19:32
  SPEAKER_01: And for me, like I said, guard us, that's been great because it's a perishable skill.
• 1:19:37
  SPEAKER_01: I I don't have time to get to the range uh you know every couple days or every few days.
• 1:19:42
  SPEAKER_01: So it I've been trying to during the the week get my 15 minutes in uh with our unit nine, unit four, and a laser ammo product.
• 1:19:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um and then the weekend I'll try to get out to live fire range and just see, hey, is this is my draw really the same?
• 1:19:59
  SPEAKER_01: Is it am I getting uh transition shots the way I was with inside?
• 1:20:05
  SPEAKER_01: And and there's in all honesty, there'll be like a tiny adjustment because now it's that recoil is a little different, but man, the learning curve is drastically reduced.
• 1:20:14
  SPEAKER_01: Everything else, all those other touch points of fundamentals are are such clean reps.
• 1:20:20
  SPEAKER_01: Instead of like, oh, I gotta redo that drill, redo that draw because I got a bad grip on it.
• 1:20:24
  SPEAKER_01: That's been solid.
• 1:20:25
  SPEAKER_01: And then it's that minor tweaks when you get to live fire versus starting from scratch.
• 1:20:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:20:31
  SPEAKER_01: So it's a big yeah, big.
• 1:20:33
  SPEAKER_00: One of the things I've loved about uh practicing a few times I've gotten my hands onto your pistols and your rifles, is how comparable they are to the real thing.
• 1:20:43
  SPEAKER_00: The weight, the feel, the mechanics, everything feels the way you want, and your real gun does feel with none of the risk.
• 1:20:50
  SPEAKER_00: Like you can then take your CQB training and clear your own house.
• 1:20:54
  SPEAKER_00: Figure out where all the creaky boards are, where are your where are your dead corners?
• 1:20:57
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have any center fed rooms?
• 1:20:59
  SPEAKER_00: If you if this room has a door opening, it's an in-swing.
• 1:21:02
  SPEAKER_00: Is there a hiding place behind that door?
• 1:21:04
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have to consider?
• 1:21:05
  SPEAKER_00: It allows you to do that as safely as possible.
• 1:21:08
  SPEAKER_00: And then if the worst ever happens, when you pick up your real gun or your real rifle, it feels as if, oh, I've already done this 50 times.
• 1:21:17
  SPEAKER_00: Because the rifles and the pistols feel so good and so comparative to the real thing.
• 1:21:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 1:21:25
  SPEAKER_01: And that's huge shout out to the engineering team that that worked on these because our engineers have uh backgrounds working for major firearms companies.
• 1:21:35
  SPEAKER_01: You know, they made these things.
• 1:21:38
  SPEAKER_01: All the the parts and pieces are all made in from actual tooled at the same places that manufacture uppers, lower, like the real gun parts.
• 1:21:46
  SPEAKER_01: So it's that's goes to why it feels as real as it does.
• 1:21:50
  SPEAKER_01: And and the engineers we brought in, coming from you know, real quote unquote real weapons, like live fire weapons, they had an invested kind of um they were invested in making this as real as possible, coming from that background and and knew what they were doing.
• 1:22:09
  SPEAKER_01: So huge shout to them because they, you know, I've I've talked to them a few times, and it's usually what they're saying is over my head and how they measure trigger pull length and matching it as close as possible with our platform.
• 1:22:22
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, that sounds cool.
• 1:22:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's awesome.
• 1:22:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I know it feels great.
• 1:22:26
  SPEAKER_01: So the layman.
• 1:22:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we're like, okay, how does it feel?
• 1:22:29
  SPEAKER_00: Just give me the rifle, give me the pistol.
• 1:22:30
  SPEAKER_00: You're like, yes, that feels great.
• 1:22:32
  SPEAKER_00: It feels realistic.
• 1:22:33
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not handling what feels like a toy to practice what is something that is a very grown-up skill.
• 1:22:39
  SPEAKER_00: So no, it is.
• 1:22:40
  SPEAKER_00: You've got a great product there, mate.
• 1:22:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and yeah, likewise.
• 1:22:44
  SPEAKER_00: So thank you for bringing what is a very unique personal perspective and personal history to today's conversation.
• 1:22:50
  SPEAKER_00: I really appreciate you joining me, mate.
• 1:22:53
  SPEAKER_01: I really appreciate you having me.
• 1:22:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's awesome to get to talk to you.
• 1:22:56
  SPEAKER_00: Appreciate it.
• 1:22:57
  SPEAKER_00: All right, thanks everyone tuned in for this episode.
• 1:23:00
  SPEAKER_00: Depending on which platform you're watching it on, don't forget to like and subscribe.
• 1:23:04
  SPEAKER_00: Leave us a comment.
• 1:23:05
  SPEAKER_00: Your support means the world to us, and it means that we're able to keep bringing you the guests that you want to hear from.
• 1:23:11
  SPEAKER_00: For now, that's the end of today's episode.
• 1:23:13
  SPEAKER_00: I look forward to catching up with all of you in the next one.
• 1:23:15
  SPEAKER_00: Cheers.