Training Review: Rob Pincus/ICE 2 Day Combat Focus Shooting

[rburch]

On July 10th & 11th, I attended a 2 day Combat Focus Shooting class in Virginia Beach. The class was run by ICE training and took place at the C2 shooting center.

Rob Pincus was only able to be there the first day because of the shooting schedule for one of his TV shows, but did an awesome job while we had him. Dan Lowyns was the lead instructor on the 2nd day, and also did an excellent job.

I will admit this course isn't exactly cheap; tuition for the class was $450which isn't bad, but I fired around 1100 rounds in the two days, and the cost of that much ammo, combined with the tuition and other expenses such as lodging, gas, and food, could put this class out of reach of some people.

If you are the type of person who can’t handle physical discomfort, or who can’t bear the thought of mistreating a gun, this isn’t the class for you.

It was not a comfortable class, we had rain most of the afternoon on the first day, and the second day was just hot. I had to refill my 2 liter camelback twice.

I had blisters on my trigger finger and the web of my hand at the end of the first day. My palm was actually bruised from the recoil. My thumbs were sore from reloading my mags, by the end of the 2nd day I was having trouble loading them. I had tweaked my left ankle, and bruised the ball of my right foot.

We dropped our magazines in the dirt, and occasionally even stepped on them by accident as we ran the drills. We then took those dirty mags and with just a quick wipe on our pants loaded and reused them. When the rain started, we were doing the same thing only with mud. There was enough grit inside my mags to cause the follower to hang up, and create malfunctions in my pistol.

I enjoyed every minute, well, almost every minute. We were not comfortable, we were working hard, but we were still having fun.

I know having fun isn’t the point of this type of class, and that some circles consider it to be detrimental to training. I disagree and feel Rob and his instructors do as well.

I’m not saying they baby you; they push you hard and force you to push yourself even harder. They will chew you out when you make mistakes, but they also make sure to show you what you’re doing wrong, and more importantly how to do it right.

You learn constantly, and everything builds on what you’ve done previously. You take the time to learn mag changes or presentation from the holster, etc. From then on, those skills are incorporated into the drills that teach you further skills.

By the end of the two days you’re doing multiple target identification/engagement at staggered distances with bystanders. In our case it involved about 10 targets with random numbers.

While we walked around a group of paint cans, an instructor would call the numbers pretty much at random and we’d have to make the shots.

This involved identifying the target, shifting to get a clear shot at the target while at the same time avoiding the bystanders with the rounds that passed through the target.

At the same time we were presenting the weapon, firing 2-5 shots into the center of the chest, and performing any reloads/malfunction drills our weapon required.

This is really just a brief overview of the class, I will post more on this when I have time, and of course feel free to comment or ask questions. I’ll admit even a month later I still haven’t fully processed everything we covered in the class, but I’ll do my best to clarify what I can.

I’ll close now by saying I can easily recommend the ICE Combat Focus Shooting class to anybody that intends to use a handgun as a defensive tool.

[TMUSCLE1]

Great write up! I have been very interested in ICE training for a while now.

Did your weapon every malfunction because of the way it was being run?

What other drills did you do?

Did you take pics?

What were you using? (Just curious about this really)

What did Rob teach while he was there? Can you go more in depth about that?

Once again great write up.

[blueorb]

Yes, good write up. However, $1,000.00 for a 2 day course? Wow, that seems a little on the excessive side. How does that compare to other 2 day courses?

[VHinch]

Originally Posted by blueorb

However, $1,000.00 for a 2 day course? Wow, that seems a little on the excessive side. How does that compare to other 2 day courses?

About average I'd say. Most of the two days I've done that didn't involve airfare have been right around $1k once you figure in fee, ammo, lodging, food, etc.

The last time I did Thunder Ranch it was more like $2500, but that was a 3 day course and I had to fly there, rent a car, etc.

[rburch]

Did your weapon every malfunction because of the way it was being run?

All the weapons malfunctioned by the end of the first day. Especially after it started raining. Really I don't think we were doing anything to cause malfunctions. It was just a matter of combining sand, dust, and water inside them with the carbon build up from shooting 600+ rounds in a day.

That and we were getting tired which led to limp wristing, etc.

What other drills did you do?

A lot, really too many to list here, so I'll make another post detailing some of the drills.

Did you take pics?

Rob got a few, I didn't have a camera with me, and even if I did I wouldn't have had time to use it.

What were you using? (Just curious about this really)

I had my CZ PCR 9mm, other students had a Beretta 92, and a Wilson 1911. I'll add details later about my cz I had some trouble.

What did Rob teach while he was there? Can you go more in depth about that?

Honestly I still have a bit of information overload. There wasn't much traditional lecture, at the beginning Rob introduced himself and the concept of Combat Focus Shooting. But the rest of the "Classroom" stuff was done between the drills and in a lot of cases demonstrated as much as told.

I know that doesn't really answer the questions, but I'll post more on the subjects in a bit.

Oh and...

$1,000.00 for a 2 day course? Wow, that seems a little on the excessive side. How does that compare to other 2 day courses?

I priced other classes and this one was far from excessive. Really ammo was the most expensive part and I was able to buy it a box or 2 at a time over about a year.

[rburch]

We did a lot of drills and a lot of variations on the drills over the two days. So I won't be able to discribe everything we did, because I know I'll forget something.

Every drill was done on the SEB Target

It has a vague silhouette with target zones on the torso, and a small target area on the head. It also has 6 small shapes to either side of the silhouette. The shapes are numbered 1-6 and are Circles, Triangles, or Squares.

The first drill we did is what Rob calls the "Extend, Touch, Press" drill. Starting from a high compressed ready position, the instructor gives three commands. Extend, extend the gun out toward the target in your line of sight. Touch, touch the trigger. Press, press the trigger until the gun goes off.

The point of this is to slow everything down and really focus on the fundamentals. It's about grip and trigger control. Once we'd done a few they switched things up and gave a single command to trigger the actions.

The next drill is called the "UP" drill and was really just a variation of the first drill with multiple shots instead of 1, not a set number but trying to mix it up so anywhere from 2-5 but normally most of us shot 2-3. With the focus being not to get into a pattern.

Because we were doing runs of multiple shots, reloads were also incorporated at this time. We all had 3-5 mags so we had to reload at least twice each run.

We also incorperated lateral motion into the drill, both at the beginning, and during reloads. The idea being to take yourself off the bad guy's line of fire.

That was probably the first hour or so on the range, more in the next post.

[rburch]

The next drill is called the SEB drill.

Again just a modified version of the Up Drill, We still had the basic up command to shoot the upper chest with 2-3 rounds, but the instructors could also call a number which required a single round in one of the numbered shapes on the edges of the target.

We also started increasing the distance a bit during this drill, moving back as far as 20-30 feet for a brief period.

Really, 99% of the stuff we did the rest of the time used either the UP or SEB drill as it's base. They just tweaked the circumstances that we were doing the drill in.

I'll give some more highlights of the drills later on, but want to move on to discuss Rob's teaching and Combat Focus Shooting in my next posts.

[Rob Pincus]

HEy man, Thanks for posting the AAR!

I've been on TFL for over almost 12 years and this is definitely the only recent review that I am away of. Of course, I'm glad it is a good one!


If anyone has any questions for me, feel from to email:
rob @swatmag.com

****

And thanks to everyone else for your interest in the CFS program and I.C.E. Training.

-RJP

[ranburr]

Rburch, what other classes have you taken? How did this one compare to those?

[rburch]

Rburch, what other classes have you taken? How did this one compare to those?

Aside from an NRA Basic Pistol class, this was my first one. So I can't compare other schools.

Been really busy the past few days, I'm hoping to get a few more posts in here tomorrow, just too tired to be coherent at the moment.

[rburch]

I took the following off of one of Rob's Sights, I figure the best way to start explaining this idea is to let him.

The Combat Focus Shooting Program is an intuitive shooting program designed by Rob Pincus to work efficiently with the body's natural reactions during a dynamic critical incident.

Unlike many traditional programs, CFS does not take a purely mechanical approach to shooting training in isolation from the context in which the skill must be used.

CFS is not simply "point shooting," it is a training methodology that leads to more efficient defensive shooting skill.

If you're like me, the first thing you thought upon hearing this is "What the hell is a dynamic critical incident?"

Rob does a great job explaining it in his book, but I don't have my copy with me so I'll give you my version.

To me it's stepping out of the restroom in a convenience store and finding a robbery in progess, turning a corner and facing a man with a knife, someone kicking in your front door at 3am, etc.

In short it's a crisis you were not expecting. So really Combat Focus Shooting is about surviving an ambush. It's not about perfect 1-2" groups at 25 yards or even being able to draw and place 3 rounds in the target's chest in 2.5 seconds.

The focus of the shooting is to get combat accurate hits on the target. Rob defines this as any hit which signifigantly effects the targets ability to be a threat. There are cases where a hit to the arm or leg, or even a miss could be considered Combat Accurate if they end the threat, but for the purposes of training, we considered the center of the chest to be Combat Accurate.

The actual lessons spend a lot of time dealing with what happens both physically and mentally to your body during those incidents. For instance, your flinch response will lower your center of gravity, orient your body toward the threat, and bring your hands up into your line of sight so the can guard you.

You do not have control over these actions and no amount of training will stop them from happening. So Rob's training teaches you to start from that position, because that is the position you will be in if you ever have to use the training for real.

Similarly, it avoids anything requiring fine motor skills, because your body's ability to perform such tasks diminishes greatly under stress. Rob's main example of this is the use of a slide release. In Rob's classes, you don't use it. You rack the slide to release it instead.

Sorry if I'm not making sense with this, if so feel free to email Rob your questions, or better to beg him to come back and fix my errors.

More later...

[Eagle0711]

Strange thing happened. I was visiting my sister about 70 miles away, Tues. the 17th of Aug. I noticed some trainning DVDs and mentioned that I would like to see them. A friend of my sis. had loaned them to her a couple of months ago. She loaned them to me and I watched them, and took notes on the information. I packed them with care and mailed them back to her on Mon. the 23rd of Aug. thru the U.S. Post office and insured them for $100.00. They said that she would get them in a couple of days. By Fri. the 27th they hadn't shown up. As luck[old Murphy] would have it my sisters friend asked for his DVDs back. So I paniced and tried to locate replacments, and no luck. There were 5 and were the American Rifleman Video Collection. Thankfully if they don't show up soon this link should make it possible to replace them. I have to comment on the quality of the practical application. These were the best that Iv'e ever seen. Rob is an excellant instructor. He is NOT an egotistical blowhard know it all like a lot of instructors. This stuff got a 10 from me , and I'm not easily impressed. I 100% recomend these DVDs or the instruction if you want to win a life or death incident. Thanks, Lyle

[rburch]

So realize it's been a while and I'm sorry.

Thought i'd go over my issues from the class. Specifically the personal problems I had with my CZ PCR. I had never fired even close to that many rounds though the gun in one session, so I hadn't realized the trigger was a little too long for my finger, and that I was shifting my grip to reach the trigger.

Because of this I wore a blister into the thumb side of the web of my hand and busted it open early on saturday afternoon.

I was able to get through the class, and promptly went looking for a solution to my problem. I found it in the form of the thin aluminum grips from the CZ Custom Shop. They changed the grip from 1.43" with the factory rubber grips to 1.13" and this made a major change in the reach for the trigger.

Made the gun look better too, but that's just my opinion.


I'm planning to add a set to my full size CZ too.

I had some other problems, but discuss them later. Going back to the drills next time...

[Don P]

I will admit this course isn't exactly cheap; tuition for the class was $450which isn't bad, but I fired around 1100 rounds in the two days, and the cost of that much ammo, combined with the tuition and other expenses such as lodging, gas, and food, could put this class out of reach of some people.

I would say that this price puts most people out reach for the class. I by no means am implying the coarse is not worth the price with all the expenses. With todays economic outlook I wouldn't consider attending and thats me earning 22.40 per hr. Just my opinion now.

[rburch]

I would say that this price puts most people out reach for the class. I by no means am implying the coarse is not worth the price with all the expenses. With todays economic outlook I wouldn't consider attending and thats me earning 22.40 per hr. Just my opinion now.

I agree it's expensive. I think it's worth the price, but don't think it's an option for everyone. I spent about a year saving and stockpiling ammo for the class. But I figured since I'm planning to get married next year I needed to do it now while my budget had some flexibility left in it.