Review of a recent Combat Rifle Class

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PalmerWMD
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Just got done with a weekend at Max’s CRCD Class.

Thoroughly enjoyed myself and I am sooo glad I overcame my recent workout injuries in the last couple of weeks to squeeze in some leg work outs before I came. :biggrin:
but I get ahead of myself, let’s start from the beginning:

I had been in the military for quite some time but with only very sporadic tactical training.
Have been shooting once a week for the past 18 months (needed a hobby after my divorce) :gotme

Recently I decided to up my game and was looking around for some tactical classes.

Looked at the ubiquitous Magpul videos and some other “big name” classes and they just bothered the heck out of me.
They were mostly about becoming an AR driver and transition dancer, not a tactically proficient and rounded individual.,

Those courses seemed to be focused on a PoU (Philosphy of Use) that might be good for a SWAT team but not for a civilian 1st Defender.

I am not an experienced Infantryman but I know a thing or two about training troops and using the right PoU ….and in my mind the mainstream, Carbine classes that are currently taught often use a PoU that fits the instructors needs better than those of the students.

But enough about why I think others are flawed, lets talk about whats great about Max’s Class:

For one you are not on a static range punching paper…. pop up targets from different angles while doing live fire reaction drills as individuals, buddy teams, fire teams and as a capstone event as a Squad is the better training tool.

Secondly the terrain is realistic, no nicely maintained and easy to observe firing lane of gravel or grass.. its all a conglomerate of bushes and trees and inclines and declines and ravines and stumps and rocks etc etc.

Just like in the real world!
Also , while Max takes reasonable safety precautions, but he doesnt allow excessive precautions to cripple training like you will find sometimes in the big military and in most police depts.
You get treated as an adult, which is why it is important you show up only after getting thoroughly comfortable with your rifle.

Finally Max makes a real effort to explain and make sure student understand which tactical response is appropriate in which situation, so you are later empowered to think for yourself what tactical situation or intent you have that will lead you to either break contact or attack thru or flank etc.
Hopefully this way folks in a real SHTF will not blindly execute a drill thats inappropriate to the situation at hand, because they learned what is useful when.

His manual CONTACT between that and his blog it totally sold me on training with him.
I often find that authors of such manuals try to fit the square peg of their own experience as SF or SWAT into the round hole of training up civilian 1st Defenders for WROL, TEOTWAWKI etc results in comically misplaced guidance.
but none of such errors in judgement can be found in Max’s book.

Everything he write makes sense for the situations he writes about and hopes to train about.

I also believe that this type of training will transform the tactical firearms community in the next few years. We will see the faddish “tacticool “we will almost make you a SF operator” type schools adapt or shrink.

Non-faddish training focused on the basics of Fire and Movement is a must IMO and I strongly recommend folks take his classes (or classes by those who exhibit a similar training philosophy which is not many, but some others do exist)

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WDRacing
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Thanks for the review Fred. I haven't fired a firearm on the move in quite some time, not including some minor range time where you change positions and fire at different targets. That is more fun than anything else.

Did you guys get your heart rate up while doing drills? Firing with your heart rate up over 140 isn't something that can be learned without doing it.

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PalmerWMD
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Heart rate went way up.
The course is designed so you walk uphill the entire time on each lane, while negotiating a side incline and roots and rocks etc.
You are forced to react , aim, fire, yell at your buddy while when out of breath and negotiating difficult terrain.

The snow made things a bit easier actually compared to the non snow training, since it was so easy to slip and fall so few people sprinted form cover to cover making it less cardio intensive in the snow .
but the training value was still good since you had to take care with your footing while moving and aiming, shooting.
just like in the real world in the woods or city broken due to unrest or worse.

On a the non snow days atthe end your legs will feel like rubber and some guys push themself close to the throw up point.

The patrol class is a bit harder yet which I will post up a review as well.

here is a link tot this particular school.
I understand that Mason Dixon tactical and Mosby are using a similar philosophy.
(But the mainstream courses "taught" by the celebrity shooters do not)

As a result of attending a few of these in the hills, I mostly stopped my upper body weightlifting and focus mostly on core/legs now.

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PalmerWMD
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Here are some more eloquent comments than mine posted on another forum. (he gave me express permission to quote him)
They do a good job IMO contrasting the Magpul Dynamic, EAG, VikingTactics etc vs the more substantial Max Velocity courses (and others like him):

Much of the current tactical training scene revolves around a few core skillsets: weapons manipulation, close range target acquisition and speed shooting, and CQB/dynamic entry style tactics and shooting. This is not useless in and of itself, as I believe no one has ever been in a firefight and said “Darn, I wish I couldn’t manipulate this weapon as well as I can,” but this style of training is still a very incomplete picture of why I own weapons. I am not a cop, SWAT team member, or Navy SEAL, and never will be. As we discussed during a bit of down time this weekend, this kind of training has a very narrow philosophy of use (POU).

These classes, and more importantly the mindset that accompanies it, is frankly misdirected at the armed civilian. Students will learn to crouch, drive their rifle, and very speedily and efficiently stand by themselves on a firing line, shoot ten rounds in 2 seconds into a target that is 7 yards away and then perform a blazing fast magazine change, and if they are really tacticool, they can flip their rifle over their shoulder and pull out their GLOCK brand GLOCK and do the same thing again while walking slowly towards the 7 yard target. So you learn to shoot 1, maybe 2 targets to shreds from 7 yards away while standing/sticking your butt out in the open at breakneck speed, and look appropriately HSLD while doing it. Heck, you can even do the goon check when you’re done shooting. Big freaking whoop. Sells lots of DVDs, but doesn’t do jack for anything but a very few specific scenarios that a civilian wouldn’t find themselves in. Students walk away having taken several seconds off the time clock on a drill that involves lots of bullets at a stationary target, and feel good about themselves. They also basically wasted hundreds of dollars and even more hundreds of rounds of precious ammunition.

The founders never intended for this country to have a standing army. Ever. When we entered a state of war, the government would call up the unorganized militia to protect the people of the country. This of course assumes that the unorganized militia (all males 17-45/60, depending on who you talk to) have their own weapons, kit, and the ability to use them effectively in a military style. Back then it was standing in lines in fields, today it looks quite different but the philosophy is the same. An American who knows his history, and understands the founders’ frame of mind, needs to be able and willing to take up arms to protect the country. This means having weapons, ammunition, and the gear and fitness to get them to where they are useful in battle and having the skill to use them effectively. This, ladies and gentlemen, is not CQB dynamic squatting and gratuitous mag-dumping and transitions, this is light infantry tactics. Patriotic Americans who are students of history understand that having a nation of able bodied light infantrymen was the founders’ vision.

For whatever reason, a lot of people in the community are not cool with civilians being able to act as a cohesive small unit in a military fashion. This could be for several reasons, be it that they believe that is the government’s role (read a history book mate!) or only cops and the federal military should have that kind of ability. Some may be ignorant of history and believe that simple civilians who don’t get a government paycheck will never need to use military tactics in defense of themselves, family, or country. They make their living and gain notoriety by training civilians to be wannabe SWAT operators in the same classes as the SWAT operators, and just lump it all in together and call it good.

MVT’s CRCD is not a carbine class, and it is not a shooting class. It is a light infantry class. Be it a foreign invasion, periods of lawlessness or natural disaster, or whatever situation where you may need to protect people important to you, learn how the pros – military light infantry units – do it. Yes there is lots of shooting and carbines, but this is about putting it all together in SUT (small units tactics), and the CRCD is just the beginning. Teamwork: shooting, moving, and communicating, all at the same time. Bring a buddy or 3 or 7, and learn how to be a team and be useful when the SHTF and this country needs you. Your Magpul/Vickers Tactical/Insert Pantaeo Productions Trainer Here DVDs will still be there when you get back exhausted with all your kit and weapons covered in mud from learning how to use microcover, which you can’t learn how to do on a 25 yard gravel covered square range. If you are a militia member, prepper, or just an informed and armed citizen like me, get off your butt and train!

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ImStricken06
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check out my video from a Tactical Response class me and the mrs just took: videos-from-tactical-response-fighting- ... 85948.html

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PalmerWMD
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I checked it out.

Interesting also. :yesnod

I have been starting acting as a lanes safety at Max Velocity Tactical now. :naughty:

Shot about 12,000 rounds in the last 18 months (not counting handgunning)
Most of those rounds were at square ranges though. at Max Velocity the round count is not really that high since they focus on the movement and the drills and the tactics more so than on the trigger pulling.


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