The Last Training Opportunity

“Unload.
Show Clear.
Hammer Down.”

Wait – SCRATCH THAT!

“Unload.
Show Clear.
Take your last training opportunity.”

I’ve followed the commands “Unload;  Show Clear;  Hammer Down” a hundred times on ranges in Falling Plate and other competitions and training scenarios.  It translates roughly to: Eject your magazine, show the RSO or instructor that your gun is clear, and press the trigger as you’re still safely pointed somewhere down range (to be absolutely stinking sure the gun is empty) before you re-holster.

What if we change the “Hammer Down” command to invite the opportunity to take your last, best shot of the hour/day/week with a perfect dry practice run?  What if we applied this invitation to view EVERY circumstance we come across as a dry practice/training run?

I love training with instructors from across the country as I travel and this week I scoped out Jeron Tree of 360 Defense Inc. as I traveled through Salt Lake City.  This one invitation to “take your last training opportunity”, delivered in a simple form of rearranged verbiage than that which I was used to (“hammer down”), spurred me to evaluate and recognize a myriad of training opportunities we have throughout every single day.

Rather than just pointing the gun down range in any ole’ (safe!) direction and pressing the trigger as a purely functional and necessary drill as prescribed, Jeron encouraged me to perform a perfect dry practice shot with accurate sight alignment, sight picture on my threat and perfect trigger control each and every time.  Each time I subsequently did so, I was making the conscious decision to visualize and practice precisely placed shots, utilizing perfect fundamentals along the way.

How many times have I wasted that “last, best training opportunity” over the years by not seizing the opportunity to make following the “Hammer Down” command be useful as yet another training shot?  I mean, isn’t that why we practice anyway?  To perfect our fundamentals?  To repeat something (done WELL!) thousands of times so that muscle memory kicks in when we need it most?

What other training opportunities do I walk on by?

What is my alertness level while in my home, on the couch with my husband, watching Pawn Stars?  Does this change when I’m at the gas station, scrubbing my windshield of dead bugs?  And in the back stairwell of my apartment complex on a cool spring night?

As I sit by the window putting these thoughts to paper tonight, have I evaluated what a threat looking in might see as my overhead light casts a perfect backlighting for him to see my every move, versus how pitifully far I can see into the dark nightscape from my comfortable chair?

Have I made the most of all of my last, best training opportunities BEFORE the Gift of Fear, as Gavin DeBecker calls it, sets in and the ‘bad guy’ tries to lay claim to what he wants?

“Unload.

Show Clear.

Take your last training opportunity.” 

And make it count as though, in your very next breath, you may just have to use it to save yourself.

Photo by Mellor Photography