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Elm Fork Tuesday Night Classes
New Registration Process
Tiger Valley is instituting a new registration process for our Tuesday night classes.
Students
interested in attending a class are requested to contact Tiger Valley
by phone at 972-977-9513 or email at tjpilling@tigervalley.com.
Please provide your name, phone number and email address.
You can register up to and including the day of the class.
This
process will enable us to properly staff these events as well as
provide notification if weather causes us to cancel a particular class.
Prepayment is optional, but available to those interested via our
online store.
Surgical Pistol
While
a rifle is the preferred weapon for longer distance engagements, all
you may have on you is your pistol. Make those critical
long-distance hits by taking our Surgical Pistol class on November 3.
The course content will focus on getting the highest level of
possible accuracy out of your pistol. This is a great class for
both the experienced and the new shooter. Drills will be shown
for correction of shooter errors on trigger control, trigger reset, and
corrections for longer distance shooting.
Bring your
handgun, 150 rounds of ammunition, holster, and safety gear. The
cost is $65 and the event runs at Elm Fork from 6:30 PM until 9 PM.
Please notify us via email or phone if you are planning to attend.
Low Light Pistol
On
November 17, Tiger Valley is offering an
opportunity to learn and practice skills in utilizing your pistol when
ambient light is low or nonexistent. This class was originally
scheduled to run in October but was rescheduled due to rain.
Bring either a hand held or
weapons mounted light, along with your pistol, holster, safety gear,
and 200 rounds of ammunition. The cost is $65.
Notify us via email or phone if you are planning to attend. Arrive by 6:30 PM at Elm
Fork, with the class running until 9 PM.
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January Team Sniper & March 4-Man Match
Tiger
Valley's first two matches for next year are open for early
registration. A 2-man team sniper match will be held on January
30 and 31, 2010. A 4-man tactical team match is on March 20 and
21, 2010. The cost for either match is $150 per person.
Full
logistical details will be released in next month's newsletter, but the
general format will follow our previous matches. Registrations
will be accepted on a first come, first served basis and space is
limited. Payment can be made either with a check to our office
address listed at the bottom of this newsletter or through our online store.
|  | Team Sniper Match Posters Available
Tiger Valley Team Sniper Match posters are now available for online purchase and can be printed in variety of sizes.
Brandon Parscale, from Parscale Photography,
captured the many excellent moments from the match used in the poster.
To view the poster and order, simply visit the Tiger Valley section of SmugMug by clicking here.
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| Training in the Rain - Lessons Learned
-by T.J. Pilling
It’s
amazing how much SWAT has changed in the last 30 years. Yet in
some areas it hasn’t changed at all. In 1979 I joined the Garland SWAT
team. We were handed an M-16 with one magazine (if you were
lucky) and told to go find the rest. That included holsters,
magazine pouches, hose clamps to put your flashlight to the fore end of
your weapon, everything you needed that they didn’t hand you the day of
selection was on your dime. Actually, they did give us two
t-shirts that said we were the SWAT team.
As time went on,
things improved on SWAT. The department became progressive and
was more willing to spend money where they thought it needed.
Money started to flow and we got the new wiz bang video equipment,
vests, guns, gas launcher, you name it. When the money started
flowing, we bought some neat gear. This is not to say that
problems with equipment procurement did and still do exist; it was not
a bottomless pit of money. Some needed equipment never did, and
still does not seem to get purchased. Don’t get me wrong; the
blame doesn’t all fall entirely at the feet of administration, but also
with the team members themselves.
Flash forward to 2009 at an
advanced pistol/rifle class at Tiger Valley in Waco, Texas. We
had 32 officers from various SWAT teams from across the state. The
weather was atrocious; rain, wind and fifty degree temperatures.
We did the orientation in the building and promptly moved to the firing
line for pistol techniques. As officers were filing out the
building, I did a visual check of equipment as well as rain gear.
Seeing all but four or five with rain gear, I stopped one and asked,
“Where’s your rain gear?” He retorted, “Rain gear is for
sissies”. Well count me as one of those sissies, it was
miserable.
We went to the firing line and started doing drills
on steel. Those who weren’t shooting were feverishly loading
magazines awaiting their relay on the line. In hindsight, I think
the rapid movement to do anything was more an effort to keep
warm. Body language was soon giving those away who were cold in a
bad way. Shoulders started to inch up to the ears; hands were pulling
into sleeves and whole bodies turned instead of just the head.
Most had deployed to the firing line in nothing more then long sleeve
t-shirts, which some if they were lucky, had an assault vest over
it. It was only 9:00 AM, and I knew this was going to be a long
and painful day for some. Only one person had both a weatherproof
top and bottom out of the entire 32 officer class. Some officers
did have DRMO reject military Gore-Tex which soon failed because of the
constant rain. However, even those with the jackets were missing
the waterproof bottoms.
Since everyone was soaked to the
gills, the class all voted to shoot through lunch. We moved to
the 100-yard line to confirm their zero on their carbines and then
moved to the 200 for stationary and moving targets. When the
command to move to the prone position was given, it was like watching
an ESPN slow motion reply. They all got into position, but it was
ugly. Those not on the lines were in the pits working the
targets, but their attention span had dropped in the cold and wet to
the point where things were moving slowly. When the first relay
that was on the line moved to the pits to work targets for the second
relay, I began watching some for signs of hypothermia. Steam was
rising off exposed heads as well as soaked backs and legs. We ran
the second relay and decided it was time to close camp before we made
someone ill.
The point of all of this is that we are all
familiar with the old warrior adage that we “train as we fight”.
Obviously, this includes training in inclement weather under conditions
that are not as favorable as we would always prefer. However, if
we don’t equip ourselves both mentally /and physically/ for these
hardships, we set ourselves up for sub-par performance. It’s easy
to say that you’re tough and can handle things mentally and can “gut it
out” operating in the cold and wet, but it’s an entirely different
thing for your body to actually perform at the level that it must
during those operations. While you may be able to tough it out,
there’s no real reason to stand there shivering and losing your mental
edge due to climatic discomfort. Having the right equipment is
essential.
Rain gear is not a fight that is foreign to
me. I fought this fight when I was a sniper on my team, and it
was tough. It took years for the powers to be to decide that we
needed it; some other piece of gear always seemed to trump the
purchase. Rain gear is not flashy, if you asked the troops which
they would rather have, rain gear or some new gadget, the gadget would
always win. Good rain gear (and any environmental gear for that
matter) is not cheap, but priceless when needed. It’s not about
making a fashion statement. Rain gear made by companies like
Columbia, Patagonia and a host of other outdoor vendors is available in
fashionable SWAT black or green for that matter. Your average
patrol officer raincoat is just not adequate for the task.
If
this training day had been the real thing, the entire unit would have
been functionally ineffective by 2:00pm. Needing good rain gear
in Texas, some would laugh off as non-critical since it gets over 100
degrees for months at a time. The problem is that it only takes
one day in the rain when all your scopes, guns, radios, and armored
vans become worthless because the guy you got behind it can’t stop
shaking. The point is, while things like rain and cold weather
gear isn’t sexy as the latest whiz-bang flashlight, your odds of
needing it are greater. There is no such thing as bad weather,
just bad gear.
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Previous
Newsletters Available Online!
Check out our previous
newsletters for fantastic training videos, equipment
reviews, and special articles. Find them here.
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Upcoming
Events
November
December
January 2010
March 2010
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Tiger Valley LLC.
Range Address: Hwy 84 at Joe Russell Rd. | Prairie Hill, TX 76678
Mailing Address: 6309 Scottsboro Ln. | Garland, TX 75044
Cell: (972)977-9512 |
