CFB Petawawa CQB Clinic 27-28 June 2015 - Debrief here! Pics up!

Just got back from Petawawa and I'm now enjoying a much deserved libation. Once again, a big thank you to Barney and Chalkriver for organizing this clinic, none of this would have been possible without your dedication and effort. You have built a great community and it's great to see such a great turnout.

For those of you that missed the clinic, we got to shoot A LOT these two days, and Barney prepared us for the ORA CQB matches. But most of well, we had a lot of fun, even in the pouring rain! We shoot better in the rain anyway.

Thanks again Barney, looking forward to seeing you in a couple of months.
 
Thanks for another great clinic Barney ! I asked our female visitor to take a few pics and she did a great job ..thanks again . It seemed like everyone had a good weekend of shooting with some training and a few laughs thrown in . I just spent a couple hours cleaning 3-4 lbs of echo range out of my gear and rifle..gotta love muzzle brakes in the modified prone..lol

Once again thanks Barney as you are a real asset to the firearm community and hope to see everyone back in Petawawa soon .

The person on the far right in the pic left his sunglasses and jacket in the bldg ...can someone contact him for me.












 
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schumy said:
Just got back from Petawawa and I'm now enjoying a much deserved libation. Once again, a big thank you to Barney and Chalkriver for organizing this clinic, none of this would have been possible without your dedication and effort. You have built a great community and it's great to see such a great turnout.

For those of you that missed the clinic, we got to shoot A LOT these two days, and Barney prepared us for the ORA CQB matches. But most of well, we had a lot of fun, even in the pouring rain! We shoot better in the rain anyway.

Thanks again Barney, looking forward to seeing you in a couple of months.
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Couldn't agree more...Had a blast, learned a ton & the rain made sure to point out where I need to upgrade my kit. Plus, as Schumy said, we shoot better in the rain.

Big shout out to Barney...great clinic...Fast paced with lots of info to absorb, and even though you run a super tight program, you keep us all laughing and engaged. Good lessons on situational awareness and a lot of fundamentals. Anyone who has a chance, should attend a clinic. I know I will make this at least an annual event - although I think I'm leaving the SKS at home next year:)

And a cheer for Chalkriver as well for making this possible and hosting us all at Petawawa. Definitely will be back for some of the Petawawa Gun Club events.

And finally, thanks to all my fellow shooters...What a great community we have. I learned so much just hanging out with you all. see you all again soon I hope.
 
Rolled into my driveway at 2310 and did a hasty truck off load or unpacking. I am bushed but trying to beat the depression blues after having spent many hours with all of you plus many laughs. I have many thoughts to debrief and share with all of you. Several of us had to dry our carbines and pistols for the journey home while many more had to hit the road so we will just have to share our "take aways" right here on this thread.

So what stuck in your head after processing many or much of the information I threw at you in almost 36 hours?

I want to blog about some clothing choices for Service Rifle and CQB and Precision Rifle so that you can shop in confidence knowing that your future purchases are gonna be outdoor performance specific AND you can hit the gym with your first layer clothing and still look good. Yes your clothes will /can serve double or triple duty. What's not to like?

And it's time to start another blog about mental management for competitive mindset. It kinda works also for real world living. For example:'the positive outlook for sports or business or raising a family. It works for every facet of your life.

Anyway I have to drop into bed now. It's been an awesome experience with you all in the Petawawa community this weekend.

Cheers, Barney.
 
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I just want to give a quick thank you to Barney and ChalkRiver for allowing me to come out and assist. I'm looking forward to putting some rounds downrange with you at the fall clinic!

And for all of you that I got to fix your double feeds and locked bolts on the line, thanks for your patience with my fumbling with your guns.

Great work by everyone involved and there were a lot of great lessons given by all and learned by me. Thank you for the opportunity.
 
Thanks Hungry, Chalkriver, and everyone that helped put this on. I had an awesome time and it was a great introduction to CQB/ORA.

Looking forward to the clothing blogs. On Sunday I was wearing all quick dry stuff but it was not ideal, found my shirt was not staying tucked in and was riding up my back under my vest, which was mildly annoying, I know I need a better belt / pants arrangement, so I'll be looking for something suitable for CQB, hiking, and generally being outdoors.
 
I can't thank Barney and Chalk River enough for putting this event together for us.
What a great experience and privilege to be able to use a range like this. Also thanks to the pair of guys from Quebec who were our squad partners(#1 & 2), and my other squad partner (#4). Special thanks to squad-mate (#2) who was my safety (the guy with the day-glo orange gloves) :d , who gave me lots of great tips and help during the various stages. I learned a lot about what I was doing wrong, and where I really need to improve. I REALLY need to improve in a lot of areas, this being my first kick at the CQB can. Looking forward to trying it again sometime.

I actually preferred the wet weather on Sunday. I'm not a hot weather person, so I quite liked doing the exercises in the rain, and it was a relief to me compared to the previous day's hot sticky weather. I'm already comfortable in inclement weather out on dive boats on the Great Lakes, so a nice light drizzle is nothing. I just gotta get some lens caps for my red dot before the next time hopefully.;)
I like to think, "I shoot better in the rain", but not sure if I did on Sunday, but that's something to work on.

Chalk River, please extend our gratitude to Range Control and everybody/anybody else involved there at Pet for making this happen for us. All the members of the base we encountered there were friendly and helpful and made us feel welcome, and it's an experience I won't soon forget. Geez maybe I shouldn't say that. Will it ruin their reputation if I say they were friendly to us? Hah, hah.
Cheers, and hope to see y'all again sometime.
 
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finally have a few free minutes to type out a review of the weekends fun.

First off, Barney thanks so much for your instruction. I haven't kept tabs on the number of your clinics that I have attended but I'm always super happy with the experience. I appreciate your teaching style. Humor mixed with learning is always a winning combo. Always a bummer when we pass the check point ( thanks for that terrorists ) on our way out on sunday. At least this time there's no reason for depression with the up coming clinics later this year!
Morgan, thanks for all that you do. Your ability to get us range time is truly appreciated. Not only that, you also mange to convince / bribe your family members into helping out too.

For any one who has not shot at a military range, the experience is worth the price of admission alone.

Here is what I took away from this clinic:

My Tavor performed as well as my AR. May be even a little easier to handle than an AR.
Even if you dont have an AR or a Tavor you can still hold your own with a SKS as a few attendees did.
Keep sure your mags load on a closed bolt. SERIOUSLY that is an important point otherwise you will run in to trouble as I did last year.
Keep sure your mag storage system and sling feel right and work for you. It can be tough to test that out outside of the clinic environment. The Fuds at your local range might get a little freaked out.
511 makes really good products. I wear their pants at work, at the range and most every where else. Durable, versatile and they don't make you look like a mall commando / ninja in your everyday life.
It is possible to shoot in the rain without melting or contracting some water borne disease.

Obviously we are all there for the trigger time and the clinic but the now customary Saturday nite dinner at Danny's is a major highlight. Its speaks volumes that everyone gets along so well at the range that we all descend upon the restaurant en mass to chow down and shoot the ####. Always great to see familiar faces and new ones as well.

Thanks again to everyone and thanks to CFB Petawawa range control for letting us play in their sand box!

Safe travels Barney, looking forward to September!
 
I shoot better in the rain!
I shoot better in the rain!
I shoot better in the rain!

Great experience at this clinic. CFB Petawawa echo range was a pleasure to do this CQB clinic.
Really learned a lot about what works and what does not.

I'm already gearing up for September.

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Thanks to Hungry and Chalkriver for the hard work and dedication they put into this

Shoot straight -- chrisco
 
Many thanks again to Barney and Morgan for hosting and organizing another excellent clinic!

This is my 3rd Hungry clinic, and first CQB. I found it was excellent opportunity to run your gun harder than you ever would on a normal range day, as the speed/accuracy constraints definitely amped up the stress level and got away from the "mochaccino by my side" mentality to shooting and employing both ARs and pistols. It was a great chance to test your gear and equipment in both dry, wet, and muddy conditions, and it was nice to see some Noveske's (including mine) caked in mud and still functioning!

My only complaint would be how deliberate the transitions and the urban prone were. I would like to have been able to transition naturally and drop to an urban prone position in an urgent manner, and found the artificiality of clearing weapons or getting comfortable in the urban prone to take away from the reality of the drill itself. I do understand its a safety issue, and saw some shooters be very liberal with their muzzle direction during these drills, but it might be something to improve on for the next course.

It was great to see so many familiar faces from clinics past, and I will keep attending any clinic that 9er domestic (read: WIFE) will let me attend! Hope to see some of you at Sharpshooter and PR in the fall!
 
I DO have a couple questions re: that new yellow quick-draw training aid that Barney introduced to us at this clinic:

Barney was using his yellow banana-guard at the DND base which is exempt from CFO regs. But if we buy one of those yellow thingies for our own use off-range, do we need to get an ATT for it from the CFO?
Could we get in trouble for careless pointing of a banana? Are there any safe storage regs covering it? I also can't find a decent level-I retention holster for it. :evil:
 
LOL. And be sure to get some Magpul gear for your banana protector. They make a tactical banana protector holster, stage II retention. Gotta protect your banana, but make sure you've got fast access.

Anyway, a fantastic time to be sure. Thanks to Barney, Chalkriver and everyone who helped and attended. 100% worth it.

Now: to maintain the warrior mindset.
 
Thanks again to Barney, Morgan, my target partners and everyone else I met and chatted with.
Learned lots and my notes-to-self were:
1. need a sling plate for my AR and JR
2. need a thicker butt pad for AR and JR to improve Length of Pull
3. mag retention systems (flap or bungee) may be fine if you're jumping out of a plane, or crawling through the bush, but on a course firing line they are just in the way
4. mag dump pouch is a handy (quick & lazy) way to gather your mags after patching the targets so you can safety for the next shooter
5. rain is a nice way to keep cool while shooting; plus, the rifle looks cool with the steam rising off of it after the Mad Minute
6. the Econolodge is too far from the base, my bad for going cheap

All in all, a great weekend and look forward to doing it again next year.
 
So, got to try a couple of techniques from the clinic today at my local range...confirmed two things...First, the "sight picture, sight picture, sight picture" exercise really tightened up my standing offhand groups...significantly...Second, modified prone really freaks out the RSO's....:runaway:
 
chrisward3 said:
My only complaint would be how deliberate the transitions and the urban prone were. I would like to have been able to transition naturally and drop to an urban prone position in an urgent manner, and found the artificiality of clearing weapons or getting comfortable in the urban prone to take away from the reality of the drill itself. I do understand its a safety issue, and saw some shooters be very liberal with their muzzle direction during these drills, but it might be something to improve on for the next course.
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I agree with Chris on this, safety is our primary concern, but it would be nice if we could do transitions without stoppage. If I can make a recommendation, the safety relay need to be A LOT more aware of what they need to do and be very vigilant with their assigned shooter. Chris mentioned seeing a lot of shooters being liberal with their muzzle direction, I noticed that some the safety relays were too far from the shooter.

I think that with some modifications to the way the safety relay cover the shooter we can add a bit more fluidity and remove some stoppage from the course of fire.

The safeties should be aware of what exactly to look for, this way we mitigate shooter error due to inattention. We should do clear demos of what to look for when clearing a shooter.
The safety needs to be right behind the strong side of the shooter and not 4-5 feet behind, as some were last week.
The safety relay and not the shooter makes the call when it comes to continuing through the course of fire, they are responsible for CORRECTLY verifying that the shooter's weapon is clear before allowing any transition. The shooter's responsibility is to clearly show his safety the cleared weapon.
Lastly, but probably most important of all, the safety should not be pressured to clear his shooter as fast as possible.

Some shooters may be stressed during the exercises, the safety should act as a guide for the shooter throughout the course of fire, and assist with clear commands. We're ALL there to learn, not to fluff up our "operator" ego.
 
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