You are walking home from the grocery store and carrying several bags of food. Two men are walking behind you and yell out to you: “Hey Johnny!” You turn and tell them your name isn’t “Johnny” and that they have mistaken you for someone else. They apologize and you continue walking home. […]
Written by: Greg Ellifritz I’ve known for a long time that the words we use when coaching a shooting student can affect how quickly that student grasps a certain concept. One important concept I’ve used over the years is to express all of my coaching cues as positive statements. If you […]
Written by Greg Ellifritz I was recently listening to a podcast where the host was interviewing noted author and speaker James Howard Kunstler. Mr. Kunstler is well known in the fields of permaculture, architecture, and sustainable living. He has written several excellent books, with The Long Emergency and World Made By Hand likely […]
Written by: Greg Ellifritz “Simply put, the human brain can only consume about three ‘chunks’ of information in short term, or working, memory. As more and more items are added to a list, the average person retains less and less. Four items are a bit harder to remember than three. Five items are even harder. […]
Written by Greg Ellifritz Read the story below. It’s a prime example of everything that shouldn’t happen in a fight, but sometimes does anyway. Victim at WIBW-TV hangs on to attacker despite punishment The story describes a situation where an irate man attacked several people who were working at a TV news […]
Written by Greg Ellifritz I was recently reading an article called The Coach’s Cue – Breaking the OODA Loop. It was an excellent read for me because it combined two passions, combative strategy and strength training. In the article, the author speaks about the importance of simple, one-word, vocal performance cues. He was speaking […]
Written by: Greg Ellifritz Many of my students are serious practitioners of the art of self-protection. They’ve graduated from numerous shooting schools and hold black belts in various martial arts systems. Although they generally enjoy the training process in general, their ultimate goal is to become better fighters. They are hoping that the skills they […]
Written by Greg Ellifritz One of the hardest things I do as a firearms and self defense trainer is convincing people that their lives are worth defending. Many students come to my classes with an attitude that displays an extreme lack of self worth. It’s hard for me to comprehend, but many people do […]
Written by: Greg Ellifritz As I was scanning my news feed last week, I came across yet another mistaken identity shooting where the “defender” fired through a door or wall. Dad mistakes daughter for intruder, shoots her to death According to the article: “Pressley’s father told investigators he fired through a door at […]
Written by: Greg Ellifritz Training scars … we all have them. I’m not talking about training scars like the black eye you get when your partner goes a little too hard while sparring or the scars you get when you cut your finger trying to quickly open your fighting knife. The training scars […]
Written by: Greg Ellifritz A couple days ago I finished Karl Rehn and John Daub’s new book Strategies and Standards for Defensive Handgun Training. I really enjoyed it and found it to contain a whole bunch of valuable information. The authors’ book description follows: “What percentage of carry permit holders attend training […]
Written by: Greg Ellifritz “I like to throw myself passionately into a sport or activity until I reach about an 80 percent efficiency level. To go beyond that requires an obsession and degree of specialization that doesn’t appeal to me. Once I reach that 80 percent level I like to go off and do […]
Written by: Greg Ellifritz Think about your last firearms training session. From which distance did you spend the majority of your time shooting? Next question… When you visualize possible scenarios when you might have to defend yourself with a firearm, how far do you imagine the criminal shooting at you will be? […]
Knowledge to make your life better. If you have some free time, check out some of these links this weekend. Double taps: please, no! Why firing two shots on one sight picture may not be the best tactic. Family Safety Jeff Gonzales talks about some considerations should things kick off when you are in […]
Written by Greg Ellifritz By now, most of you have seen video of the takedown of the suspect in the April terrorist vehicle run-down attack in Canada. If you haven’t take a look at the short video embedded below. The video perfectly illustrates one of the most common mistakes I see students […]
Written by Greg Ellifritz Ever since I started training people in the fighting arts for a living, I have kept very meticulous records. Not only is it important for potential future legal action, it’s a great marker for tracking progress and improvement. Each year at this time, I do a review of what I […]
Written by Greg Ellifritz I recently was contacted by a regular reader of this site. She had an interesting request for a specialized article for the non-combatant. To paraphrase the request: “I read all the great advice on your site and try to implement as much of it as I can. But […]
Knowledge to make your life better. If you have some free time, check out some of these links this weekend. Cop shares gunfight lessons from ISIS-inspired ‘Draw the Prophet’ terror attack Some good lessons here from a cop who killed two rifle-armed ISIS terrorists with his duty Glock pistol. Closing the distance on rifle armed […]
Knowledge to make your life better. If you have some free time, check out some of these links this weekend. New Glock Gen 5 Manual The folks at Loose Rounds got a hold of the latest Gen 5 Glock factory manual. Download it at the link above (opens to PDF). You’ll also want to […]
Written by Greg Ellifritz My friend Dave Spaulding recently wrote an article about the standard drills he uses to evaluate his students at the beginning of a training class. The drills themselves serve as a great practice session if you work them for multiple repetitions. Check out the article at the link below: […]
