Guest Scott "Jedi" Jedlinski of Modern Samurai Project

[00:00:02] Speaker A: Welcome to Life, Liberty and Equip podcast. I'm Greg Davis, founder of NeoMag. This podcast is about living boldly, using liberty for good and staying equipped and mindset, skill set and gear for whatever comes your way. Today's episode is ad free, but it's made possible by NeoMag. We build innovative American made gear to help you stay better equipped. If you want to support the company and get free, not sorry. If you want to support the company and get great gear, head to then or support us for free by hitting subscribe, leave a review and share the podcast. I would love to hear from you. You can email me at lifelibertyequip1pmail.com also hosting with me today is Nate Hills. [00:00:40] Speaker B: Howdy. [00:00:41] Speaker A: Tiberius Giblin. [00:00:43] Speaker C: Howdy, Howdy. [00:00:44] Speaker A: And Michael Billings. [00:00:46] Speaker D: What's going on? Everybody [00:00:49] Speaker A: got a good episode today. I'm excited for this. [00:00:52] Speaker B: Michael, I think it's on you, buddy. [00:00:54] Speaker D: All right, here we go. Had to clear my throat, but today's guest is Scott Jelinsky. Jedlinsky, owner and lead instructor of Modern Samurai Project, a name that's become synonymous with performance driven firearms training. Scott brings decades of experience from both the martial arts and shooting worlds. With a lifelong background in taekwondo, Muay Thai, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, where he earned his black belt, he approaches shooting through the lens of athletic performance, body mechanics and efficiency rather than just fundamentals alone. [00:01:24] Speaker B: He's a USPSA masterclass shooter and has earned some of the most respected performance benchmarks in the industry, including the Fast Drill coin and the 0.1 elite standards, coin achievements that reflect a deep commitment to mastery. Scott has trained extensively with top instructors across disciplines and has translated that knowledge into a teaching style that blends combat proven principles with high level performance shooting. His work has been featured in outlets like Recoil Magazine, Shooting Illustrated, and Surefire's Field Notes, and he's been a guest in some of the biggest podcasts in the space. [00:01:57] Speaker E: On top of that, he's had the honor of instructing elite units across the country, including SWAT teams, federal agencies, and instructor cadres from organizations like the FBI, U.S. marshals, and border Patrol. Scott, welcome to the show. [00:02:12] Speaker C: Thank you much. Thank you much. God, that kind of sound impressive. [00:02:15] Speaker B: Well, and you also had the instructor the pleasure of instructing me and Greg, which I'm sure is a highlight of your career. [00:02:22] Speaker E: Honor, honor. [00:02:24] Speaker A: I was kind of surprised our names weren't in there somewhere with some of the elite people that you have had [00:02:30] Speaker C: the pleasure of training, you know? Yeah, but the thing is, the minute I put up there. Everyone thinks I'm flexing, and I don't hear the end of it. [00:02:39] Speaker A: Well, Scott, I'm so glad to have you on our episode today. I know you do a lot of these, and I listen to a lot of them, and it's always interesting to hear your points. I've taken two classes with you, and we've had dinner together at Shot, and we've. We spent some time together, and I always appreciate your point of view on things, and so I'm looking forward to getting into some of this stuff. We're going to kind of talk about. About just how you got your start and. And some training things and also all sorts of stuff. So I'm looking forward to other people getting to know you. Like, we got to know you, so. [00:03:14] Speaker C: Sure. Yep. Yeah. All right. Where do you want me to start? [00:03:17] Speaker A: Well, so I'm going to start all the way back with little Scott. [00:03:21] Speaker B: Little Scott, Scotty. [00:03:22] Speaker C: Oh, geez. [00:03:24] Speaker A: We're not gonna spend. We're not going back for too long. But just. I'm curious. Cause actually, I don't know this. What was your upbringing like? What kind of environment did you grow up in? [00:03:35] Speaker C: Sure, yeah. I'm an Air Force kid. That's where you get the Korean eyes and the Polish last name. Right. Dad was from South Chicago. Didn't want to go to war during the Vietnam War, so he joined the Air Force. That's how that works. And got stationed in Korea and met my mom, and they had the biggest gook ever. That's pretty much it. [00:03:56] Speaker A: If anybody spends a few minutes around you, they're gonna find out your awesome sense of humor. [00:04:02] Speaker B: I mean, I've always described you, Scott, as a bit of an anomaly since you have a Polish last name. Then you meet you, but you're like a what, you're six foot two, six [00:04:11] Speaker C: foot three, six, one. [00:04:14] Speaker B: Okay. [00:04:14] Speaker C: Yeah. I don't know. Six, one, six, two. [00:04:16] Speaker B: You're the tallest Asian I've ever met with a Polish last name. And it's terribly confusing. It is in all good ways, but it's confusing. [00:04:26] Speaker C: Yeah. And then you guys figured out why my nickname is Jedi. Because nobody can pronounce Jedlinski. [00:04:33] Speaker B: It's me all day. [00:04:34] Speaker C: Right. So I've been Jedi since 77, 78, because of that. Right. So, yeah, moved around a whole bunch. Dad retired in Vegas when I was 16, graduated out of Vegas High, went to UNLV. I think I'm like one of 15 people that actually graduated from UNLV, you know? Yeah. Was in the. You Know restaurant industry in the casinos until I graduated. They went into banking and then mortgages and stuff like that and did that until about went full time. Company started and I mean if you look at the, the tax ID number, the company started in 16, really started teaching classes in 17, went full time in 19. And then, yeah, here we are growing up, played baseball, football, wrestled. Been doing martial arts, especially taekwondo since I was a little kid. Started doing jiu Jitsu in 1996 and then finally, after almost 30 years, finally got my black belt last year in Brazilian Jiu jitsu. So that's all that's outside of it? Yep, that's that side of it now [00:05:42] Speaker A: where your was your dad in a martial arts. My martial arts or where did that. [00:05:47] Speaker C: Dude, he was a 5 foot 5 pollock from some South Chicago, bro. They didn't have money to take martial arts lessons, dude. Yeah, no, it's just, you know, you grow up, you got slant eyes, you got to, you know, you got to punch and kick people. That's how it is. Yeah. You know, and then, I mean, one of the lucky things is that most Air force bases offer at the, you know, club or the, you know, the gym or whatever they, you want to call it the gym, the community center, they offer free lessons and stuff like that, you know, so it's usually karate, a lot of taekwondo, stuff like that. Yeah, so that's. I just got into that. And then, you know, being a building, a military kid, you can ask him. It's kind of like being in prison. You don't really know every. Get a move every two years. At least that's how it was back then, you know, you don't really know anybody. The rules are always the same as prison. The nerds want to be your friend first. And then if you're of any size, you know, the bullies are gonna wanna throw hands and you gotta prove yourself right. You either get your ass kicked or you kick ass. And then after about a month, everything settles down to where they leave you alone, you're somebody's bitch. And then you move again in two years. So that's, you know, so you gotta learn how to fight being a military kid, bottom line. [00:06:57] Speaker A: So, yeah, at least if you wanna stay at the top of the food chain. [00:07:00] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. For the most part. Yeah. Now, Scott, it's a good time. Wouldn't change it for the world. [00:07:05] Speaker D: Before you started the firearm side of the house, in the training us a little bit about what you did history wise, working and growing up, what did you inspire to be as you were growing up. What did you want to do when you grew up? [00:07:19] Speaker C: Oh, I wanted to be an attorney because I love arguing with people. Yeah, yeah. So for example, my degrees in economics and I have a minor in philosophy. Right. Because it used to be a major in philosophy, but then, you know, I went to so unlv. At the time, Nevada didn't have a law school. And then I got to be about a junior and then I started looking into how much law school costs and my dad was like, good luck with that, fam. Yeah, I ain't paying for that shit. Right. You know, Vegas or Nevada had a thing with like Utah and Arizona and California that you, if you went to law school, you could go at local, you know, non state, whatever. Yeah, in state. Exactly. Yeah, in state tuitions. But still it was nuts. There was nobody, you know, there's no way you could afford that on your own. Right. And my dad was like, if that's what you want to do. So I switched to business. Right. And economics, just the philosophy of business, if you will. So pretty much graduate on time. I took long breaks and stuff like that, but, you know, I graduated, so that's it. So I already had all the credits for a minor in philosophy, so got that as well. So yeah, that's how that worked out. So yeah. [00:08:32] Speaker A: So then how did you find yourself? You mentioned, I think both classes. I mean, at some point you like to drop the line that you're not a numbers Asian, which I always thought was funny. [00:08:41] Speaker C: I, I am, I mean, in the mortgage industry for 26 years, you gotta like, you gotta do the numbers and stuff like that. I just, I don't like people asking me to do numbers. You know what I mean? So, yeah, yeah. But no, I am for the most part. But I'm not, I don't nerd out on numbers like some people do. I like data. I like data that leads to glory. Right? Like, I don't just do numbers to do numbers. I do. Okay? So if I have this many points at this point in time, that's this his factor. And I beat you. So that's what I like. Big fan of hit, you know? [00:09:16] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:09:17] Speaker C: If you want to do a build drill, you know, just to make it by the skin of your teeth, you got to do a 1 second draw and 20 splits. That's the math I like. Yeah, that's the math I like. [00:09:26] Speaker E: So, so running a business and being a shooter and an instructor and everything you've done, how has that changed you personally in your personal life? [00:09:38] Speaker C: Oh, like in like, in what, what, what, what regard, though? Like personal life or. [00:09:47] Speaker E: Yeah, business life over the past few years, running your own business, you know, becoming an instructor, how has that affected or changed your personal life? How is it bled over? [00:10:01] Speaker C: Well, I got divorced three and a half years ago. I guess that's a change. [00:10:07] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:10:09] Speaker C: Anyway, gosh, that's a, that's an interesting question, man. So I'm going to give you two sides to that. The good side and the bad side, right? Here's the good side of it. I would tell you that I've met some of the best people on the face of the earth through this industry, okay? Gentlemen, gentlemen like yourselves, right? Dudes that want to get out, they want to train, yes. They do business at what they love, but they do a good product and they just want people to get better, you know what I mean? And that doesn't really exist in other industries, right? And like in the mortgage industry, it's like, yeah, associates with that guy. You know, we do good business together. But I'm, I'm not really your friend, you know what I'm saying right here? I've read the heights of guys, right? For example, you know, when Greg and I get together, right, we talk about shooting, we talk about business, we talk a lot about watches, we talk a lot about, I mean, competing, yes, it's part of shooting, but it's a different vibe to it. You know, we talk about cigars and stuff like that. So even if he got out of this, if I got a business, right, I would think we would still be friends. You know what I mean? Right? It's not like that in the mortgage world, right? It's not like that at all. So I've met the heights of great people in this industry, right? On the other hand, in other industries, you meet some scumbags, bro, Just like, oh, no, no, sir. You know, if not recommending you to anybody, if I see you at a trade show, I am beaten feet to the other side. Unfortunately, the same thing exists in the firearms industry, right? [00:11:49] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:11:50] Speaker C: And it kind of shocked me, right? It's like, hey man, we're talking about serious business here. We're talking about guns, we're talking about people's lives, we're talking about training Meek be. I was like, nah, man, there's scumbags in this industry too, right? And that shouldn't have changed me. I should have just been okay with it and then would have been so shocked by the whole thing because people are people, you know what I mean? I will take this Industry over any other that I have been in just because of the amazing friendships that I have made. And I should have been surprised that there's scumbags in this industry too. So does that answer your question? I feel I did a poor job on that, but at least that's a insight to my psychosis. [00:12:31] Speaker A: No, that was good. I think I found the same thing. And to be honest, the scumbags thankfully are pretty far and few between. Just from the circles I run in, I guess. [00:12:41] Speaker C: Yeah, but they're loud, man. [00:12:43] Speaker A: They are loud and they shake themselves out pretty quickly. Figure out who they are. [00:12:48] Speaker B: The next thing is it's a sport not or good and bad. It's a double edged sword. It's a small industry and the more you run into people, the more like it's, it's like bumper cars. You just continue to beat your know, bump into people and everyone kind of gets the same feeling about those scummy people. Like if one person has felt it, probably 10 other people have felt it, everyone's gonna like, yeah, we're gonna put them over there in that corner and we'll wave it. [00:13:14] Speaker C: The problem is everybody still subscribes to their page and loves the drama. [00:13:17] Speaker B: That's true. [00:13:18] Speaker C: That's the problem. Yeah, well, don't tell me what ear that. Oh, you know, this guy, you're right. Blah blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then yep, you're right on his feet all the time, you know, God bless them. I wish him all the help, everyone, all the help they have to in the world. I'm trying to let Jesus back into my heart. It's hard, but I'm trying. Yeah, I'm trying, man. [00:13:38] Speaker A: Well, if you ever want to talk about that, I'm all about that too. [00:13:42] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, sure. [00:13:43] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, it's. I say there's, as I say, there's a lid to every pot and there's, there's the sky people that have those, have those channels. They find their people. [00:13:55] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:13:55] Speaker A: And thankfully they all kind of flock together and hopefully they stay out of our business. [00:14:01] Speaker C: Is a. Yeah. [00:14:02] Speaker A: The plan. So. [00:14:05] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:14:06] Speaker A: Sorry. Yeah. [00:14:07] Speaker B: Scott, so I mean you mentioned it a little bit when you're talking about what you and Greg frequently talk about when you guys get together, but outside of work. So outside of guns and shooting and training, what, what do you do for fun? What, what is a relaxing day for Scott? [00:14:24] Speaker C: Yeah, I like, I love what, I love what I do. So outside of, outside of shooting and, and rolling Shujitsu. What, what, what like do me and my fiance Heather do? Yeah. Yeah. So outside, like a vacation, like an everyday thing. Like, what did we do yesterday? Right. I got up, I got. I gunsmithed a little bit. I was messing around with some stuff. Right. We took the dogs to the dog park and then we went to our favorite cigar lounge here where I live in Matthews, North Carolina. We get a couple drinks, we had a cigar, we set out there. My buddy Quincy, who lives in the same condo complex as we do, he's a cop with his fiance, had a great time, talked about, you know, talked with them for about two, two and a half hours. Right. That's, that's, that's a relaxing day for me outside of shooting and jiu jitsu. Right. Other times it's going to be hanging out with my step kids. You know, they're all grown right now, expecting a step grandbaby in the next couple of weeks. That's crazy. Yeah, that's crazy. Yeah. So that's it. You know, Thing is, I love what I do. [00:15:35] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:15:35] Speaker C: You know, and I'm in a. You know, I've been seriously shooting now really since about 2010. Right. This business is going since 2017. And, you know, there's ups and downs to everything, but God, you know, the motivation is still there, you know. You know, even more so now that I've gotten back to competition in the last year or so. It is just. Yeah. The fight, the fire still there. So I don't really like to relax, you know what I mean? I'm not a beach person. I'm not a mountain person. Right. Like sitting still in one place. There's not a cigar or some nice bourbon or tequila in my hand. Talking to good friends now, man, I don't want any of that. [00:16:25] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:16:25] Speaker C: You know, I've got to. I don't know, man. Maybe I'm just a weird dude, but if I'm. If it's not going to get me glory, I almost don't want to do it, you know. Well, and maybe that's the secret of my success and the secret of, I don't know, my. I, I don't really have a failure, so. [00:16:41] Speaker A: But, you know, I mean, it's definitely the hustle. Like it's. If you're going to, if you're going to run your own business, you're going to grow your own business, do all those things. There's. Stopping is not something that you get to do too often. That's just, that's just part of the price you pay to, to have something that you have passionate about and that you want to grow and see, you know, and see. Do better. [00:17:02] Speaker C: Yeah. And I just. Yeah, I just, you know, I just. Again, if you're not. If you're not getting better, you're getting worse. You know what I mean? And I kind of fell into that. I mean, it wasn't really my fault, though. I mean, you can shoot 100 classes a year. Most of them are on the weekend. You don't have time to compete. Right. You know what I mean? And I was, you know, kind of in a bad, you know, family atmosphere where that was not looked upon. You know, I've been out for a month on the road shooting with your boyfriends and stuff. Now it's time to paint drywall or some shit like that. I'm like, damn, how much money do I make? Can we get somebody to do that for me, you know? [00:17:35] Speaker A: Yeah. See the bus pain when I go home. [00:17:37] Speaker C: Now. Yeah, now with Heather, my fiance, it's like she leaves me alone for day one. Maybe we go grab some dinner and a cigar. Day two is like, all right, what are we doing? Let's go train. Let's go. Jiu Jitsu. She comes to me to my jiu jitsu class, right? Or she comes with me to the range here. We set up drills, we set up stuff. She's a great coach. She doesn't shoot a lot because she has got messed up thumbs from gymnastics when she was a kid, but she's an amazing coach. Right. She takes what, things that I say, things that Donovan Moore says, Buck Lawler, A.J. zito, Tim Aaron. Like, she'll go to classes with me when I take classes, right. And she is just a. She has like this photographic memory, right? To where she'll just give me the cues that someone else said and says, you're not doing that. Come on, man, Stay low. Let's go. And it's. It's. It's phenomenal. That's awesome. Phenomenal. So, yeah. Yeah. [00:18:26] Speaker B: Well, I know. I know other aspects of your life where you talking about you continuing to go. Like, I know you're into cars or you were last time we chatted. [00:18:34] Speaker C: Oh, no. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Well, Glory, right? [00:18:38] Speaker A: That's. My next question is what did you drive when you went. When you went out yesterday? [00:18:43] Speaker C: When I did what? Oh, when I was talking to you. [00:18:47] Speaker A: Well, when you were on your way out yesterday, when you guys are going out yesterday, did you. I'm assuming that you drove your Audi. [00:18:52] Speaker C: I was. Oh, we drove mine. Yeah. My Audi. Yeah. [00:18:54] Speaker A: I was going to set you up to talk about Audi a little bit, [00:18:58] Speaker C: you know, I mean, what's, what's there to say? It spent way too much money on it. But it's. Yeah, it's a 20, 24 Audi SQ8, right. Four liter, twin turbo. It's tuned to 820 horses, 670 at the wheels, carbon fiber everything. You know, it's got an air ride suspension that I can either drop it on the ground or raise it up to off road whenever I want to.12 inch subwoofer pushing a thousand watts. You know, I'm Gen X guy, I gotta, gotta go fast. I gotta have the boom, you know. Yeah. But I love it. I absolutely love it. Yeah, that's it. Yeah. That's the other thing. If I'm not sure, if I'm not doing jiu jitsu, if I'm not with, you know, I'm just gonna call her my wife. She's my wife. You know, it's a ceremony is important, but you know, for all intents and purposes, she is my wife. The wife, the kids. Yeah. And then, you know, maybe a close fifth place would be, would, would be the car. Yeah. So. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's a good point. I often forget about that, but yeah, [00:19:59] Speaker A: it's so, yeah, I think it's one of the coolest Audis I've seen. I think it's awesome. [00:20:05] Speaker C: I appreciate that, I appreciate that. Now for the Internet, we're like, ah, why don't you get an RSQ8? It's the same engine. People say it's a. Say you can, you can. Yeah, it's just, it's just the tuning is different. So, you know, little fun fact. The engine in the SQ8 is the same engine that's in the RSQ8 as in the Lamborghini Urus and the Bentley Beniaga. Right. But yeah, but they got different suspension. Like you track your suv. Get out of here, kid. Get out of here. Man. Driving me crazy with that. Right? So I actually had, I mean if we're just talking about nonsense here, I actually had a deposit on an rsqa, right. And. But it was stuck in Jacksonville Port for like two months because there was some like Western Chinese part in it. You know, they got. That's where the Chinese do all those Muslim slave thing, whatever. We can't have those parts there, right. So they had to replace the part at the dock. So it's there, it's there, right. And then my buddy Chris Hoff, right, he's really into cars. He's like, man, you need to talk to Them because you put the deposit down, but I don't know, man, you need to talk to them about this. So I called them up and I said, hey, man, you know, I travel a lot to my sales guy. And they're like, yeah. And I go, well, what if it comes in and I'm not home for a month to sign the paperwork? Are you guys going to sell that thing from underneath me? And he's like, we're going to do our best not to. I'm like, you what the what? You know what I mean. [00:21:29] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:21:30] Speaker C: So then, so I get home after that trip, I get an email, Boom, your car is on the lot. I'm like, heck, yeah, it's Sunday, right? I call my guy, up I go, hey, Eric, I know you're off today, but let's do this. He's like, oh, bro, it's not on. It was a mistake, right? I'm like, whatever. So I live five minutes from the dealership. So I drove down there, right, and looked around the lines like, no, he wasn't there. But I saw the SQ8 in that color, the Ascari blue, right? And I hated the wheels on the RSQ8. These wheels are even better, which doesn't make sense because I changed the wheels after a month. After I had it. Anyway, body was 30 grand less. Oh, oh, right, yeah, it was 30 grand less. So we just took. Bought that one, took the 30 grand and put that into it. And now I hunt urses and RSQ8s and oh, what else? Oh, the Cayenne Turbo TT also has the same engine, so I, I hunt those at the Red Light Grand Prix, of course. Always staying within 10 miles of the speed limit. [00:22:30] Speaker A: Of course, of course, of course, of course. It's all about the acceleration. [00:22:32] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, that goes back to glory, Scott. And goes back to glory. [00:22:35] Speaker C: This is torque at the wheel. Yeah. 100 though. So there you go. [00:22:40] Speaker A: I love it. [00:22:40] Speaker C: That's me. That's me. [00:22:42] Speaker A: So you mentioned briefly before your, your professional path. I think, I always think it's super fascinating that you went from a mortgage guy for over 20 years into being one of the top tier instructors in the world. What is that? How did that go? Like, how did you go from mortgage [00:23:04] Speaker C: guy to the genesis of all that? [00:23:06] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. [00:23:06] Speaker C: So take us through that when you. So I used to live in Northern Virginia, Metro DC, right. And doing jujitsu up there, if there's 20 dudes on the mat, half of them are law enforcement, right? And up there, because you got dc, it's, it's local, state and federal. So my buddy Al, he was state department, msd and he was like a three year white belt because he kept on getting deployed, right? Well, but Al's like 6, 6, 300 pounds of pure muscle, right? And he would win all the time, but he wouldn't win out of skill, he would win out of hate, right? And that, hey, yeah, that hate would, would hurt him and hurt other people. So I said, hey dude, we're one of the few big guys at the, at the school, right? At the academy. I got a key. Hey man, when you, since you're here learning, back for a while, learning Farsi or whatever, let's, let's work out in the mornings, right? That'll give me a big roles all the time. I'll get you, blah, blah, blah. And then I think two or three months later he got his blue belt. He said, hey bro, I need to thank you, man. I go, now you're doing the country's work, man. It's all good, right? And he goes, he's like, no, I need to thank you. He goes, do you shoot? I go, I own a gun. And he goes, well, let me take you out shooting. And it was, I had a blast. Except everything he taught was the thing I tell people not to do, right? Sauce leaves, lean forward like that, you know, 100, 100 on the grip and all that other stuff. But it was a blast. And I was fortunate that for my house there was Silver Eagle range, you know, so I could go shoot anytime I wanted. Five minutes away from me, right? And then my knee went really bad in about 2011. By the way, it's not from jiu jitsu, guys, it's from pickup basketball in college. So I had to get my left knee replaced 2012 or something like that. So all I could do to keep the man card, right? Because I couldn't roll. So just go shoot all the time. And that's when I really got deep into stuff, right? Because most of the classes I had taken, most of them were, here's the drill, don't miss. If you miss, you need to fix it, but I'm not going to tell you how to fix it, right? And then so what I said, like, you know what, I'm going to treat this like jujitsu. I'm going to figure out why I want to do what I want to do, right? I'm going to figure out how to do it, find the most efficient way to do it, and then I'm going to rep it and rep it and rep it to a standard, you know, and then our standard in shooting is time and accuracy. So then you find drills and start doing that and thing. And then after that, you know, just like my progression in jiu jitsu, after a while you get bored rolling with the same people, just so you get bored rolling with doing the same or shooting the same drill. So I started competing, and I think really the thing that set me apart was my jiu jitsu style of teaching. Right. Explain what we're doing, break down the components, demo it, and then coach continuously throughout the class. Really resonated with people. Yeah. So I just brought, you know, the concepts of speed and accuracy in that training to the self defense, tactical side. And I think it really resonated with people. And, you know, we are where we're at today, almost 10 years down, still teaching 100 classes a year. Even though this year is weird, man, this year is weird with stuff. But, yeah, very blessed. And that's where we're at right now. That's how I got started. That's where we're at right now. [00:26:39] Speaker A: So how did you undo what that guy taught you? Between that and here? Obviously you had taken some other classes and training and stuff, but yeah, like, how did you go from being taught isosceles 100 to compete? Were you still competing, doing all that when you started competing, or had you undone all that by then? [00:27:04] Speaker C: Well, I hadn't completely undone it. Right. I just did it really fast, I guess, you know, to the point. Because I made master, like a year and four months, which was back then, very, very quick. There was a little bit of undoing as you go further and further and further. You know what I mean? Yeah, I think that answers your question. I'm not. I'm not quite sure. Right. [00:27:28] Speaker B: So, Scott, I just want to make sure I understand the timeline. So masterclass rating came before the company started, right? [00:27:37] Speaker C: No, no, no. I started teaching. So I started competing in 2016 when carry optics first became a digital division because I had no interest in irons. Before that, I had no interest in spending a million dollars shooting open. But as soon as Carry Optics became a provisional division, I started. So that was 2016. My company started in 2017. I was a class then. And then master came in 2018. Gotcha. Got it. [00:28:13] Speaker B: Okay. [00:28:13] Speaker C: Yep. And then I stopped competing in 2019 when everything blew up so. [00:28:20] Speaker D: Well, Scott, you saw some clear parallels between martial arts and shooting. What made you want to teach the [00:28:25] Speaker C: firearms side of the house as opposed to the martial arts part of that? [00:28:30] Speaker D: Just from both in General, from training martial arts your whole life to picking up shooting during the process of your injury, what made you decide that you wanted to teach the firearms training? Was it because who taught you, taught you completely the wrong methods and techniques? [00:28:46] Speaker C: Yeah. So what made me want to decide to teach? Yeah, because I resisted for a long time. So one of the ways that I kind of, kind of got well known, other than some achievements that I did, like the fast coin and masterclass and all that other stuff, was I used to be a moderator for the primary and secondary network, right? They're still around. You guys remember that? But they used to be huge back then, right? And I think I was one of the first like guys that wasn't a cop. Hopper wasn't former mill, that was a moderator that I was kind of like the switched on civilian. Well, Matt Lanfear, who owns primary secondary, kept on trying. It's like, dude, you need to teach, you teach. And I was just like, you know what, man, here's the thing. All you instructors are a bunch of bitches. You can't agree on anything and you're. And you're really mad about it all the time. Why would I want to be part of that? I enjoy my status as an elite student that's welcome into the community, right? And then Trump got elected, okay, which is great, absolutely fantastic for our two way rights and stuff like that. But the way mortgage works, mortgage rates work is when business is doing well, Wall street does well, and then long term investments, bonds and treasuries don't do well. And that's when rates start going up. So half my business was gone, refis out the window, okay. So I had to find a way to supplement my income. So I said, matt, all right, I'm ready to do this right, because daddy needs some money. And then a 20 person class sold out an hour and then I had a 10 person wait list. So I did another class and then another class and then another class, right? So I think in 2017 maybe I did 10 classes. And then in 2018 it was up to, I think I had like 30, 35 classes scheduled, which is great. And then I think mid 2018 or maybe the beginning of 2019, Houston PD went full retard on the dot, right? So then you had your first major PD accepting the dot on their duty weapons. And then it just went nuts. So I went from 35 to 85 overnight because of all the PDs, right? And it, I had all the, I had the time because open enrollment weekends le weekdays, right? So that's just, that's just where it kept on rolling and rolling and rolling. So that was basically the reason why. Because I mean the opportunity was there, I think. And I'll say this, I'm sure somebody on the Internet correct me, I was the first person to have a red dot pistol dedicated class. [00:31:14] Speaker B: Yeah, I think I wouldn't be surprised if that was true. [00:31:17] Speaker A: And I think one of my questions here, I think that's. Yeah, yeah. [00:31:23] Speaker C: Here's a funny little stat when we went, I'll tell you, go look up everybody that has a red dot pistol class and I'll guarantee one point in time that dude told me I was an idiot because people don't need a red dot pistol class and now they have a red dot pistol class. So. [00:31:37] Speaker A: And, and aiwb. [00:31:40] Speaker C: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. [00:31:41] Speaker A: You put those, put those two together. I, I had never seen that, that before and so I definitely think. [00:31:46] Speaker C: Right, yeah, yeah. You know, I mean maybe it was an AIW specific class. Right? I mean you can't, you can't take anything away from Gabe White. [00:31:57] Speaker A: Sure. [00:31:57] Speaker C: Right. I mean, I mean he, he is the AIWB as far as teaching it in class and being known for him and people want to understand that. Magic. He is the goat. Right? Yeah. I'll mention guys like Matt Jaques because he's the one that actually convinced me to go AI WB versus Strong side concealed. But yeah, I can't remember anybody else that was really teaching AIWB in their classes other than those two back in 1517. Yeah, yeah. [00:32:29] Speaker E: As we were saying, you were one of the first instructors to teach red dots in appendix carry. Over the past nine, 10 years, have you been an instructor? How has teaching and training changed over that time? [00:32:41] Speaker C: What a great question. So, yeah, about growth and about if you're not growing, you're stagnating. Right. So it was, and you know, Internet land. I don't want this to sound cocky and stuff like that, but a whole bunch of dudes would come to my class and I, you know, and maybe they're Instagram famous or they're a celebrity or a well known competitor and they would come and shoot the class. Right. And I'd be like, whatever, you know what I mean? Yep. And that's no disrespect, especially to the grand masters out there because it's different. Like we're doing static shooting. Right. They move and all that other stuff. And, and I get it. And I get it. Right. Except for BJ Norris, he impressed the. That dude is nuts fast. Right. Yeah. Anyway, and then all of a sudden, like out of the blue, boom. Nobody's beating me. And then all of my students are beating me. Like it was like a 90 degree angle. It's like, bro, you could do anything. And now you're, you're smashing me. What in the hell is going on, right? Whether it be the draw, especially splits, you know, stuff like that. You know, guys who come to my class could do a three second build drill. Now they're busting out 160s, 170s, like it's nothing. I'm like, man. So I started looking at some of the things again that how they were doing things versus how I was doing things, right? And like, for example, people ask me all the time, right? You know, I was, I was the one. I didn't create it, but, you know, I kind of made the drop from 12 popular because it was a very consistent way to acquire the dot. Actually, the first person to say that was Jerry the Burner Barnhart. The reason why we all carry dots on pistols now, right? And then, you know, I'll give you a funny thing, Donovan Moore, you know, one of my best friends goes, hey, man, if you ever tried like the escalator type thing, like the lift from six. And I go, yeah, I've tried it before. And he's like, oh, okay. He goes, well, it's more efficient than what you're doing. I go, why? Why are you saying that? Because you can't beat me. And he's like, that's fair, that's fair. And then what? Then he starts beating me. And now I'm like, oh, right. And then I think I taught a class. Buck Lawler came out there, man, My man's doing 0.8, 2.85 draws from concealment. Do you do it? I was like, okay, now there's a reason, right, for me to learn how to do this. Cool. So now from the draw, I always lift from six. I always do an escalator, right? You know the thing with the splits again, Nobody could beat me on a bill drill. You know, for the most part, or, you know, not bad, blah, blah, blah. Then all of a sudden, you know, Vinny Dearmon goes, hey, man, I can't do a two second build drill. And I go, Bro, you got 15 splits from the jump. He's like, yeah, but it was a 150 draw. Then I teach him how to do a one second draw. And now he's crushing me, right? And now, okay, well, now I got the draw, but I don't have the Splits like I used to let me get back. So that's been a journey, you know, my splits have gotten a lot better. So it's just the growth, you know. I'm not going to say that I would ever say like, oh, those things are stupid, blah, blah, blah. If I ever complained about splits, it's because people were skipping the draw and going directly to sexy ass splits. You know what I mean? But now you got to learn how to do both. It was the same thing with competition. You know, I took what I needed, right? Blah, blah, blah. Enjoyed it, but I didn't have time. Now I have time. Now I want to get out. And I got to tell you boys, in the six years I was out, this game is nuts. What these kids are doing now. My God, right? My God, like when I made, when I made master, a year or four months, people like, he cheated. People were like looking at all my shit and everything like that. It's like, no, no, he did it. Now dudes are making GM in less than a year and doing well in majors and stuff, right? You know what the secret key is to that? Some form of Division 1 level sports and video games. [00:36:36] Speaker B: Sure, I mean, it makes sense. The video games, everyone. A lot of people knock video games, but it's going to teach you all sorts of quick thinking as well as quick hands and all of that if you're playing competitively. [00:36:50] Speaker C: Yeah, as long as you don't become a 300 pound fat ass on your, you know, sitting. Playing video games all the time. But the combination of the two, bro. Dude, there's some kid out there, he just, he's GM and carry optics and GM in. I think he just made GM in open and he did it in eight matches. [00:37:06] Speaker B: Holy crap, right? [00:37:07] Speaker C: Super big kid's name is Max McNutt. Great kid, right? Fast played, you know, I think he played soccer. No, no, rugby. He was a rugby kid, right? So fast stopping, fast acceleration, brutal, brutal strength, right? And he, his job, he still gets paid professionally to play Call of Duty, huh? Geez, what a. What a great combo that you can learn from that, right? The final thing I'll tell you is this. The biggest thing, how my teaching has changed, been supplemented is really breaking down words and what people are trying to say, right? Instead of me just going, well, you don't like me, so I don't like you, so everything you say is stupid and blah blah, blah. I'm like, I'm like, wait a minute. Maybe the words make sense. Maybe they just don't explain it well. So I. So I reverse engineered the way that I teach so I could explain it a little bit differently. So not only do I know how to break something down that I'm trying to do a little bit better, but so my students know the path of what I'm trying to say, right? For example, if 2023 in the firearms world was a meme, right? You would be vision. Just, just look at that small spot on the target. No matter what you do, your grip can suck, right? You can, you can smash the trigger with no care to the world. As long as you're looking at that spot, the bullets will go where you want them to go. Then I'm like, well, but the gun's not on my holster yet. How does that happen? [00:38:39] Speaker E: How do I get from point A to B, Right? [00:38:41] Speaker C: Right? Oh, shut up. You're stupid. Blah, blah, blah. Okay, maybe I am stupid, but you need to answer the question, right? If 2024 was a me would be principle based shooting, right? And then I'm like, wait a minute, because techniques sucks. Well, that's great, bro. But what you're explaining as principle is actually a technique, right? But that's okay. People were getting better kind of learning to that because all that stuff is a, is an, is a facet of learning, okay? So instead of throwing the baby out the bathwater because the messenger was a, how about we just kind of look at stuff? All right? So here's how I did. I didn't change anything about the way I teach. I just defined it a little bit better, right? So I think there's four stages to learning, okay? And this is how I learned jiu jitsu, how I did sports, how I learned shooting, everything like that, right? So four steps, philosophy, principle, technique, and reps. Okay? Right. Those are the four steps, for example, right? I say to my students all the time when we're looking at something, it's like, hey, why do you carry a gun? Right? I'll ask you guys, why do you carry a gun? Greg, why do you carry a gun? [00:39:46] Speaker A: Self defense. [00:39:47] Speaker C: Self defense, Right? If you were a cop, why would you carry a gun? [00:39:51] Speaker B: It's same thing, self defense. [00:39:53] Speaker C: Same thing. Yeah. And it's your job, right? Right. So there is. Right? But, so, but when we talk about philosophy, about carrying a gun, let's. Let's look at a couple of things, right? You're saying you're a part swap band, you got to run your four 10 hour shifts, you got call outs, you got overtime, you go to the gym, you're a man, so you do Jiu Jitsu, Internet, you take that however you want to take it. [00:40:17] Speaker B: That's right. [00:40:19] Speaker C: Right. Exactly right. You do all this stuff. If I tell you that you got to shoot two matches a month, right? Four hours of pop, taking eight hours away from your family, you might look at me like I got three heads, right? [00:40:31] Speaker B: Sure. [00:40:31] Speaker C: On the other hand, right, Greg, I know at least you've competed before. I don't know if the rest of you guys have, right? But I'm sure you do. Okay? I'm sure you guys have all seen the guy at the end of the match that goes up to the safe table. He's got his jersey on with a whole bunch of company names that don't sponsor him. So I don't know why he's wearing them on his jersey. Right? You know that when he puts that gun into the pouch at the safe table, he doesn't touch it again until he dry fires or goes to his next match. Right? So if I tell him, hey man, you need to work on a, on a one second draw to protect yourself and your family, he's gonna look at me like I got three heads. You know what I'm saying? Right. So you gotta understand, like, especially when you come to my class, I need to know what your philosophy is on the gun, no judgment. You tell me what you want to learn, and that's what I'll concentrate on with you in the class. Yeah. Does that make sense, guys? [00:41:21] Speaker A: No. [00:41:22] Speaker B: Absolutely. [00:41:23] Speaker C: Then let's talk about the principle of what we're doing. Right? And a lot of people don't get the definition of a principle. The definition of a principle is a held belief to help you accomplish your goal. Can your principles change based on your beliefs? Absolutely. Absolutely. They can. Right? So if my philosophy is different from yours, maybe my principles are different than yours. Right? Right. So, yeah. So for example, what's a principle? Can we agree in order to get strong, you need to lift heavy shit? [00:41:56] Speaker B: Yes, for sure. [00:41:57] Speaker C: Sure. Right. That's the principle. But depending on what your philosophy is, the technique to fulfill that principle might change. Some dudes bench all the time, right? So they can wear their Speedium shirts and flex, Right? Some dudes, right, want to do Jiu Jitsu and get strong for Jiu Jitsu in that thing. So they roll all the time. Some dudes push sleds, some dudes put parachutes on their backs and sprint. But it's all heavy shit to fulfill their individual principle. But the techniques don't need to be the same, right? [00:42:29] Speaker B: Yep. [00:42:29] Speaker C: Finally, the last thing is is repetition. You have to do the repetitions, okay? So instructors try and get all sciencey and stuff all the time, and I kind of respect that, Right? You know, the low end of it is muscle memory, right? We all know that muscles don't have memory, but we know what they mean, okay? Then we get. Then we read the talent code and Steve Anderson, and then we start saying myelination all over the place like it's a magic goo that. Ah, you're myelinated, bro. So I got yelled at by a neurosurgeon in Miami, one of my classes. Like, bro, stop using that word. You don't know what that word means, but bro, it's science, right? He's like, look, man, look. Myelination is like the learning process is a road trip from New York City to Los Angeles, right? Myelination is 10 stop signs on the way there. But you're saying it's the entire trip. Yeah, stop doing that. I go, well, then what word should I use? Or what phrase should I use? He goes, neural plasticity. And I went, do I look like Aaron Cowan to you, bro? I can't use words like that. I can't. I can't do that shit, right? And he goes, well, I'll get back to you. I'll get back to you. He doesn't get back to me. He's a neurosurgeon. He's really busy. So then I'm teaching another class, and this lady I had my class, she is a neurology professor at UNC Charlotte. And she goes, I like the term procedural memory. And I'm like, okay, speak more to that. It's like, well, you got all these processes, right? That you have built into your subconscious because you don't want to use conscious brain cycles because you do it all the time, right? That stuff's written in the subconscious. For example, remember that first time you, like, drove to your office or your place of work or wherever, right? [00:44:15] Speaker B: Yep. [00:44:15] Speaker C: First time you went there, it took forever, didn't it? Because you didn't know where you were going. Now what happens? You don't even remember the trip. Yeah, yeah. You're like, oh, I'm here. Oh, wait a minute. I had a doctor's appointment. My God. Right? Because the drive to work is just so part of your subconscious. You went there, but you forgot you had a new thing at doctor's appointment, right? That's the learning process. Here's the one thing. I will disagree with people all the time when they say techniques don't work. No, no, no, my friend. When the technique works, it works right now, okay? I will tell all those students out there, if you go to a class, the guy goes, hey everybody, welcome to my class. You're not going to get better in my class, but do what I say. In six months from now, you'll get better. How does that even work, bro? Right? [00:45:01] Speaker B: Yeah, well, you're not walking away with anything. [00:45:04] Speaker C: Well, guys, name one thing in your outside of your life and shooting where someone said, hey man, you need to do this thing or buy this thing, but it's gonna work in six months, right? Hey man, this alias clip is amazing, but you got to use it for six months, otherwise it just falls off. After six months, it'll stay gone. Attached. Right, right, right. You know, to our, to our LA climates. Hey, man, this body is the greatest body on the face of the earth. Except you got to wear it for some six months, then it'll work after that. You would never accept that, right? [00:45:31] Speaker B: Exactly. [00:45:32] Speaker C: You would never ever accept that. When the technique works, it works right now. But because we have to rewrite the procedural memory, your subconscious keeps on pulling you back to what you used to do. What you have to accept is you're going to make mistakes, right? When you understand the philosophy, principle, technique, it works right now, but then after that you're going to make a mistake, right? So you do one good rep and then four crappy ones, and then two good ones, and then three crappy ones until you've done enough to rewrite the procedural memory, right? And the people go and say, my God, how do you demo and call what you're going to do within a quarter, half second, you know, depending on the difficulty, every single time I go, because my procedural memory is so good in what I do, I can do that. Yeah, right, right. But on the other hand, right, Put me on to a USPSA stage where I haven't run around and done a sage plan in six years, and then I'm going to look like. Right? But the thing is, is that are you a person that can take failure, right? Because you get excited, because it has something new for you to learn and oh my God, there's another chance for glory and something I suck at? Or do you say things like, well, he does something different than I do, so he can't be wrong, so he's an idiot, or competition will get you killed in the streets because I suck at it, so it's not good. Are you that person? All right, well, that's your philosophy. Just stop talking on the Internet so much about it, you know, either do it or don't do it. Nobody cares otherwise, you know. So, yeah, so that's, that's how I've kind of changed my paradigm for teaching and explaining it a little bit more about my methodology. Yeah. [00:47:10] Speaker A: And I've having taken a class a couple of times, I've, I've experienced your wording in that and I think even over time I'm going to, we're going to skip yours. We'll come back to it. That's fine. Because you kind of teed up. The next question is like, so I've taken the class and I've seen your class, your classes change and the way you word things change. What factors do you make you change up your class flow and an information. Is it just as you learn new things or. [00:47:41] Speaker C: So it's always a hierarchy of what I think is important. Right. I mean, honestly, if I could teach everything I wanted to teach, it'd be a week long class. [00:47:54] Speaker A: Sure. [00:47:54] Speaker C: Right. But nobody wants to hear my jokes for five days. Right. I don't, I don't care who you are. So I have to, I have to, I appreciate that. I have to establish a hierarchy of importance. Right. For example, one of the things I used to do. I don't know if you did it, Greg, when you had a class was remember the two, the three two inch squares? And now you can see everything during transitions. Right. What is more important? Teaching people that or teaching people trigger control? As far as prepping to the final wall, a controlled slap and a full slap and applying that a distance, both I think are great lessons. What's more important? I'm going to go with the trigger. I'm going with the trigger control. Yeah, right. And the various types of trigger manipulation as it relates to site confirmations. Right. I used to not. I used to teach a stage in class. Then I went away because my knees were so bad that it was killing me. Now that I've lost all the weight, my knees are better, I'm competing. The stage is back. Right. I used to teach my way, the way I teach my way. Right. And when the whole site confirmations came out, you know, static dots, stream cheeks. Right. Gross site picture, like I'm already teaching that. I just say it differently. Yeah, well, but then I kind of also realized, but wait a minute, this stuff is keeping, starting to gain more prominence and guys I respect are teaching this way. So maybe I need to help students translate to what I'm saying and that. Right. So for example, when I do the Three and two drill. And I explain all that. Explain it my way. But I've already explained site confirmations and trigger manipulations. Now I'm going to tell you. You. How they're the same thing. Yeah. [00:49:36] Speaker B: How do you. [00:49:38] Speaker C: Yeah. So if you explain the same thing two different ways, you're more likely to grasp more people to understanding what you're saying. [00:49:49] Speaker B: Well, one of the things that when I took your class, I think it was two years ago now that I really appreciated, which is exactly what you're talking about, is that you'd explain something from the scientific and you know, propriocycle. [00:50:03] Speaker C: Yeah. Technical. That's what say technical. Yeah. [00:50:05] Speaker B: And you'd get through that and you say, okay, so for all my knuckle draggers out there, which by the way, is me, you'd be like, you do this. So it goes faster. I'm like, cool. That I can do. Like, I appreciate the technical, but I'm not going to remember that. But when you say, hey, put your hand here, put your hand here, bring it up, it's faster. I'm like, got it. That I can remember. And I always really appreciated the. Because I can remember my class. And again, it goes back to your asking philosophy of why we wanted to get better and everything doing it that way across the board, all of us had a different philosophy or there was enough different philosophies. But you could tell the difference between the intellectual guys, like, I need you to break this down to the super technical level versus me, who I'm like, just tell me what to do. Put this here, say, put your finger on the trigger till you feel this. And then you break the shot. [00:50:56] Speaker C: Like, got it. [00:50:57] Speaker B: Okay, that makes sense to me. [00:51:00] Speaker C: But here's the other thing though, right? Is that each one, each person takes a little bit of both. [00:51:08] Speaker B: Right? [00:51:08] Speaker C: Right. So my technical person who's trying to help out their wife, their daughter, their son, whatever, right? And that person is not a technical person. They go, what does Scott say? Oh, yeah, put the hump in the hole. [00:51:20] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:51:22] Speaker C: Right. On the other hand, the non technical person kind of gets the technical part because if they don't, then they're just led around the nose by the next instructor with a good resume and good rap. Right, Right. Without any filter as to what to take in and what to throw away. Right, right. Because they don't have a basis for it. They. They can do it. But now, but wait a minute. That dude was like super Ranger, Delta, Green beret, SEAL guy, and he says, stick your thumb in Your butt and you'll shoot faster. So I'm going to stick my. Pull him in my butt, you know, so. But if you understand the technical, you have a. Just a little bit more of a basis of a filter on what information you take in and what you throw away. [00:52:05] Speaker B: Well, and for sure, I took away a lot of the technical information. I just, just. Which was. Which was excellent. But I also just appreciated like, okay, we've talked about technical. Now let's. Let's break it down for you now. Let's do it, you smooth mind guys. And do the thing. I'm like, okay, cool. [00:52:21] Speaker A: It's kind of the why and the how, you know, if you could just teach somebody how to. And it was. And Scott, you already kind of alluded to this, like, just knowing how to do something sometimes isn't enough. Knowing why you are doing it that way. [00:52:36] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:52:36] Speaker A: Matters just as much, if not more sometimes, because. [00:52:38] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. Like, you know what the one that. Well, people are like, you know, you'll see the thing with the philosophy and stuff like that, right? Or the principles and stuff like that. And they're like, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, we'll get it. And I go, oh, okay. What's the. What's the principle of a good grip? I'll just say that. What's the principle of a good grip, guys, right? And inevitably, right. They will say to control your sights. I go, oh, so. Right. Oh, so you don't need a good grip when you're running? Because that's nothing to do with my sights when I'm running, Right? So I don't need a good grip. [00:53:17] Speaker B: Just throw it. [00:53:19] Speaker C: Just throw it. Yeah, it's like, oh, no, you need a good grip when you're running. It's like, okay, is the grip when I'm running the same as the grip as I'm shooting? No, probably not. This is a horrible grip running. Yeah, right. This is a good grip running. This is a horrible grip shooting. Right. Because it's going over the burn. You know what I mean? So I go. I go, I know you guys really think this is silly and kind of a waste of time, but you need to think about this stuff, right? You need to think about this stuff. And that's all I'm trying to do for you. [00:53:47] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:53:48] Speaker C: Right. So then I'll go, so what's the philosophy of a good grip? What are you. So we're talking about shooting, right? I get. What do your sights do when you have a good grip? [00:53:56] Speaker B: They. [00:53:56] Speaker C: And I'll say something. [00:53:58] Speaker B: Yeah, they just return Every time, in theory. Up in line. [00:54:02] Speaker C: Return to what? Return to what? [00:54:03] Speaker B: Your target or like, which one? Whichever one your eyes are looking at. [00:54:10] Speaker C: Okay, good. So that's good. Most people say they return to your point. To where? Your point of. Or they turn to the target you were shooting. [00:54:17] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:54:17] Speaker C: What if you're shooting two targets? Yeah. So you got to clarify that they return to your point of aim. Yep. They return to your point of aim. Right. And then that's what I used to say. And then my buddy Sean Griffith, he's a FLETC instructor, probably top 20 lo GM in the country, he goes, I'm gonna add one more there, brother. They return as quickly as they left. I was like, oh, so when we talk about shooting, we're talking about ga, ga, ga, ga, ga, ga. Right? But that's not all shooting, Right. If you're giving me 16 splits at 40 yards, I'm going to tell you to hold on, partner. [00:54:52] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:54:52] Speaker C: I don't care how good your grip is, right? So. And then let's think about that, right? Sometimes we just talk about shooting fast. But is this, you know, for example, is this a good grip for a bullseye shooter? [00:55:03] Speaker B: No, no, hold on. [00:55:05] Speaker C: For a bullseye shooter. Yeah. Did the sights return as quickly as they left? Yeah, yeah. That's a good grip then. That's a good grip. It's not for what we like to do. Shoot fast for self defense and, and you know, in competition stuff, we want that gun to be flat. But here's the thing. How could you say, no, that's not what I want if you haven't defined it. [00:55:29] Speaker B: Fair enough. [00:55:31] Speaker C: Right. Then the technique becomes your individual technique. Right. So one of the things that I say in classes, right. I wish I had my blue gun. Oh, hold on. Right. Is that's the principle, the technique is the individual way that you apply your grip. Right. I gotta take this light off so I can show you another grip, Right. So right. There's my grip. [00:55:57] Speaker A: Yep. [00:55:57] Speaker C: There's Frank Proctor's grip. See that? Here's Eric Rafael's grip, right? He puts that index finger on the front of the trigger guard. 90%, all the same, 10%. A little bit of difference in nuance. Right. They all work fantastically because they all follow the same principle. Pump and hole, you know, good strong hand, but not over tense. Most of the power is in the support hand, Right. But the technique, the actual application is slightly different, is just a little bit different. You see what I'm saying? Right? So just because somebody does something differently does not mean it's wrong as long as it follows the principles of controlling the gun so that the sites return to the point of aim as quickly as they left. If we have that type of discussion, then I think a whole bunch of arguing on the Internet, where we're all basically saying the same thing, but just employing it a different way, calms down and then we can stop arguing on the Internet and go out and practice some more. [00:56:54] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. [00:56:55] Speaker B: So with that, Scott, one of the things, and I know you've done this in the past, but I'd love to hear if you have more examples of this. Have you ever had students come in the class that do something really well, but it seems really odd? And then you practice it and say, oh, no, that works. So I'm going to bring it into my. The techniques that I'm going to leave with my students. [00:57:19] Speaker C: That's really odd. And I'm going to. No, not odd. I don't think odd. I go, oh, that's different. [00:57:27] Speaker A: Yeah, unconventional. [00:57:29] Speaker B: Yeah, that's the word I needed to use. Unconventional. Something like you just hadn't seen before. But they're doing it well and it almost is like, well, I gotta take a look at it. [00:57:37] Speaker D: It'd be like Donovan's. When you're working the drop from 12 and Donovan's in, bring the gun up from the draw. [00:57:44] Speaker C: I didn't think that was weird because you know, again, in competition you do that all the time. Maybe, maybe. I said, well, okay, I have a non retention rig, but out of appendix where you're already higher up and you got to turn the gun. No, I don't think I've ever said anything as weird. That. Or that's strange and actually work. I said, that was different. Okay, right. And until you can beat me, I got other shit to do. [00:58:10] Speaker B: Well, I think that was one of my. [00:58:11] Speaker C: Does that make sense? [00:58:12] Speaker B: Oh, absolutely. No, because I was gonna. I was the, the escalator method, which you got. You helped me work on when I was at the class. I just remember you talking about that in particular, like, oh, that's, that's cool, but I can still beat you. And then as soon as people were doing that fast enough to beat, you're like, all right, I guess I gotta work on that one now. Which I really appreciated that perspective where it is until the concept is proven to be faster than your, you know, your technique or your application. Once it's proven, it's like, all right, well I gotta learn it. It's worth my time. [00:58:44] Speaker C: It's like anything else. Like, look I'm a lot older than you guys, right. I'm 55 years old. But I remember when computers first came out, right? The first everyone's first computer was like a Commodore 64. Yeah. People like you need to learn how to do word processing on the Commodore 64. It's like now I'm just going to stick with the typewriter right now. Because it's faster. Yeah, because it was faster. Hit on the thing. Mine had autocorrect. So pop up with the white out. Right. Like, no, you need to do this because it's better. How's it better, bro? I'm done with the paper. Paper before your thing even boots up. Right. Right now that would be ridiculous to say I prefer a typewriter over a computer. It's the same thing. Yeah, it's the same thing. Until you can prove me you can be me. Right? It was the same thing with cars and horses. By the time you got that thing with the front crank going, blah, blah, blah, you know, you're not. Your horse is already where he needs to be. But now you would never say anything like that. It's the same thing. Yeah, it's the same thing. Yep. [00:59:45] Speaker D: So, Scott, you've mentioned several well renowned shooters and instructors who have been some of the instructors that have played a role in your skill set and what you teach even recently. [00:59:57] Speaker C: Yeah. So I'm going to give some credit where credit is due. It may surprise some people. That's okay. My switch to AIWB was an epiphany that was given to me by Matt J. Queen Luis of victory first. Right. He. Yeah, it was right when the Raven Eidolon came out. Right. And he said, hey man, do a draw. I was at 3 o' clock with like a jacket over it. Boom. It was smooth as all get out. 1.4, I think at 10 yards on steel. Hell yeah. Then he put this in. They put this thing. Thing right. I did a draw and it was the jankiest thing I've ever done in my entire life. 1.1.15. Wow. Okay. You see what I'm saying? You see what I'm saying? So from there it's like, wait a minute, this is great. This is horrible. This is faster. We're going with faster. Right? Because nobody cares. Nobody cares about your smooth. Right. So I'll give that. The genesis of my grip came from Steve Fisher. Right. He's probably surprised I'm actually giving credit to him for that. [01:00:59] Speaker B: I am, actually. [01:01:01] Speaker C: Yeah. But here's the deal though. Steve didn't teach me the grip. Steve did the grip. Right. So just going to a class and watching him do the grip, right. I went boom. And I. And I got it. So we'll give Steve credit for showing me that grip because it's. They're pretty much a carbon copy. Right. And what. And what is our grip? I love people who are like, oh, I hate. I don't like the way you do your grip. Nobody else does that. My grip is literally an open gun grip with a gas pedal. Yeah. Just without a gas pedal. [01:01:33] Speaker B: Right? [01:01:34] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:01:36] Speaker C: Right. Get above the bore axis to control the rise using equal force, not greater force to control the gun. There you go. All right. The concept of how I build my grip that I call the wave is a. I'm not going to use the word evolution, but interpretation of Mike C. Clander's Judy chop. Okay? Right. I don't chop. I roll like a wave. Okay. Who else? Tim Herron has been my mentor in the Competition world since 2014. One of the greatest individuals on the face of the earth and an amazing person. Who else? Obviously Donovan Moore. Right. Donovan Moore is a classic example of someone who came to my class. Right. Shooting 40, 45 splits all Alphas. Right. But wondering why the guy who beat him in half the time is beating him when he shot Charlie's. And what he has done with his career not completely culminating in, but probably a shining example being the first person to make Grandmaster and USPSA 100% from concealment. Right. And if there's one feather I put in my cap is I'm the guy that showed him the AIWB draw or at least took it to the next level. Helped him take it to the next level. Right. Hey, can I say one thing that's going to sound like a flex though, but I'm really proud of it. Yes. There are three GMs in carry out or not carry optics, but just USPSA that made that from concealment. Right. The first was Donovan Moore. The second was Buck Lawler. And the third was Sean. And Sean, I'm sorry, I can't remember your last name, but he shoots for on site firearms training. Every single one of them have been to my class. [01:03:26] Speaker B: That's awesome. [01:03:27] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:03:28] Speaker C: Yeah. So anyway, not trying to flex or anything like that. That's. I'm kind of proud of that shit. Sort of the subject. Right. [01:03:33] Speaker B: I mean, as you should be. You're an instructor and they're students of yours. That's awesome. [01:03:36] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah. So. So Donovan. Right. Donovan and I have talked talk about shooting. Yeah. And I'm saving the best. I'm saving the most for last. The best for last. There's Buck Lawler has been right. The way he thinks about shooting and things of that nature is. It's not outside the box, but it's constant experimentation. And he has been amazing recently in competition. Right. You know, Tim has always been the longest mentor. But Billy Barton, right, two division grandmaster out here, world record build drill, 1.21 seconds in front of 400 people at nationals three years ago. And I'm proud to say the first stage he ever shot was in my class in 2018. [01:04:24] Speaker B: That's awesome. [01:04:26] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah. I'm sure there's a host of others out there, you know, Brendan Bernanke, Justin Anderson, Sean Griffith. Back in the day, there were guys like Les Kiss Martone, JJ Raza. As far as seeing what he does out on the Internet and the conversations I've had with him about the stuff, and just literally the greatest dude on the face of the earth. [01:04:51] Speaker B: Such a nice guy. [01:04:52] Speaker C: Yeah. And more. And above all those people, wrap them all together. And none of them have had nearly the same impact on me as AJ Zito for impractical performance. He is my best friend. He is my brother. He's been there since the beginning in 2018. And I don't talk to anybody about shooting more than him. So, yeah, there you go. I think that's a pretty complete list. I don't think I left anybody out for the most part. If I did, I apologize. [01:05:26] Speaker A: It's a pretty impressive list for sure. And I think what's cool is because you kind of talked about it earlier, is that you guys are all pushing each other too. You're like, hey, I like what you did, but check this out. And by the way, this beat what you did, and you don't take that offensively. You say, okay, then I need to do that. And I'm gonna. I'm also gonna see if I can do that better as well. I. I think seeing that. [01:05:49] Speaker C: Oh, yeah, is. [01:05:51] Speaker A: Is super cool because that's how we all get better. [01:05:53] Speaker C: That's how. [01:05:54] Speaker A: Because that just overflows into. In your students. And then the people that we take out to the range and we're like, hey, you know, try holding the gun this way. [01:06:00] Speaker C: Or. Yeah. [01:06:01] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, for sure. [01:06:02] Speaker C: Yeah. [01:06:02] Speaker A: It keeps overflowing. So that's. That's so cool. [01:06:05] Speaker B: Well, actually, I mean, I came back from your class, and again, I. You helped me work through the escalator because what I was doing before was screwy and dumb. [01:06:13] Speaker C: I think you're doing an elevator, right? [01:06:16] Speaker B: Yeah, well, I was doing. Yeah, it was bad, but I went and shot shortly thereafter with some, some buddies and they're like, what are you doing? I was like, well, it's the escalator. You know, I'm sure I did a much poorer job describing how it worked and everything, but I'm like that this is why I'm doing it. And the one guy I know, he literally was just like, well, that's dumb. I was like, okay, well, you can say that's dumb. And then he went and took your class, actually, him, it was you and Donovan at Donovan's range in Illinois. And he came back, he goes, I'm sorry, you were right. And I said, I wasn't right. They were right. But you know, give it a try. [01:06:54] Speaker C: So, yeah, it's fascinating. And when you let the ego go, I mean, you have to have a little bit, little bit of ego as a defense mechanism. Sure. Right against the out there. But when you let the ego go and you do it based on two things, speed and accuracy, everything else becomes so much easier to filter out. You know what I mean? Like, I'll have people like, I had a conversation with one dude, right, who hated the drop from 12, but all he did was compete. He didn't carry a gun. Anyways, like that drop from 12, stupid. You're already going past the blah, blah, blah. And I got go, yeah, but I'm faster than you. He's like, well, it's still dumb, right? And then he started doing a scoop draw, right? And scoop draw was. His scoop draw was great, but he wasn't doing an escalator, he was doing an elevator. So for the, for the audience out there, here's an escalator right straight up from here, straight up to my eyeline, an escalator, an elevator is this, right? Right? See the difference? Right now there's dudes that do some fast ass elevators, right? So I don't give a shit if that's what they do as long as the time is there, right? And so I said to the guy, he's like, okay, so you do you. I do an escalator. I go, no, you don't. You do an elevator. He's like, no, I don't. I go, here's the video. You go all the way out and then up. That's inefficient. He's like, yeah, but I'm fast. I go, I'm fast with a draw from 12. Why is mine dumb and yours isn't? Yeah. Right. So at the end of the day, I don't care if you pull the trigger with your big toe. If you can do it in point A, I'm gonna ask you how you did it. [01:08:21] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:08:22] Speaker B: And see if you can't replicate it. [01:08:24] Speaker C: Yeah, right? Yeah. Like I've had guy goes, oh no, they dropped from 12. Stupid. I was like, bro, when you reload, where's your muzzle? Right? [01:08:32] Speaker B: Yep. [01:08:32] Speaker C: So you, so you only lift from six. So that means you do this. No, you don't, you do that. You drop it from 12, you know, so just having that, being open minded, talking about stuff. What you do is what you do. The principle that we. What's the principle? Get your reload, get your. Get bullets in the gun. Get back on target as quickly, as efficiently as you can. Right. The technique is how you do it. If it matches the time, it matches the time, you know? [01:08:57] Speaker A: Yep. Yeah. [01:08:58] Speaker C: I love it. [01:09:00] Speaker E: So we've talked a lot about competition shooting and training military and police. And obviously those can be somewhat different techniques. How does your training merge and overlap when you're teaching competition compared to police and military? [01:09:18] Speaker C: How does it change? [01:09:20] Speaker E: Change and or overlap? Is it the same, is different? [01:09:24] Speaker A: What's. [01:09:24] Speaker C: So to be clear, I mean, I've taught a lot of mill, but those are mill guys that came to my class. I've never gotten a mill contract. Cop contracts all over the place. All over the place, Right. Nothing changes. The only thing that changes is the holster I use. If it's open enrollment, I go aiwb. If it's a LE dominant or an LE only class I use my als. [01:09:45] Speaker B: Okay. [01:09:45] Speaker C: But that's the, that's the only thing that changes because I don't teach tactics. Right. I don't want to teach tactics. Right. I just teach the hard skills of shooting. Now the difference between the two is the philosophy is the same. We need to build an index whether it be on our body or. Or equipment to make our draw and manipulation of the gun easier. Okay. The technique is different. Okay. For example, when I'm drawing appendix, whether it be here, whether it be here, my index is my belly button. I keep my gun right here, Right. So that when I'm drawing, I already know where everything is. When I'm shooting out of an als, right. It's a different direction, but my finger is always touching the bottom of the holster. So I use that as a handrail. Same principle. Use an index on your body or your equipment to get an efficient draw. The technique is different of where I start and what index I use. Okay. Yeah. So nothing really changes, right? Because I don't, I don't talk about tactics. Thank baby Jesus. Because those guys can't agree about anything, man. [01:10:49] Speaker A: Well, and we see and this. I'm sure we could get into a whole conversation about application of competition into real world tactics, stuff like that. But we did a video on the Rage recently where there was. We set up a stage and the fastest way to shoot the stage was to shoot the furthest target first and then as you're kind of backing out, shoot the close target. And I think we had somebody comment, like, in a real world, why would you shoot the far guy when the close guy was right there in front of you? [01:11:22] Speaker C: I think just that's the easiest answer in the world. [01:11:25] Speaker A: Go for it. [01:11:26] Speaker C: Do you know what the answer is to that? The guy 15 yards away has an AR, right? And the guy 5 yards away has a baseball bat. [01:11:36] Speaker A: Yeah, it's. It's. That's got. If I'm not. I can't remember the answer that we gave him. But yeah, it just use. Use your brain and that in that situation, take care of what needs to be taken care of first. And if it's the far. Yeah, to your point, if it's a far guy with a rifle or if the far guy has a knife and the close guy has a gun, then you take the close guy. So there's a lack of critical thinking from a lot of people or people just like to be right about things. [01:12:06] Speaker C: Oh, they just like to argue about it. I had this one guy, right? So I don't know if you guys saw the video where I completely stolen from JJ Rakaz and Donovan Moore adopted for my own uses about my trigger control thing, right? Where we shoot the one in square at three yards, right? And then we go out to 25 and apply the same technique and see how it transfers over. He goes like, I don't get the visility of this, right? So why don't we should do 25 yards instead? Because 25 divided by 3 is 8.333, right? 1 times 8.33, which means an 8 inch group at 25 yards. I'm like, bruh, you're making this way too hard. What are you even talking about? He's like, yeah, but what's the better. Why not do it a 20, 25 yards? And I'm like, well, maybe after I get done with this drill, we see if it translates to 25 yards. But if you can't hit a 1 inch square at 3 yards, ain't no way you're gonna hit right in a zone consistently at 25. Right? Plus, what can I see at three yards that I can't see at 25? The holes, right? Yeah, right. Matching up the trigger press to the hole to either the success or the mistake, which is not easy at 25. So let's crawl, walk and run so everybody can see everything instead of redoing everything as hard as possible, where you're like, let's go do build rules at 25 yards. Cool, if you can do it. But how do you know which one you missed? Which one's the Charlie, which one's the alpha? You know what I mean? So let's pick a more difficult target up close to get more data, then apply the skill at distance, right? But they just don't get that. And here's the thing, man, I know why you reply to the guy. Because the first thing I do when someone says something smartass is I go to their channel. When there's no videos, I do just go have whatever. [01:13:41] Speaker A: Yeah, that is our reply a lot of times as well. I can't wait to see your video explaining how to do this. [01:13:47] Speaker C: My other one is like, I'm sorry, if you don't like this, I'll refer you to refund the money you paid for it. [01:13:52] Speaker E: Yeah, it's always the private channels. It's always a private page. [01:13:57] Speaker C: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly. So, but you know, but on the other hand, the haters make you really think about your. To see if there's any holes in it. You know what I mean? So, [01:14:10] Speaker A: so nearly everything you teach is tied to martial arts. So how does the mindset from martial arts discipline, repetition and pressure translate to performance on the, on the range? [01:14:22] Speaker C: It's 100% exactly the same thing. The only thing is that you can't. Well, I mean, I guess you can do force on force, which we have all done, but that shit gets expensive, right? What I want you to think of is that shooting is just a different, just another martial art, right? It is the discovery of another range of contact, right? For example, you got, you know, any of the striking sports, right, where you have intermediate distance, fists, elbows, knees, feet, right? You got close distance, right? Standing up grappling, Greco Roman wrestling or whatnot, dirty boxing up close, right? And then you have grappling, whether it be jiu jitsu, sambo, judo, yada, yada, which is, could be on the ground, but some form of grappling, right? Well, shooting is just a different distance where I can't touch the person or I don't want them to be within touching distance of me. Right. So when we look at it that it's just another martial arts where you're covering a different range. Why does it need to be any different? [01:15:28] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:15:28] Speaker C: You know what I mean? [01:15:29] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:15:30] Speaker C: Right? The body works the way the body works. The biggest thing about the firearms industry is that we go, look, man, you punch this way, you fight this way, your stance is this way. When you're throwing hands, when you're, blah, blah, blah, we shoot a rifle, right? We got lead foot forward, right? Everything's good. Blah, blah, blah, blah. But no, when you get a pistol, you need to go to a saucy and lock your shit out and bend. No, it's athletics, I think, you know, especially with cops, the biggest thing I say is like, hey, man, everything you teach is athletic, right? Your, your defensive tactics are athletic, your PT is athletic, you shoot, you teach the rifle athletically, then it comes to the pistol, that all the rules got to change. Why? It's just like any other athletic endeavor. And then when the guy goes, I'm great with my rifle, but I suck with my pistol, right? You go like, then stop treating them differently. [01:16:18] Speaker A: Yeah, same. [01:16:19] Speaker C: Stop treating them differently. You're. Yeah. When you stop treating it differently, your pistol becomes a world smallest sbr and you're doing the same thing. And now the athleticism can come out. [01:16:28] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:16:29] Speaker C: Right. [01:16:29] Speaker A: So I also think it's just good to do, do anything that creates pressure where you have to perform under pressure. It could be any. [01:16:37] Speaker C: Absolutely. [01:16:38] Speaker A: It could be anything. It could be chess. I don't care what it is, but do something that, that creates pressure where you had to perform. [01:16:45] Speaker C: The body doesn't know the difference between mortal stress and social stress. Right. The famous NYPD gunfighter Jim Cirillo, I think it was 19 gunfights, 17 dead. So he never got nervous when he burned a bad guy down. He didn't have time to. And then he went to the Bianca Cup World Championship, had Rob Latham and Brian Enos on either side of him and said he felt like a dog shitting razor blades. So anytime we can put ourselves in a safe environment, that induces that stress. Right. And the more we get used to inoculating that stress, the better we'll be in an actual stressful situation where it matters. [01:17:20] Speaker A: Yeah. And I do think there's something different about martial arts. I'm not a martial artist whatsoever, but from the few times I've, I've had somebody who, who is very good at Jiu jitsu, I've Rolled a couple times. They've taught me some of the. Some of the basic stuff like that. I. I do have a great, great appreciation for it because I think once you. Once you will learn how to fight and fight back, and once things go wrong and you have to figure out how to undo what you did wrong, it's. It really is just. It's a different level of. Of pressure, and they're. Compared to anything else, and then they're [01:17:59] Speaker C: the nicest guys in the world, weren't they? [01:18:01] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. [01:18:02] Speaker C: 100. Why? Because at any point in time, if things go south, they know they can fold you in your clothes. I mean, right. I saw a meme the other day. Oh, it's my buddy Kenny Florian, who's, you know, famous UFC fighter, stuff like that. He's got these. Yeah. He only lives 15 minutes away from me. We just got done shooting for, like, two and a half hours this morning. And training. Right. He put up this meme was classics like, hey, when you can fight, everything's funny. [01:18:26] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:18:27] Speaker B: I mean, that's fair. Like, you were capable. [01:18:30] Speaker C: Right? [01:18:30] Speaker B: Not a big deal. [01:18:31] Speaker C: Yeah. And here's the thing. Fighting with a gun is the thing. You know, I think there was. I forget who said. I think it was John Chapman who said, hey, man, if you carry a gun, you're a gunfighter. Now, don't go all operator crazy on me and stuff like that. That's how you need to look at it. You are fighting with a gun. Yeah. Right. But on the other hand, take it a little easy chat, because if we didn't have these guns and knives on there, you could not stop me from making you unconscious. Right. So find a balance. But that balance is based on, again, what philosophy. Your principles, technique and. And repetition. And just know that. Just know that. You know. [01:19:10] Speaker A: Yep. My plan is to run away as fast as possible. I'm pretty. [01:19:14] Speaker E: With your arms like this. [01:19:16] Speaker C: That's a plan, bro. That's a. That's a plan. You know, all you guys with your truck guns who think you're gonna go back out to your truck after you're in the mall and go back in for an active shooter. Sure, buddy. Nope. Sure. Nope. Right. Get your ass and your family out of there, unless you have to do what you got to do. You know what I mean? So wrong with running. Now that I can. Now that I can run. You know, I used to say running breeds cowardice, but now that I can run, I can come kind of enjoying sprinting and stuff. [01:19:46] Speaker D: So, Scott, you've achieved masterclass in uspsa, other than Grandmaster, what goals do you have for yourself? I'm assuming just for shooting. [01:19:55] Speaker C: I'm not gonna. I'm not gonna tell you that making GM is not important and not a goal, but it's not. It's not the result that I'm looking for. It's. It's the journey along the way to take that and bring it back to my students. Right. So my whole thing for getting back to competition is a. I love completing because I love glory, but it's. It's the learning. Right. And how that translates into how I teach to make other people better. Right. And let me say this, okay. You will never, ever be the best pistol shooter you can be unless you shoot USPSA hard. Stop. You can say to yourself, I don't have time, which is valid, and say, I have other philosophies. I'd rather do jiu jitsu and Muay Thai. Right. Because I'll probably never get into a gunfight. You're absolutely right. But if it's important to you to be the best pistol shooter you can be, you need to compete hard. Stop. Not going to argue with you. You can disagree with me, but it is. Right. Because the thing about competition is that they will. It will present to you especially USPSA will present you with things you suck at that you would never come up with on your own. Yeah, right. You cannot tell me that on your own. You're going to come up with. All right, so I'm going to draw to a. To A. I'm sorry. You're going to draw backwards, retreat to a corner about five yards behind you, do a hard lean around a wall trying next to four barrels, and hit a headshot at 20 yards with a no shoot underneath it. Would you ever come up with that on your own? Probably not. Unless you went to a class. [01:21:31] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:21:31] Speaker C: Yeah. Right. But then you go to a match and you do it and you be careful and you want to send three, right. To make sure you got that head shot. And at the end of thing, you put three mics because you put all three into the barrel because you didn't lean off of it enough. [01:21:44] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:21:45] Speaker C: Yeah. Guess what? You're going to practice for the next week. Guess what you're going to look for on the Internet for people to give you a better technique in order to do it. [01:21:57] Speaker B: Absolutely. [01:21:58] Speaker A: I just don't think there's anything else out there that can push you to shoot in anything like that. I mean, let's just you and your buddies get together and Set stuff up. But you're probably gonna be setting up stuff like, you know, like a USPS 8 stage. I just don't know of anything else out there. I was listening to, listening to you on, on, on, on some other podcast. So you were just talking about the importance of, of having some sort of test of a standard to, to have to compete and just see what, see where you land and if, if nothing else, use it for that. [01:22:32] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. And like I say in my class, like, man, maybe you don't have time, maybe you don't have the resource, stuff like that. But competition just isn't USPSA or IDPA or PCSL or stuff like that. That it just, it could be as simple as you get together with your boys. Somebody shoots as good as you, not as good as you, better than you, right? And then you pick a drill. My standards, Blauer standards, the fast drill, the bill drill, the super test, casino, whatever. You get together at the end of the month and you bet something, right? Bourbon, tequila, cigars, spouses, I don't know, right? Some dudes are like, hey man, if I win, you got to take my wife for a month. Okay. Anyway, and then whoever wins the cold run, right, Wins whatever the prize is. But that's not what we're going for, right? We're going for shit talking rights for the next month. Oh, absolutely, right. And here's the thing, guys, if that doesn't resonate with you, and I say got into the Internet people, if that doesn't resonate with you, then you're dead inside. Stop carrying a gun if you're dead inside. [01:23:34] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:23:34] Speaker C: You know what I mean? So. [01:23:36] Speaker A: All right, so let's talk a little bit just about some, some gear stuff here, okay. That you wanted. Yeah. [01:23:45] Speaker B: So right now, Scott, your primary gun, what optic is it running? [01:23:51] Speaker C: I'm pretty. So it's either going to be a SRO or a 507 comp, right? Me, you know, I'm. Here's my philosophy. More gun, more better. More optic, more better. Yeah, I don't mess with, with small optics, right? If, if you have a small optic because you think you're going to print while you're concealed, that means you have a shitty holster, right? So it's going to be one of the two. Now I'm not saying I don't mess with some other things, right? O site is really disrupting the market with like the cheapest optic on the face of the earth. That seems to be pretty okay. Yeah, pretty okay. So I, I test out different things you know, the. There's the sile pull that I had and, and I tried to beat the shit and break that thing and I can't and stuff. But you know, generally it's going to be an SRO or a 507 comp. I will tell you, when the new 507 Pro Max comes out, that thing was sweet. [01:24:41] Speaker A: I saw that. [01:24:42] Speaker C: It looks like 30% brighter. [01:24:44] Speaker B: I mean, it's a big plasma screen TV on your gun. It's interesting. I'm interested to see it. [01:24:49] Speaker C: Why not? Why not? You know, I mean, when Destro came out, I mean, people were making memes about it being a fishbowl, but look where that is. Right. You know, the only downside is that I think right now it doesn't fit into ALS holsters. Right. But that's nothing a heat gun and a Dremel can't solve. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So there's that. Yep, there's that. So that's the optic. So plenty of good optics out there though. But any good companies coming out there? But right now I think Trijicon and Hollow sun are, are the top. I am very pleasantly surprised by the Acro, which has a very little visual noise as compared to the P2 with that big ass battery tray. I think AimPoint. And again, I have friends at AimPoint. I've been on their podcast and stuff like that. Learned to take a joke, but I mean, Aimpoint did a really good job making their own 509T. Fair enough. [01:25:44] Speaker A: So with that optic, actually, as an example, do you. Do you have a preference for. For open or closed emitter? [01:25:52] Speaker C: Oh, yeah. So I'm a performance guy and there's no way you can have a big enough window with an enclosed emitter. Yeah, Right. So if I'm gonna, you know. Plus. If I'm gonna, you know, plus, here's the thing, and I've said this before and I've been. People like really hate me for saying this. Right. Why do you want a closed emitter? Because of rain. When does rain affect you? Competition and classes. Yeah, that's it. That's it. Right? To this day I keep on saying to all my cops, man, I get it. Do what you want to do. If you're not thinking about it, it makes you comfortable, then you need to do that because if you're thinking about something, it'll make it slower. But please show me the. The officer involved shooting with a pistol in the rain at a distance where mad that mattered. [01:26:32] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. [01:26:32] Speaker C: And the minute you can't give me that thing Right. Then the whole enclosed open emitter. Then it just. It's personal preference, bro. It's personal preference. You do what you want to do. I'm a performance guy, so I want a bigger window. Yeah. [01:26:46] Speaker A: And I have had to, I think some of your, I think one of your classes. We were in the rain and I had open emitter on one of my guns and I did go to a closed admitter gun that I brought. And while I. The problems were less. I still had problems. Rain still gets on. Now it's getting on two windows. So it was a different set of problems. And yeah, it was a little bit easier to wipe off, not have to try to get inside of an SRO or something. But yeah. Okay, that's great. [01:27:18] Speaker C: Yeah, there you go. [01:27:19] Speaker D: So, Scott, you kind of already answered this question, but I'm going to lead into the question. There are very few people that have had as much experience with red dots from students on the range and with professionals on duty as you have from your experience. What are the, the top dots and. Or worst dots? [01:27:36] Speaker C: Oh, you're gonna make me say worst dots. You're gonna get me. So you're gonna get me cease and desist letters and like that. All right, let's talk about right now. Right now, here's my pecking order for the best dots on the market. Okay. At least for the next two weeks until the other stuff starts shipping. After the NRA show, the Trijicon RMRHD, the Trijicon RCR, the Holosun, I'm sorry, the Trijicon SRO, the 507 Comp, and then the 509T. I think those cover everything that you possibly could where it'd be open and closed emitters with the biggest windows, the least amount of problems and all the features and benefits, regardless if you're a tactical, self defense or gamer. Okay. When the 507 Pro Max comes out with the gold dot, [01:28:33] Speaker B: We may shift some things around. [01:28:35] Speaker C: Yeah, I don't know the worst dots out there. Just that's. I'm not gonna. [01:28:41] Speaker D: Yeah, no worries. No worries. [01:28:42] Speaker C: You can say least favorite, least favorite Sig optics. Oh, yeah. Sig Optics, Sig Sauer optics, they all fail. The only, you know, the only Sig optics that had only Sig optic variety out there that has not failed in my class, which is funny enough is the Max. Michelle, the SRO clone, the gamer one, the competition one is the only optic that has not failed in my class. Everything else has failed. All, all the Romeos, all the zeros. The zero I haven't had a zero make it through my class, by the way. You know what I mean? And again, so people, you know, say like, oh well, you don't like six. I have nothing against Sig Sauer, man. I mean, they a lot of money in my pocket. I've taught at the academy six times, you know. But I'm going to tell you what it is, what it is, right? The only optic, the earlier optic that has made through my class on a continual basis has been the max. Michelle has never failed and now he doesn't shoot for them. So what are they going to call it? I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. But every other one has failed continuously. Continuously. Yeah, that's about it. [01:29:48] Speaker B: Interesting. [01:29:50] Speaker E: What distance do you typically? 0 your dot. [01:29:55] Speaker C: So it used to be 10, right? But for the difficult, extreme distances, I've switched to an 18. I still start at 10, right? Because I want to be able to see the holes, to make adjustments. Then I go to 1 8, then I go to 18, right. Why? Again, the 18 was introduced to me by Donovan Moore and another great influence, Dave wampler. He's graded 2 division GM. He's the team captain for Atlas 2011. Yeah, one of the best teachers and one of the nicest guys on the face of the earth. Seriously, if you guys have a chance to go train with them, you should. He was telling me about the 18 right? Now, before, I don't, I don't zero from a bench, right? But now I do because it's 18 yards. Three rounds, 18 yards, 20 inch square. I don't care how good your vision or your grip is offhand, you ain't holding that thing steady on a 1 inch square. So I do bench at that point. So the first time I tried it and I, I zeroed it, you know, started off at 10, then went to 18, got it, zero to that. And then I shot a B8 at 25 yards, you know, offhand freestyle and I shot a 107X. [01:31:07] Speaker A: Wow. [01:31:07] Speaker B: Okay. [01:31:08] Speaker C: So guess, guess what I'd never do anymore. Zero at 25. Zero confirm at 25. Because I don't need to. [01:31:14] Speaker B: Sure. [01:31:15] Speaker C: I don't need to. The 18 just proved, right. And why is it 18? Most USPSA targets are between 5 and 35 yards, right? Halfway in between is 17 and a half. Ain't nobody doing a 17 and a half yards. They bump it to 18 and it's proved to be amazing. Amazing, right? But I want to tell most people, man, depending on your philosophy. A 10 yard zero is fine. [01:31:40] Speaker A: You're still going to be on target at 25. [01:31:42] Speaker C: Yeah, it's point. You're 0.7 inches high at 25. Right. But the difference between 10 and 25 is I can see the holes at 10 so I can make my adjustments while going back and forth. That being said, if you want a zero at 25, you knock yourself out. Sure. If your whole value as a good person is posting your B8 scores on the Internet, you knock yourself out, man. This is just what I have found right as a thing. So now I start at 10 on a 1 inch square and then I confirm at 18. Before, it used to be confirmed offhand at 25, right. I go, well, that means you have a 25 yard zero. I go, well, then I also, if I have the resources confirmed to 50, does that mean I'm not sure? 50 yard zero. [01:32:24] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:32:24] Speaker C: Come on, bro. Come on. [01:32:25] Speaker B: I'm confirm at 100 yards. Let's go. Let me get my spotting scope out for my nine mil. [01:32:29] Speaker C: Exactly, exactly. You know what I mean? So here's my thing. Do what you you want to do. You're an American, right? This is just the way that I do it. 10. Confirm at 8. Confirm at 18 on a 1 inch square. [01:32:42] Speaker B: Interesting. All right, Scott, so we like to do some quick fire questions. And this is basically around edc, so obviously we make ADC EDC stuff. So we're always interested in what people are doing. So I got some quick fire questions for you. You ready? All right, so what is your EDC gun? [01:32:59] Speaker C: 99% of the time it's a 5 inch inch Walther steel frame with the Surefire X300. This one has an O site on it because I'm trying to beat the out of this thing. And so far I haven't been able to break it. But the other thing is, you know, in all fairness, because if you see me competing and stuff, I've been messing around with 2011s, okay? And part of my, I had two things. My contract with Walter, when I first did it right, I was like, hey, I get to do what I want to do, right? Because shooting one gun, you get into an echo chamber, you can kind of board. So. But my other philosophy is if I'm going to compete with something, I'm going to teach with it. I'm also going to carry it. So lately I've begun 2011s and right now it's the Kimber 2K11, right? Love this thing. So depending on my mood, who I'm teaching what they want to do, blah, blah, blah. It's in between those two guns right now, but mainly the Walther. [01:33:50] Speaker B: I know the answer to my next question, but I want you to say it anyways. What holster do you use? [01:33:55] Speaker C: No. Yeah. So if it's concealment, it is my Pro model MSP holster, right? Universal. The retention's on the light. I usually do with the sidecar. I also have a model that. Where the mag pouch is separate. Okay. My gaming rig, because I compete from concealment, is a hybrid between my holster and Donovan Moore's apx with the little wing there and the. And a tier one mag pouch attached higher. It prints a little bit, but I'm at a match. Who gives a shit? And then the newest addition that doesn't conceal at all, but sometimes you just got to play the game is the Mars Magnet from Billy Barton, Inspect Train Training. This thing is amazing. Like most of the times when like you have a magnet for like unloaded starts or just a, a holding place when you're making ready and stuff, they can move around, especially if they're fully loaded. He put this, he did this 3D printed little ledge. So for example, we'll just go with the Walther map. It stays right there. [01:35:02] Speaker B: That's awesome. [01:35:03] Speaker C: Yeah. Yep. So. And it's super strong. So much I can't get it off right now. But that's my competition rig. [01:35:10] Speaker B: Nice. [01:35:10] Speaker C: So. Oh, also I've got the MSP from Griffin, called the Griffin. Right where it hooks onto the top of the belt. Yeah, yeah. [01:35:19] Speaker B: Okay. [01:35:20] Speaker C: There you go. And then for various things, guys, you know a big fan of your guys's kit, right? You know the alias stuff and you know the different hangers and stuff that you guys have there when like my, my knives and different stuff when I'm messing around with different stuff. It's, it's fun to fix our own different kit, but not even taking on stuff, all that stuff, right? That'll go onto my belt. I'll have the, you know, male, female parts on their different stuff, right? Like when I carry my shit works knife. That's all on Alias gear and stuff on my, on my duty rig or whatever, right? When I teach cops and stuff. It is a Point Blank Industries belt, which is fantastic. A safari land Als. I've got my. I got. I forget the names of things sometimes, right? I'm starting to be Joe Biden or some. Anyway, your little hook thing for the Air Pro and whatever else I need. What do you guys call that thing again? Attack Trap Yeah, the Tech trap. So I've got. I've got that on, right? I got a couple mag pouches. Because again, if I switch back and forth between Walther and the 2011, the mag size is it the same? So I've got a couple of mags, right, with the Alias on there. I switch the size for the Mag for the PDP versus the 2011s, and it makes my life so much easier. [01:36:41] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:36:41] Speaker C: So much easier. So, yeah, there you go. [01:36:43] Speaker B: What's your EDC ammo of choice? [01:36:46] Speaker C: Oh, Hornady. 135 +P, right. Why? Because I think it's the softest shooting +P ammo that still passes the FBI standards, right? Penetration standards. And I teach a lot of feds, so I get that shit for free. [01:37:03] Speaker B: That's the best. That is the best answer. [01:37:05] Speaker C: I like that. [01:37:08] Speaker B: What is your. So we. We talked about your competition rig, but what is your EDC belt? [01:37:14] Speaker C: Oh, it's the core. [01:37:15] Speaker B: Okay. [01:37:16] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. So a lot of good belts out there, right? I. I Blue Alpha makes great belts. I know you guys had their collab with their alias and stuff like that. Hunter Constantine has the belt, which is great. The problem with those belts is that I like them just a little bit stiffer. Right. Hunter has that elastic on it. I wear heavy guns, and it just seems to bow out on me. The Blue Alpha stuff is great, but just. Just not stiff enough for me. And the core belts are just. You probably can see that, but show the Internet. My belly button. The core belts are just great. They're really great. And stiff, expensive. Especially the way I draw the gun where I'm punching down. I need the hardest, most stiff platform available. So, yeah, core belts, nice. [01:37:56] Speaker B: We carry core belts. We're a big fan. Then finally, any other favorite EDC gear that you've got? [01:38:07] Speaker C: Man, I gotta tell you, I hate knives, but I buy a lot of them. Buy a lot of them, right? They're just like an accessory for me and stuff like that, you know. Love Craig Douglas's, you know, Shiv. Works Blade. Big fan of everything that comes out of. Oh, my God, I'm forgetting their name. Protech. [01:38:33] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:38:34] Speaker B: Protect makes some really nice Protech. [01:38:36] Speaker C: Oh, thank God. I remember their name. They're great stuff, Protect stuff. But, you know, like, knives are like watches for me and stuff like that. So where's my carrier right now? Right now I've got this microtech Boker collab, right? The main reason why I got it, because it got all this carbon fiber. [01:38:57] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. [01:38:58] Speaker B: So it matches your Audi. [01:38:59] Speaker C: So it matches my, so it matches my Audi and stuff like that. You know, I, I use knives for utility and stuff like that. If I ever have to get in a fight with a knife, it's going to be a bad day and I'm going to die. But you know that, you know, as far as you know, I'm. Maybe I'm bad. I don't carry a tourniquet on me. A tourniquet's always close. I got it in my car, I got it in my range bag. I got all that other stuff. But I really don't do any medical. I mean there's only so much shit I can carry. What else do I carry? Edc, phone, wallet. [01:39:32] Speaker A: So you have a lot of stuff clipped in your pockets when I see you. Do you have a light in there? [01:39:37] Speaker C: Yeah. So look, so I carry a weapon mounted light and stuff like that. I generally don't care, carry a handheld light just because it just takes up too much space. But I got a little tiny, you know, the surefire one attached to my thing, the one that goes from like 100 to. Or 10 to 300 luma or whatever. Lumens 1. Again, just a utility, just a utility thing. You know what I mean? So. Yeah, awesome. Not, not, not. If I could carry land didn't get in the way I would. But I got other I need to carry, so. Absolutely. Plus you guys have seen my wall before, man. You know, I have. I, I travel so much, man. I got the Costanza rocking. You're not. Yeah. Between knives. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I will say this though, because people called me out of on this. Yes, I carry a Louis Vuitton wallet. This thing was expensive as three years old and it's the best. It looks like it's brand new. Absolutely worth the money. You can call me, you know, bougie, whatever you want to, but I've had a lot of tough wallets that didn't even last me a year, so. But this thing. Bulletproof, man. Bulletproof. And I'm fancy. [01:40:48] Speaker B: You are so. Look at you. [01:40:50] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. Hell yeah. Awesome. [01:40:53] Speaker A: So I was just looking at classes because I'm trying to get down to one of them this year and I noticed that you have several different class types. You have your fundamentals and performance and then you have the path to performance. Help me and other people pick the right class. What's the difference between those? [01:41:12] Speaker C: Yeah, so the path and performance, especially in whatever's going on in the training environment right now. Three day classes are very hard to fill. I think there's a couple out there. But mainly the staple now is the path to. I'm sorry the two day red dot. The path to performance. Right. Well fundamental, I'm sorry, fundamentals to performance, that is your end user. I concentrate on you. I don't talk a lot about teaching. Right. And there's a lot of me teaching you how to do things and then some time for self exploration. Then there's the red dot pistol instructor. That's where I teach people my methodology for teaching. I give you supporting collateral so you can build your own program. And the performance part is still there because if you can't shoot, nobody should care what comes out of your mouth. Right. But it really focuses on teaching what is replaced. The three days, the two day AIWB class. Okay. Because the three day classes were really hard to fill. So you got to read the market. In the two day AIWB we go over the core principles of body mechanics. All that's the same but we do the like the five different hand positions. Right. That encompasses everything. Right. High thoracic cheater grip, hands relax, arms crossed, hand behind the back. But then day two we get into drawing, moving forward, drawing, moving back, drawing left and right. Reloading from a concealment. Right. Getting the carry garment out of the way, how to relay left, right, back and forward. I also took one of probably the most. That's the word I'm going to use applicable drills out there right now that Donovan Moore I think was the first person to really see. And that's retreating build drills. Right. How to draw quickly, how to do retreating build drill, how to modulate that with site confirmations, depending on what distance you're trying to imitate and trigger manipulations. And then we Paul putty together where everybody goes from AI to. I put together my little stage stress test to see if we can't perform and it's been received very, very well. Very, very well. And I enjoy doing it. Yep. [01:43:20] Speaker A: Awesome. And I assume you do your, your black belt in all those classes. [01:43:26] Speaker C: All those classes, yeah. Oh, one more thing about the 2 day AIWB. It's site agnostic red dot irons. It doesn't matter. You can come to the class. Yeah. [01:43:36] Speaker A: Cool. [01:43:36] Speaker C: Awesome. Yeah. [01:43:37] Speaker A: And people can go to modern samiproject.com right? [01:43:41] Speaker C: Yep. [01:43:43] Speaker A: What socials do you spend most time on that people can find you? [01:43:47] Speaker C: IG and YouTube. Okay. [01:43:49] Speaker A: What's your handles there? [01:43:51] Speaker C: I just look up Modern Samurai project. No, there's. That's only me. [01:43:54] Speaker A: Okay. If anybody's like me, I cannot spell Samurai. So I'm going to help the people. S A M U R A I. Yeah. I always forget about the you. I'm like, hey, my dog's just walking in. Hey, buddy. [01:44:07] Speaker B: Welcome, Riggs. [01:44:10] Speaker C: It's Samurai. Samurai. [01:44:14] Speaker A: Very good. Is there anything else that you want to shout out or tell people about anything coming up? [01:44:20] Speaker C: No, I mean, go to the classes. Yeah, that's basically about it, man. Life is good. Having a good time out here talking to awesome people like yourselves, man. I wish you guys all the continued success in the world. You're one of the few companies that keeps on innovating with really cool stuff. So keep on doing what you're doing, man. [01:44:40] Speaker A: Appreciate that. We will. And I, I just want to give and I know Nate, Nick can speak to this too. If you, if you're on the fence of going to a class because you think you might, you might not be good enough or something like that or, or whatever, go just absolutely go to Scott's class. I've stood next to, I stood next to a woman. I was like, like 4 foot 6 that had barely shot anything before. By the end of that, I think [01:45:02] Speaker B: first day, she was the most accurate shooter we had. [01:45:06] Speaker A: Not fast, but she went from not knowing how to hold a gun to out accuracy wise shooting me on a B8 Scott is extremely good at. [01:45:15] Speaker C: I remember that. [01:45:15] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, she was, she was amazing. There is no skill set unless if you have anything to say. Otherwise, I don't think there's any skill set that, that should be safe. Yes, be safe. [01:45:28] Speaker C: Got to be safe. Know the four firearms rules of safety. Right. Know to keep your finger off inside the trigger guard. If you're not shooting stuff like that, just do that and we will be okay. [01:45:36] Speaker A: A gun with a good holster, some spare mags and some ammo, that's about it. So, yep, go do his class. You will not regret it. You are going to want to take it multiple times because it is like drinking out of a fire hose. [01:45:48] Speaker C: Absolutely. [01:45:49] Speaker B: You're going to come out with about 15% of what he actually taught. So. [01:45:53] Speaker C: Yeah. [01:45:53] Speaker B: So good. [01:45:55] Speaker A: Very good. [01:45:56] Speaker C: Cool. Awesome. Appreciate it, guys. [01:45:58] Speaker A: Yeah, thank you. Appreciate you joining us today. Nate, you want to roll us out? [01:46:02] Speaker C: Yep, I got it. [01:46:03] Speaker B: Thanks for tuning in to Life Liberty and equipped. If today's conversation challenged you, encouraged you, or helped you get more equipped to pursue your mission, share it with a friend, drop a comment and leave us a review. [01:46:14] Speaker A: Therefore, forget to hit that subscribe button and leave a review. What takes a few seconds to help turns into more opportunities to reach new people. [01:46:21] Speaker D: And if you're not already part of the Neomag Insiders Club, now's the time. Get early access to Neomag gear, exclusive content and front row seats to everything we're building. Go to theneomag.com to sign up. [01:46:34] Speaker E: Until next time, live boldly, stand for liberty, and stay equipped. We'll see you soon. [01:46:40] Speaker B: Bye. [01:46:40] Speaker A: Bye.