As requested in another thread:
On Oct 25th I had the opportunity to go to The Poseidon Experience (just off 96th Street in Fishers by the Home Depot) as part of a meeting for The Well Armed Woman IndySouth chapter. There were 27 or 28 of us with different skill levels and ages represented. There is a locker room for locking up valuables (there are no live guns or ammo allowed) and a couple of decent sized class rooms. The simulation area is at the very back of the building, with a roll up door (the owner, Jessie, told us they've brought a car in before for training purposes). The owners are both retired Navy SEALs. It's not a big facility but they've put thought into making the best use of the area they do have.
First we had an orientation to cover basic grip and stance (only weaver was covered, no isosceles) as well as sight alignment, trigger control and breath control. The explanations were easy to understand and clearly demonstrated. After the orientation we were divided up into 3 teams (because of how many of us there were) who were supposed to rotate through 2 stations. The first station had SIRT guns and IDPA type targets with sensors that beeped when we shot them. The goal of this station was to check our grip and stance (this is when one instructor walked directly in front of us as mentioned in another thread) and to start working on trigger reset to make shooting multiple targets faster. After all the ladies on my team rotated through this station, we moved over to the theater station. There we again used SIRT guns to play different games and we had our scores recorded (everyone has their scores recorded and entered into the computer so they can track your progress). The games were meant to help us with that trigger reset to shoot multiple targets faster idea. After my group was done, I stayed to watch the other groups. It took about 3 hours to rotate all of us through with most of us getting to shoot 3 or 4 games.
This was an eye opening experience. I struggled with a flinch last year that I've been making steady progress on overcoming. The first 2 or 3 shots with a SIRT gun in the first station showed me it's still there...but it went away when I registered that there was no recoil. Trigger reset isn't new to me, I heard about it from a TC I had in Ohio (and I'd heard about it before in an NRA Basic Pistol class I attended). The concept of combining trigger reset with multiple targets was new to me. Most of my range time so far has been shooting stationary targets while using trigger reset to avoid slapping the trigger. My biggest challenge was resetting the trigger when he wanted me to. I was doing bang-bang-move-reset-bang-bang while he (Jessie) wanted bang-bang-reset-move-bang-bang. I had to think about performing the sequence in the right order so I was slowed down. I also discovered I need work on acquiring the sights more quickly.
It was a positive experience and a lot of fun. The instructor's were all encouraging and never made anyone feel uncomfortable or out of place with their skill level or physical ability (some drills asked for shooters to move from a standing position to a one knee kneeling position). I wouldn't hesitate to take a new shooter in. They use SIRT guns until you've mastered the drills, then they move you to real guns that have a special magazine so there's recoil but no live ammo. So even someone who's sound sensitive can take training. No, it's not a substitution for the real thing in my opinion but it's definitely a good addition. We're planning on trying to hold our Indiana chapter leader Christmas Party there and I can't wait to go back. Questions on anything I forgot to mention? Please ask
On Oct 25th I had the opportunity to go to The Poseidon Experience (just off 96th Street in Fishers by the Home Depot) as part of a meeting for The Well Armed Woman IndySouth chapter. There were 27 or 28 of us with different skill levels and ages represented. There is a locker room for locking up valuables (there are no live guns or ammo allowed) and a couple of decent sized class rooms. The simulation area is at the very back of the building, with a roll up door (the owner, Jessie, told us they've brought a car in before for training purposes). The owners are both retired Navy SEALs. It's not a big facility but they've put thought into making the best use of the area they do have.
First we had an orientation to cover basic grip and stance (only weaver was covered, no isosceles) as well as sight alignment, trigger control and breath control. The explanations were easy to understand and clearly demonstrated. After the orientation we were divided up into 3 teams (because of how many of us there were) who were supposed to rotate through 2 stations. The first station had SIRT guns and IDPA type targets with sensors that beeped when we shot them. The goal of this station was to check our grip and stance (this is when one instructor walked directly in front of us as mentioned in another thread) and to start working on trigger reset to make shooting multiple targets faster. After all the ladies on my team rotated through this station, we moved over to the theater station. There we again used SIRT guns to play different games and we had our scores recorded (everyone has their scores recorded and entered into the computer so they can track your progress). The games were meant to help us with that trigger reset to shoot multiple targets faster idea. After my group was done, I stayed to watch the other groups. It took about 3 hours to rotate all of us through with most of us getting to shoot 3 or 4 games.
This was an eye opening experience. I struggled with a flinch last year that I've been making steady progress on overcoming. The first 2 or 3 shots with a SIRT gun in the first station showed me it's still there...but it went away when I registered that there was no recoil. Trigger reset isn't new to me, I heard about it from a TC I had in Ohio (and I'd heard about it before in an NRA Basic Pistol class I attended). The concept of combining trigger reset with multiple targets was new to me. Most of my range time so far has been shooting stationary targets while using trigger reset to avoid slapping the trigger. My biggest challenge was resetting the trigger when he wanted me to. I was doing bang-bang-move-reset-bang-bang while he (Jessie) wanted bang-bang-reset-move-bang-bang. I had to think about performing the sequence in the right order so I was slowed down. I also discovered I need work on acquiring the sights more quickly.
It was a positive experience and a lot of fun. The instructor's were all encouraging and never made anyone feel uncomfortable or out of place with their skill level or physical ability (some drills asked for shooters to move from a standing position to a one knee kneeling position). I wouldn't hesitate to take a new shooter in. They use SIRT guns until you've mastered the drills, then they move you to real guns that have a special magazine so there's recoil but no live ammo. So even someone who's sound sensitive can take training. No, it's not a substitution for the real thing in my opinion but it's definitely a good addition. We're planning on trying to hold our Indiana chapter leader Christmas Party there and I can't wait to go back. Questions on anything I forgot to mention? Please ask
