523 | Scott Howell - The Protectors® Podcast

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Welcome to the Protectors Podcast.
You know what, scott?
We're going to go through thiswhole thing.
We're going to get into a greatconversation, we're going to
talk about all sorts of coolthings that we're never going to
hit record, and about 10minutes down the road we'd be
like, hey Scott, maybe I shouldhit record.
Yeah, then we have to redo itall.
Yeah, hey Scott, welcome to theshow man.

Speaker 2 (00:32):
Oh, Jason, I'm super stoked to be here.
Thanks for having me.

Speaker 1 (00:34):
I'm honored and you're the first person.
I just I really just did hitthe record button.

Speaker 2 (00:40):
I love the organic stuff.
It's usually the best stuffever.

Speaker 1 (00:45):
And you know I've been watching some of your
videos and stuff and I'm likeyou know, I'm very interested to
see how you're the first personI've actually done this in a
while with was actually go backand take a look at your previous
content, kind of get yourbackstory a little bit, and a

(01:06):
lot of it really resonates,especially the creation of the
podcast, especially withcivilians going into a different
space, and I love that morethan you could possibly imagine
as someone who's been a fed,been in the military and 30
years worth of just crap in theindustry when it comes to
firearms and tactics and life Ishouldn't say tactics, I should
say life within this space.
I love seeing civilians step up.

(01:26):
I love seeing civilians gettinginto this arena more than I've
said it before, more than youcan imagine.
So, scott, welcome to the showagain.
Brother, let's get into it, man.

Speaker 2 (01:36):
I'm excited, shoot.
I'm excited to see where thisgoes today.
I'm always honored when peoplegive me their time.
I don't often get to sit onthis end of the thing, so this
is going to be fun for me.
So, like I said, I appreciateyou having me.

Speaker 1 (01:48):
And I think it's going to be tough for you
because, like I'm doing the samewhenever I get interviewed, I
always want to interview back.
So feel free.
Feel free, and this is more ofa conversation, I'm sure you
know that.
But you know, what reallyresonates about your story is
the COVID-19, and I typicallyavoid that subject like a harp
because I hated that time period.
Man, but I thought about it.
You had a gym that got closeddown.

(02:08):
Your livelihood, youreverything.
I mean based on your background, your experience, especially
from that point to now, it'slike you put everything into
something.
So if you have a gym that'sorganic, where you have to
physically be present, and thenit's taken away from you, you
really have to evaluate whereyou're going to next.

Speaker 2 (02:26):
It was a tough time, that is for sure.
I mean it hurt financially, ithurt emotionally, physically, it
took its toll on me and myemployees and my partner.
And, yeah, it was a rough time,on top of all the other things
that were going on, you know,having your business taken away,
along with a lot of otherliberties and things that were
happening at that time.
It was.
It was rough and, like you saidit, and you wanting to not talk

(02:50):
about it and forget about it, Iwould really love to do that
too, but I am still and I'm nota victim I would I never take
that role, but we're stilldealing with the aftermath of
that and we will be for a verylong time.
So it's very tough to just say,oh, you know, that happened in
the past, because it's stillvery present to us and it's
certainly a huge part of thisjourney with the podcast which
you've alluded to there and youknow, it really isn't that far

(03:15):
in the past when you think aboutthe big thing and about, if it
didn't happen, how your businesscould have scaled.

(03:35):
Absolutely could have scaled.
Yeah, so that's one of theparts about this is, I
absolutely could have scaledplan.
We were already 10 years intothe business of blood, sweat,
tears.
You know rough times, goodtimes, rough times, more rough
times, a couple of good times,you know, whatever, we were kind
of coming out of a of a, anexpansion phase that we had done

(03:55):
just three years before and, um, you know, effectively we went
from like 600 square feet tolike 1800 square feet, with
another with an initialexpansion, and then we moved
locations and we've had 6 like600 square feet to like 1800
square feet, with another withan initial expansion, and then
we moved locations and we've had6,000 square feet and the and
the, the.
The simple fact of the matter isyou have to put butts in the
seats and this is an org, the,the business we run is is

(04:17):
personalized services, so itmeans building relationships and
keeping those relationships andnurturing those relationships
over time.
And keeping those relationshipsand nurturing those
relationships over time.
And we had done that and workedvery, very hard, scraped,
clawed, kicked, fought, maybecheated a little bit here or
there, and you know that beingin the state of California and
being shut down, it's.

(04:42):
All of that crumbles very, veryfast when people can't come to
your location and get theservices that you're providing.
So, on top of many, many otherthings that were going on, so
it's still very raw, man, it'sstill very raw, but we're coming
out the other side.
We're still doing it, we'reattempting.
We've made a lot of pivots anda lot of changes and certainly,
you know, the podcast was a bigpart of that too.

Speaker 1 (04:59):
My favorite word, pivot.
Right there, brother, rightthere, brother.
That's my last book was pivotRight.
So you know, and you have to,you have to adjust, and that's
one thing I like about you wentinto a different space because
you saw reality.
When we get into our littlebubbles, when we get into these
echo chambers, sometimes wedon't understand what's going on
around us.
Now you see a physical location, and a physical location that's
yours, that, hey, you know whatIf that physical location goes

(05:20):
away?
That is my livelihood, that'smy life, that's my lifeline.
And then you find out that, hey, you know what.
You look around and there'sonly one protector in the room
and that's you.
So were you involved in any wayinto the firearms industry, the
training space, or you just hadbasic knowledge, or were you
training or what?

Speaker 2 (05:41):
uh, I had basic knowledge at best, you know,
like a lot of americans.
But I was also surprised tofind that this is not the case
of a lot of Americans.
You know it's somewhere alongthe line you come in contact
with those, whether it's throughyour family In my case it was
my dad, you know, my uncles orwhatever that you know had.
They were very, very much abouttheir second amendment rights.
You know and serve theircountry.

(06:02):
There was a connection to that.
They were passing that on tothe, to the kids, particularly
me, and so I'd had a very basicunderstanding and you know, I
was confident and comfortable.
But from a training perspective, from a practical application
perspective outside of, you know, maybe hitting a deer at 150
yards, or, you know, hittingbeer cans with.

(06:23):
Know, whatever, whateverpistols, whatever rifles my, my
family brought out to the range,my friends brought out to the
range?
No, absolutely not.
And that was a.

Speaker 1 (06:32):
That was a harsh reality at a time where things
got let's just say they gotpretty weird yeah, pretty weird
is right, because you said, youknow, listening to one of your
podcasts about how you weresitting there and you know you
have your firearm with yourpistol and you're like, huh, if
something happens in your mind,you think, hey, this is great, I
got a gun, I can sit at thetable.

(06:52):
Someone comes in, I'll point itat them.
What if they have a gun?
Or what if they have a weapon?
Or what if they don't haveanything?
I mean seriously.
Someone approaches you andsomeone says I'm going to kick
your ass and you got a gun.
It's not like you just be like,hey, you know what, I'm going
to shoot them.
It's like the movies, but it'snot.
It's not like the movies at all.

Speaker 2 (07:10):
Yeah, it's such an interesting mindset coming into
it.
I think again, the shortversion on that is just the
business was shut down.
That happens in about Februaryof 2020.
George Floyd, events happenthat summer around june.
Things are getting weird and incities around the nation.
I live a couple blocks from thegym.
At the time we're in thedowntown, very metro area uh, of

(07:33):
the city of san jose.
Uh, things started kind of heatup in front of city hall, which
is only a couple miles from myfront door, literally on the
same street.
We're just down the street lawenforcement.
As soon as the first dumpstergot lit on fire, hats off to law
enforcement here in our city.
They handled it decisively andthey're still paying a heavy
price for how they handled that.

(07:54):
In my opinion my non-expert,yet opinion as a citizen was
they did an outstanding jobbecause that was over pretty
quick.
But what it meant was theystarted to push people out and
they started to come down infront of the building.
I was sitting at home watchingall this happen on the news,
watching all the you know, allthe things happening in all the
cities and while San Jose wasnowhere near what was happening

(08:17):
in a lot of other places in thecountry.
Uh, to the extent or theintensity that it was going on
it, I was scared, I wasconcerned and again, I was
watching my business go down infinancial ruin in a short period
of time.
We were doing everything wecould to keep it together, not
close the doors.
Pay our employees, payourselves.
What the heck are we going todo?

(08:38):
Try to get an online businessgoing, because we were putting
together an outdoor gym at thattime, which was a total
nightmare.
You know all that.
We were trying to kind of playby the rules, to to fly under
the radar, which was hard.
There's a lot of thingshappening.
And anyways, yes, I wound updown in front of my or inside my
front window of my building,sitting inside the lobby, going

(09:01):
I can't watch my building burndown, not after all of this.
So, yes, I grabbed a couple offirearms, sat inside and was
basically just to be a deterrent.
But to your point and that wasthe epiphany, it was like what
the heck am I doing here andwhat would I do if and I had a
lot of experiences in my lifedoing a lot of things, but
nothing like that before and itwas more than just having the

(09:23):
firearm, and what might happenif somebody pulls one on me or
decides to use one, or I have touse it.
It was also other things that Ihadn't thought about.
It was man.
I just left my family sittingon the couch at home, which is
two blocks away from here.
What am I doing here?
Like, and how are they prepared?
Like, I'm down here defendingbusiness and potentially myself,

(09:43):
but what about my family?
What did I just do?
There was all of these thingsthat came up for me which then
thrust me into.
I got to figure this out.
I need to be a student andlearn a few things, and that's
that's where my journey started,in kind of the genre of
firearms, firearms, training,preparedness, a bit more around
combatives, combatives.

(10:05):
You know all the things that aprotector or you know somebody
that wants to be prepared forreally what could ever hit them
in life in the side of the head,like this, had.
What do you got to do?
What should I be doing?
I thought I knew, but man, wasI man?
Was I wrong?
I was just a baby in the wholething.

Speaker 1 (10:22):
You know we're going to get into that later on about
being a baby in this whole thing, because you're going to find
and you know this, but frominterviewing a lot of people and
a lot of my audience knows thistoo is like there's a lot of
LEOs who their only training hasbeen the academy.
But we'll get into that in aminute Cause one thing I do want
to go back to is that timeframewas a shift.
You know.
I guess a personal story for meis you know, I've been around

(10:45):
guns for my whole life, trainingand stuff like that, but I
always wanted to be aninstructor.
I always wanted to be a coach.
So I go in in 2000,.
Was it 2019?
One of those 2000 was when Iactually took the basic.
In order to become aninstructor, you have to take the

(11:12):
NRA course.
So I go in there and I'msitting around, I'm looking at
this room and I'm like a shiftin our culture.
At that point there were somepeople you know, 60, 70 years
old.
In the background there wasthree or four people in a and
you could imagine what kind ofdemographics we're looking at
here in their front who werelike purple hair.
They were this, they were thatthere was no in that room.
You could not, you couldn't saythere was one demographic at
all, it was everybody.
And everybody in that pointfigured out.
You know what.
There is only one protector,and if I don't know what the

(11:35):
hell I'm doing with this tool,then that tool is going to be
turned on me or I'm shit out ofluck.
So the protector mentalityreally does come in.
And when you think about yourfamily at home, shit out of luck
.
So the protector mentalityreally does come in.
And when you think about yourfamily at home, I was the same
way, man, even you know, leo andetc.
I I had guns ready because youjust didn't know the proximity

(11:56):
to anything.

Speaker 2 (11:56):
So but taking it to the next step, I commend you
with that, oh, thanks man, I, Ithink, um, I recognize the exact
same thing, particularly herein the Silicon Valley or the Bay
Area.
There was a very interestingshift in living in the state of
California when those eventshappened and how people

(12:19):
basically had this again, thiscoming to Jesus, if you will, of
like whoa and the cliche starts.
You know nobody's coming tosave you, you need to save
yourself, and that you could usethat as a cliche or not, but it
is true, there's truth in thatand a lot of people recognize
that it was.
It was wild to see the uptickin gun ownership in California.

(12:42):
Just ask any gun manufacturerout there.
They made a lot of money on thestate of California and have
since, not that they weren'talready, but there was a huge
uptick.
My firearms dealer friends herein town were.
It was insane, right.
And the cultures that wereadopting that protector
mentality and recognizing allthese things at the same time

(13:04):
was interesting, particularlyhere in the Silicon Valley the
Asian culture.
And then there was thisconnection back to what had
happened in April of 1992 withthe riots and the Rodney King
riots and what was happening andI was.
I was alive for that and aroundfor that.
I'm not.
I'm old enough to remember thatvividly.
I was in high school and Iwatched that happen on TV and
you had the quote unquoterooftop Asians that were

(13:26):
protecting their businesses andwhat you were seeing was kind of
a resurgence of that, and whatthat did was obviously drive a
lot more awareness to training,the importance of it, and then
people were being exposed to allkinds of stuff.
Some of it was good, some of itwas not so good, and that's
where I found myself in themiddle going well, how do I?

(13:46):
Where do I go, like?
Where's the best place for this?
Do I go to the guy who sat inthe class and got the NRA
instructors thing?
Or do I go to the guy who worethis funny hat with a Trident or
a you know a patch on it?
You know, uh, over here thathas all this experience from you
know being, you know, a 20-yearwar veteran or whatever the
case was.

Speaker 1 (14:06):
So it was a lot to take in man, and everybody, I
think, was doing that at thesame time I think we're still
doing it because the gunindustry exploded and you know,
finding and vetting and andtraining with someone is tough.
It is really tough, man, andyou know I was gonna we'll go
into the story now is that thebest training I had for firearms

(14:26):
was with the Border Patrol.
You know, because in themilitary I was an infantry
officer and artillery when I wasenlisted but it wasn't like you
know, we're going to do complexfirearms training.
You're getting a basic training.
It lets you go with the activeduty and you're doing it all the
time.
But when you're talking aboutLEO firearms training, I go on a

(14:47):
border patrol.
Great training, badass, lovedit.
Uh, go on to become a specialagent training was, you know,
you're really it's like acollege campus type experience,
but it's still basic firearmsprinciples.
You're going to get a little bitadvanced in there, but after
that academy you're done.
You'll you'll qualify everyquarter and the fed's a lot
different than locals.
But then when you get intolocal law enforcement you're
finding out that a lot of theonly training these officers

(15:09):
ever had was the academy andthen they consider their
qualification training andthat's like maybe once or twice
a year.
So when everybody, when you getto some of these instructors or
you get around people like,yeah, I'm a cop on this and that
, but then they stale me, theynever went past anything else.
But then you get into thecivilian and you're looking at,

(15:29):
like you know, someone likeyourself who's going to training
constantly, are learning frompeople constantly and keeping
that spigot open so you canlearn as much as you can.
You're finding a lot of timesthat civilian instructors may
have a lot more experience thansomeone just because they carry
a gun.
Very true.

Speaker 2 (15:47):
Very true.
There were a lot ofrealizations that happened as I
started entering into the space.
I had a lot of time on my hands, my business was closed and I
felt a deep sense of urgency tolearn as much as I could, as
quick as I could, but alsomaking the connection between
being a coach in the fitnessbusiness and that's what I did

(16:10):
for so many years understandingand studying how the coaches or
the trainers, instructors, wereteaching classes, what they were
teaching human, you know, oradult learning models, how
information was being presented,how that transferred over to
the actual performance and humanperformance and bringing it all
together I found it veryinteresting and it was kind of

(16:32):
easy for me to kind of pick outright away like who seemed to
have a really good sense of thisand on how to deliver
information to people and onthis huge mark, all these
different market segments, asyou've already alluded to.
And I was picking stuff up likeI'm going to this course or I'm
going to this, you know, rangeday, or a few guys are going out

(16:53):
to the range and there's acouple of cops, you know, on my
right and then on this sidethere's this banker dude right,
and then there's this mechanic,right, and then there's this
lady who single mom, over here,who just picked up a firearm
three or four months ago andstarted by herself and has now
got enough confidence to come tothe range with this group of

(17:14):
dudes.
And I was like, wow, what is thedisconnect here?
So that took me down anotherrabbit hole, trying to

(17:34):
understand, you know that, thatculture or that the business of
policing, the business oftraining, and, to your point,
like, okay, so they, theyunderstand how the thing works,
but they're not very good at it.
And this is not to bash policeofficers, I want to be very
clear about that.
But, to your point, they weregiven what they were given and
that was it.
So why wasn't it better?

(17:55):
And so that again led me downquite a deep rabbit hole in
trying to understand that more.
And, as it turns out, there's alot of people that certainly
agree that it should be better,and I wanted to talk to them
about it and we just kept havingthese conversations as I was
going through my training.

Speaker 1 (18:12):
Now you're allowed to bash on the system because and
the other thing you're findingout is when you go to this
training you're finding acertain people that are there
because they want to train, theywant to be better.
But one realization of megetting into the Fed world and
getting into the LEO world andbeing around a lot of cops is
I've always been kind of likesomeone that shoots.
I'm the only one in my familythat's ever been like a shooter.

(18:34):
I love guns, I love shooting, Ilove plinking, I love whatever.
But when you get in there youalways imagine that, hey, you
know what.
They're becoming a cop.
They got to be proficient, theygot to know what the hell is
going on.
But you're finding out.
Policing is a profession, it'snot just a profession and that's
one of your tools and you maynot always be as proficient as

(18:55):
everybody else using that tool,or you may have never used one
ever before, which is you'llfind a lot of that in these
academies.
That is very true.
And then when you get out there, you're like huh, the
instructors.
So I worked for a major fedpolice department before this
past year because I was tryingto become more proficient of an
instructor.

(19:15):
So I was like eh, you know, I'mretired, I'll take a
contracting gig.
So I went to work for a fedpolice department and I found
out that they are given alimited amount of training and
you only have like oneinstructor per seven eight
students for like one week.
You know, this is when I getout of the academy and you're
like, wow, man, as an instructorI have to go around each person

(19:37):
and understand what theirfundamentals are and where
they're at, but you only have alimited amount of time.
They get out onto the streetand then firearms aren't part of
the FTO program.
It's not like, hey, you knowwhat, and if any department out
there is doing it, please get intouch with me because I'd love
to talk to you about it.
But part of the FTO program islike, hey, how to encounter
people, how to do arrests, howto do this, how to do that, but

(20:00):
there's no more advanced,there's no more like hey, you
know what?
This is part of your FTOprogram.
One day a week we're going topractice on your fundamentals,
we're going to practice on dryfire, we're going to practice on
all the other aspects of it,but there's not that.
So when you get out there withthese civilians like yourself,
and when I went out there andworked with the civilians, it's
like huh, these civilians wantto be there.

(20:21):
They are learning all day.
This is their one job theydon't have.
They're not a cop who has toworry about legal stuff and
medical and all this.
All they care about is, hey,you know what?
I want to learn how to use thistool.
I want to learn to the best ofmy ability and damn, I'm a good
shot and a cop's like.
Oh man, you know, uh, I know myfundamentals, but I don't know
how to push myself past thefundamentals yet.

Speaker 2 (20:43):
No, they're not given that skill.
And again, the it's.
Somebody brought this up on apod on one of the podcasts that
I did with him and he saidimagine if you only went to the
gym and lifted weights two timesa year, you know how good are
you going to be at that.
How strong are you going to be.
How are you good, are you?
Or how good are you going to beat that any year from now?
Right, if you just do it thosetwo times?

(21:04):
I mean, it's a, it's an obvious.
You know it's a rhetoricalquestion, but the that that was
what I was gathering was thelimitations that exist, that are
, that are placed on them.
There may be placed on them bythe agency that they work for,
the situation that they happento be in, but also the
limitations they put onthemselves or that they have

(21:24):
that have been created for themin their mind or by not
exploring it more.
But to your point, I think whatthe key there was is they don't
know how to train.
It's not that they don't havethe ability to train, it's that
they don't know how to train.
And going back to my instructorexperience, one of the things
that I wanted to take away everytime I went to a course was

(21:46):
what am I leaving this coursewith?
Like, first off, why am Icoming?
What skills am I trying toobtain?
Or knowledge am I trying to get?
But then, how am I going totake what I learned and then
apply this in practice so that Ican improve and I don't believe
that's a big part of the policeculture practice so that I can
improve, and I don't believethat's a big part of the police

(22:07):
culture.
If we're talking about lawenforcement, it's, it's more of
a.
We have a curriculum, we teachthis thing.
We tick the box to say thatwe've done this thing.
Namaste, have a good day.
You're good to go.
The next step for you is theFTO program is in your example.
You go out there, you do the dothese things.
And the bigger piece of this iswhen you look at the skills

(22:27):
that, like a law enforcementneeds to have or needs to be
really honed in on.
Going out on the street everyday, like obviously, being
proficient with that firearm isgoing to be one of those things,
but how often are you actuallypracticing or doing that thing
on your job?
Now to your point knowing thelaw right, and how do you, how
do you properly enforce that?

(22:48):
Were you getting practice everyday with all of these
situations and you learnsomething a little bit new and
you apply what you learned fromthe last thing to the next thing
, maybe multiple times a day.
Driving as a skill?
Well, you're in a car every day.
You're already know how todrive, but from like a uh, like
a uh, like a high speed, or uhor um, you know high speed,
chase or defensive or offensivedriving, like.

(23:10):
How do you do that?
Well, you're kind of doing thatall the time.
The one thing they're not doingall the time is, again, you can
talk about defensive tactics,combatives, hands-on skill.
They, they should, they aredoing that every day, but
they're getting no additionaltraining to be good at it.
It's the same thing with thefarms.
This was all fascinating to me,because I think it's reasonable
for a citizen to expect thatthe police officers that are

(23:33):
sworn to protect and serve havea certain level of skill and a
certain level of you mentionedthe term professionalism to want
to improve that skill and Iwasn't seeing that.
I was like why?
Why is that?
This is odd to me, but I'velearned a lot.
I've learned a lot.

Speaker 1 (23:50):
There's two things I really want to touch on.
You have to remind me astrainer and coach.
But one thing when you broughtup, like you know, proficiency
in firearms and I love that Justshoot the gun on it, shoot the
knife out of his hand, shoot himin the leg.
Listen, one thing I've learnedis that and I think this should
be a requirement and it wouldsuck, but I really do think it

(24:11):
needs to be a requirement thatif you have a law enforcement
target and you have a silhouette, all of your bullets need to be
within that silhouette.
And if you have it, it's adeduction.
And if you have it, it's a.
It's a deduction because I tellthese people I'm like you know,
I'm like, look.
I tell the officers I'm like,look, if you miss, where is that
?
You're in a crowded area orwe're in washington dc area.

(24:32):
That bullet is going to hitsomeone else.
Your, your target needs to haveall.
I don't care if it's in the armor wherever, but all the
bullets need to be within target.
Proficiency in law enforcementis hit or miss.
You're a lot of instruction hasthat.
You're on a flat range.
You've got a paper target infront of you.
You're not moving left or rightbecause you got someone to your

(24:54):
left or right and you'redrawing and you're fine.
You're getting on your knees.
You're not siding to the left,to the right or anything.
You're staying on an X, you'refiring at a target and you're in
and out of there in 20, 30minutes and cause, you got a
million different things to do.
You don't have time to sitaround and go.
Hell man, I wish I could sitaround and train all day.
You're like oh, dude, I got toreport, I got to go pick my kid
up, I got to do this, I got todo that.

(25:14):
So when you're talkingproficiency, you know when
you're having like a hundredpercent of the people let's say
you have 100 of people on rangeand you're getting 70 percent
are calling on the first timeand then you got to stick around
for the other 30 because ittakes them two or three times to

(25:35):
qualify on the simplest courseof fire, with no stress, with no
movement, with a target goingout to 25 yards, 25 meters.
This is tough, this is thereality of law enforcement,
firearms training and and hey, Ican't fault them because it's a
check to block- yeah, it is thereality.

Speaker 2 (25:51):
It's a harsh one and it's a very frustrating one, and
so I talk about that a lot onthe show, with a lot of
different people from theindustry or in abroad about it,
whether they're coaches,civilians now, or instructors or
people that are in lawenforcement.
A lot of law enforcementofficers come on and we talk, uh
, but to your point, like a lotof citizens that are into

(26:12):
firearms training or coaching,they're on the show too.
Well, we're talking aboutqualifications and standards and
how that leads to proficiencyand what are we actually trying
to get good at, or what are weactually trying to get good at,
or what are we actually tryingto get accomplished?
And setting those, setting agoal that sets somebody up for
success and I think the when itcomes in general, this is not

(26:33):
every department, and I'veactually had some really good
experiences with some agenciesand people that work for
agencies that that are pushing achange.
They are, they are making somesignificant impacts and changes
and with the understanding thatit's not consistent anywhere,
there is no standard qual, thereis no standard.

(26:55):
There's not a standardqualification, there's not a set
of standards anywhere that'sconsistent across the board, and
I think that's a culturalproblem.
I think that there there needsto be some agreement made there
and it's going to take some timeto get there.
I recognize it's a complexissue to try to tackle.
But to your point, what are weactually preparing these people
for and what is the?

(27:16):
What is the value?
What are the goals and values?
Alignment with that?
If we are, if the goal is justto get them to pass a test, man,
anybody standing on that linethat I would have gone out there
with, with a lot of theseinstructors, even if they'd
never touched a gun, I wouldventure to say that if they had
four to six hours of instructionfrom I've never touched a gun

(27:37):
in my life to passing some ofthese police quote unquote
standards or qualifications forfirearms could do it.
They could do it, especially ifyou give them an extra three
chances to do it after theyfailed at the first time.
To me that's unacceptable.
But at the same time we have toaccept it because that's what
it is.
But now, how do we change it?

(27:58):
And again, what are wepreparing them for?
If that's what we're preparingthem for, then we should.
These are humans, man Like whenthey go out on the street and
they have stuff to do.
No, no, almost no, no uhofficer involved, shootings are
from a static position.
They're near.

(28:19):
Nearly a hundred percent ofthem are dynamic, which means
there's some type of movement,either by the suspect so that's
the paper target that isn'tmoving or by the officer right
who is standing on a firing linefollowing a very specific set
of instructions, can't even pickup his mags until everybody
else is finished and we've gone,thumbs up and whatever else.
And I I get there needs to besafety, right, we need to, we

(28:41):
need to look out for things, butthen how does that translate to
their job on a daily basis?
I don't think you have to be arocket scientist to understand
how.
What a disconnect exists there.
And I I feel bad for, uh, thosethat are involved in that
situation, that that have tosomehow find a workaround rather
than have a, have an agency,change it from the top down.

(29:02):
It has to be changed internallyand almost from the bottom up.

Speaker 1 (29:07):
There's something in that.
And then what we're talkingabout is called tests.
There's always a test and youknow when I was a kid man,
listen you give me a math test.
I'm horrible, I seriously I amthe worst person in math you
could possibly imagine.
Give me all the degrees in theworld, but if you tell me how to
do basic math, I'm like screwed.
And everybody out there listenmy kids.
They're better at math than Iam because I didn't teach them.

(29:28):
But test anxiety is a thing andthis what happens is because
you're a law leo and you havetwo to four to one qualification
a year and this may be youronly time picking up there like
really shooting your weaponoutside, you know, because you
don't want to train, becausethis mental thing in your head
is that if I don't go and takethis test I'm going to lose my

(29:49):
job.
So you get test anxiety.
I found out when I was doingone-on-one coaching with some of
these officers actually, Iwould say, like 99% of the
officers I was doing one-on-onecoaching with and I added stress
to the variable and I didn'tteach him how to do a
qualification.
I put up a different targetthan the silhouette.
They were hammering it.
They were hammering it when youput them under stress.

(30:10):
But teaching them how to shootunder stress and taking out that
variable, the test, you have toget them out of that situation.
And this is where I like theidea of having coaches and
teaching it.
And this is the I love thevariable where you're coming
from, with the gym and trainers.
You're training each individualLike listen, I'm 52 years old, I

(30:32):
can't train like a 20 year old.
If my trainer tells me to go inthere and train like a 20 year
old, my body's done Right.
You know, I can't run worth ashit, I got lung problems, blah,
blah, blah.
I can't do that stuff.
But the same thing with thefirearms is you need to look at
everybody and tailor make,tailor made, tailor make a

(30:54):
program for them.
So someone with your background, let's say, you get all the
training, experience andknowledge.
You become an instructor.
But then your knowledge isn'tjust that firearms tool.

Speaker 2 (31:10):
No-transcript there's , there's many layers to this.
So you use the term test andthe anxiety that comes along
with having to take a test andevaluation, and this maybe not
for your listeners, but I knowfor a lot of mine.
They were shocked when westarted to kind of expose this
stuff with the in theseconversations, which was really

(31:32):
the only time they're everreally being tested is actually
in the academy.
That's the only time they'rebeing tested, because when you
think about it and I think youhave to look at the context of
the test, like what happens ifyou fail?
What are the consequences offailing the test?
There's a pass-fail, right, youget a grade, or there's a
pass-fail.
The only time you really needto be worried about losing your

(31:55):
job or not getting the job is inthe academy, because after that
nobody's being fired, nobody'slosing their job for not passing
the.
They're given another chance,they're given eight more chances
.
I was, I was.
I was at an agency where aperson failed the.
This officer failed the academytwo times and I say officer

(32:15):
because she finally got throughit then failed the call, uh, and
for five sorry for firing thefirearms call.
Then got through that and thenthe second time and failed again
13 more times 13 more times forfinally passing.
So did you pass a test?

(32:37):
Or did you just get lucky, Idon't know?
Or did you?
You know you've taken it enoughtimes.
Now you're just gaming thething and there's probably a
little bit of chance, plus maybea little bit of improvement,
plus a little bit of the knownsthat you now understand, to
maybe pass this particular test,only for that officer to then
quit two months later during theFTO program.

(32:58):
Um, so, again going back totests and standards and test
anxiety, like at what point areyou being really tested?
Uh, okay, so you look at thatas as a layer, but then what's
the ultimate test?
Right, and I never like to tryto bring up scenarios where, but
you don't need to just turn onthe internet, right?
Look at these officer involvedshootings, look at the things
that are happening out there onthe street.

(33:18):
And again, I want to be clearthere are some really good
things happening out there onthe street.
I mean I can.
I can name three this week thatI've seen.
I was like that officer was onit.
There was a, there was onespecifically from Phoenix,
arizona, that I watched.
It was outstanding guy ended up, moving to his rifle, hit a guy
from about 50 yards away, um,from a semi-unstable position.

(33:40):
It was awesome.
There was another dude who wasdown and I think was in santa
ana, um, california, where a guywas holding his, his
grandmother, uh, with at knifepoint to her.
I saw that guy had to take aheadshot.
That's outstanding.
We never see that stuff, right,right, or we very rarely do.
People aren't looking for that.
They're looking for where didthis human mess up, right, and

(34:02):
how horrible did they do?
And all the things that theycould have done differently.
In every one of thosesituations something could have
been done differently, butthey're always looking for that
stuff.
So again, even with that,unless there's something
egregious, even with that,unless there's something
egregious, right, the poorqualification is not going to be
the thing that that person, orthe standard, the low level of

(34:24):
standard, the very low metricthat they have to meet, is not
going to be the reason thatperson loses their job.
So again, that's a thing I thinkpeople need to understand is
that this testing and feelingnervous or whatever else like
where should you be?
You shouldn't be nervous aboutthis test, especially when the
metrics are as low as they are.
You should be nervous about, ifanything.
You should be nervous about,like what did, what is this test

(34:46):
missing from it and how does it?
How does that apply to thethings that I may actually have
to do into the street, cause Idon't want to.
I don't want to be taking atest.
Then, right, I want to.
I want that, that, that that,to be automatic.
So you know, that's a littlebit of a soapbox.
I apologize for going on no,not at all.

Speaker 1 (35:01):
I think there's a lot of layers to that no, that's
the thing is like okay, so youmay not get fire and you may
lose, you know, access to yourfirearm until you qualify again
when you're given 50 differentchances.
One thing I in this industry isI've noticed, and you've
noticed it too, is thateverybody kind of wants to skip
from basic to operator.
Oh my, you know this.

(35:23):
This has been driving me nutslately.
I want to, so I'm I'mdeveloping two things that I
really want to do.
I want to have a course calledthe protector course, and what
this is is going to be for, likeyou, you know, before you
became knowledgeable.
I shouldn't say I mean it's forpeople who are knowledgeable
too, but it'd be like hey, look,you know you have a family, you
need to protect your family.

(35:43):
Your family comes first.
So the protector course wouldbe this It'd be basic firearms
skills.
So you know, you have a skill,basic drawing.
We'll do a little little thingwhere we can show that, hey, you

(36:04):
could draw from your holster,and if you can't draw from a
holster yet, you get proficientand we'll start it a little
ready.
But the thing is basics threeto seven yards, maximum 15 yards
.
How to identify yourself so youdon't get shot by someone else?
Basic medical stuff.
Hey, this is a tourniquet.
If you're going to carry afirearm, do you know how to
identify yourself so you don'tget shot by someone else?
Basic medical stuff.
This is a tourniquet.
If you're going to carry afirearm, do you know how to use
it?
But just a basic firearmscourse, a basic protector course
, and there's more to it.

(36:24):
But the other thing is I wantfor LEOs and this is one thing
that's been on my mind a lot,and I want to put this course
together because we see a lot ofthese in and around vehicle
courses that are interesting,that I'm not going to get into
because I don't really feel like, uh, that's a whole everybody
holy shit, but I want a courselike.

(36:44):
You are approaching the vehicle, someone gets out quick.
They don't have a knife intheir hand, they don't have
anything in their hand.
You approach a vehicle, theyget out real quick.
They have a gun in their hand.
You approach a vehicle quick,they have a gun in their hand.
You approach a vehicle realquick, they have a knife in
their hand.
Two people, three people, butin and around vehicles.
You go up and you're doing theapproach on the window, someone
in the back seat takes a popshot at you.

(37:04):
Someone in the front seat drawsand fires at you.
I want, I want LEO courses thatare in and around vehicles, that
are dynamic, that aren't likehey, you know what?
Um, they're not.
You're inside your vehicle,something happens.
Yes, that can happen.
But the main priority needs tobe your approach to that vehicle
and anything in and around it.

(37:25):
That guy, girl jots off to theleft, they get behind you.
How are you going to draw thatweapon?
Engage or draw that weapon andget to a spot where you can
engage.
That's what I want.
But you're seeing a lot, lot inthe LEO community where it's
like okay, I know how to shoot,bro man, I've been doing this
for five years.
I know what the hell I'm doing.
I'm beyond basic.
I want to get nods on and Iwant to do one person CQB and

(37:47):
it's like if I could count howmany CQB courses are out there
and how many nod courses are outthere right now.
I want someone to be able todraw that, that weapon and
engage under a maximum amount ofduress in seven meters so yeah,
I mean I know there's a lotthere, but there's a lot there's
again.

Speaker 2 (38:07):
There's levels and layers to everything, right?
Uh, the vehicle thing, and youalluded to something.
There is that people are tryingto be, you know, jumping into,
like give me the operators,course I need to be doing six
man CQB or I need to be shootingout of the windshield of a car
or whatever else, cause they seethat and they go.
I drive a car, you know I own ahouse.
It has doorways and hallways.

(38:27):
You know, this is this seemssomething like I could have.
There may be some applicationthere, for sure.
But going back to all the thingswe have already talked about,
what has to be happening?
There are so many thingshappening in those, to your
point, that dynamic environment.
What absolutely has to behappening in the background is
the shooting right, and that'sgoing to come down to speed and

(38:49):
accuracy, and that is builtthrough fundamentals.
And the problem is and I coulddraw so many analogies and I
like to use the fitness ones,because that's just who I am,
I'm a fitness dude, right, who'sbeen doing that for so long
You're trying to jump into thedeep end and major in the minors

(39:09):
when you haven't evenaccomplished the basics.
It's crawl, walk, run type ofthing, but people want to start
rolling around a little bit andthen automatically get into a
sprint, and there's so manythings that have to go on there.
So when you start adding inthese dynamic things for people,

(39:30):
it needs to be and this is whatI was seeing right when I was
going out and training is peoplewere just jumping in because
this course was available, butthey had skipped so many steps
in the process.
And so I would ask instructorshey, what does the curriculum
building look like for you?
How have you chosen thisparticular curriculum and how
does it fit in to the othercurriculum that you might be

(39:50):
teaching, setting people up forsuccess here, or is this just an
experience?
Because there's a bigdifference between training and
coaching you alluded to thatearlier, I think and then
providing experiences.
I think people need experiences.
So one of the most valuableexperiences that I had that I
thought I saw officers get waspurely based around the

(40:13):
experience.
There was not a lot of time toteach skill, but there was an
exposure to an experience thatreinforced how important
understanding those basicfundamentals and skills are, and
it wasn't just about shootingto your points like being aware
of certain things that exist outthere.
What are the most common things?

(40:34):
Let's start with the mostcommon things.
Let's not build some weird youknow end of the world scenario
or something that is just youknow it's concocted and could it
happen, yes, but what's thehighest potential?
What are?
Where are?
Where should we be putting themost value, you know, in our, or
focusing on the things whichare?
What are the things that havethe most value in this

(40:56):
particular situation and how weset people up for success?
I think that's where a lot ofinstructors I'm using air quotes
have failed and they've chaseda dollar, something sexy,
something to build theirbusiness or whatever else.
So I like what you're sayingthere about having these levels
of who are you, where are youcoming into this and how does

(41:19):
this apply to you?
I need to understand that, asthe coach or instructor, we have
a framework that we teach in orin a curriculum that we teach.
How do we adjust?
Is it flexible, right?
Does it have flexibility forthe people that are in front of
us?
And again, if you've only everhad quote, unquote instruction,
maybe through the military orlaw enforcement, they miss all

(41:42):
of that.
They don't because they haveboxes to tick right and it's
like you're here, you need to,we need to tick this box for you
.
So this is how we do it,because this is how we've always
done it, you know, or whateverAgain, a lot of layers to that.
So I mean, I picked that upright away as a coach and
somebody who's built businessesand built training programs for

(42:03):
people and gets people ready forspecific events or you know,
just to be healthier and morefit Like, how does it all work
for people?
People are confused by that,consumers have been confused and
they've been sold a lot ofthings because they don't
understand it.

(42:23):
It's an underdeveloped why?
It's an underdeveloped sense ofbasic fundamentals or knowledge
and they need more of that.
So we need more people thinkinglike that and I think that's
one of the points you werehitting there.

Speaker 1 (42:30):
I think that we're going to see more of that,
because I think and God knowsI'm not going to get into this
topic because it drives meabsolutely batshit.
Crazy is, uh, the influencertypes and the the.
You know you can shoot reallycool on a minute and 30 seconds.
I do the same thing sometimes.
I'll put up these videos.
I'm like man, I look prettygood.
I don't always and I believe me, I sometimes I uh I don't put

(42:54):
up the ones where I've realizedyou'd like shit, you know, and.
But the thing is, when you havethe civilian market looking for
an instructor, there's really noway to vet them.
I mean, listen, we have.
I mean, you are into thisbusiness, you're into this, you
interview people, you knowpeople, but people, but the

(43:17):
majority of the civilians whosay, hey, you know what I got to
take this to the next level.
I can shoot, but I want to takethis to the next level they
look up and all of a sudden theysay, oh, that guy's vouching
for this guy, he's got 2 millionfollowers and you're like that
doesn't mean he's a goodinstructor or a good coach.

Speaker 2 (43:27):
Man.
Here comes one of those fitnessanalogies.
So, when I started in thefitness business, this was well.
Well, we had internet, but itwas very not what it is now.
Right, there was no instagram.
There was no windows 95.
Man, yeah, it was.
Yeah, we were working.
Actually, the first company, abig company I worked for, we
were still working on a dossystem until we moved over, um,
but the point of that being is,if you wanted to, if you were

(43:48):
one of those people right,you're one of those.
Hey, I know I need to do this.
This is important fitness.
I need to get healthier.
I want to be more fit.
I want to look better with myclothes off, whatever the thing
is right.
Where do you go?
You go to the gym.
If you're a savvy consumer andyou want to get the most return
on your investment, it would bewise for you to hire a coach to

(44:11):
get you started at least in theright direction, point you in
the right direction and learn afew things and experience a few
things.
And so what would you do?
You go to the gym.
What we had were these wallswith all the bios the trainer
bios, you know up there with thepictures, right, and they had
their resumes there and theytold a little story about
themselves.
Some guys had their shirts off,some of the gals were you know,

(44:32):
they're in their bikinis ortheir swimsuits on stage for
some bodybuilding show.
And how did you pick a?
How did, how did a lot of theseconsumers pick a coach?
I like the way that one looks,or, you know, this one makes
sense to me because they'vegotten lean and that's what I
want to do, or whatever the caseis, and that's how people are
being picked.
Well, now you have the internetand it's just compounded all of

(44:54):
that kind of business.
And so for an unaware consumerwho has an underdeveloped why
and a very low level ofknowledge to start, it's a
terrifying place for that personto be entering in, a very
confusing place for them to beentering to try and figure this
out.
And he said that word vetbecause the instructors have
been saying this for a long time.

(45:15):
And so now I have consumers.
Vet your instructors, vet yourinstructors to your point.
Okay, how do I do that?
I don't even know what I'mlooking at here, this dude, this
dude's bio.
He says he's an instructor.
He's an instructor because hewrote it in his bio.
Right, that's that's what Iknow.
Right, but he again wore.
But he again wore.
This beret worked on this team,has this many years in law

(45:37):
enforcement, whatever else.
It's reasonable to expect thatan unknowing and unassuming
consumer is going to look atthat and go that sounds good to
me.
That should be right.

(46:00):
And then you couple that withsome really cool sexy shooting
videos.
You know, or you're runningaround on the, you know, you're
running around on the rangedoing stuff and it you know
running and running and gunning,right, that makes it.
I think conventional wisdomwould say, yes, that is what I'm
, probably what I should belooking for, and the reality of
it is it's not.
It in most cases it's not.
And, uh, that's a harsh, harshreality for people to find out

(46:21):
someday, and maybe even in theirprocess of like, oh, I've
chosen this guy and now I'm inthis camp and I'm in this tribe
or this faction, right, and Ifeel like I'm part of something
now, like I'm in the cool kidsclub, right, so to speak, and
I've had and I've gotten alittle bit better and whatever.
And then you're faced withseeing or hearing something like
vet, your instructors, andthese are the guys that are

(46:43):
selling you snake oil and you'retrying.
You're going like, oh man, thatkind of sounds like my
instructor, but no, no, no, thatcan't be the case, right.
And so they just dig in harder,right.
And then they're faced, maybe,with the reality someday that
they got really less than goodinstruction, less than great
foundational fundamentals, andthen they have to make a

(47:04):
decision and that's just anotherterrifying place for them to be
.
It's like what do I do now?
Like this is my tribe, theseare my people, this is what I've
adopted, I have all thisequipment because this guy told
me to buy it right, or all theguys on the range, or all the
people on the range that I wastraining with, had all this
stuff and that seemed right tome.
And now I'm have questions whendo I go to get those answers?

(47:25):
To your point, there is a shifthappening and we're starting to
see that get better and I thinkthe industry at large is kind
of cleaning itself up a bit byfrom people that are really
doing a good job, talking aboutit in the right kind of way,
understanding how people receiveinformation and demonstrating

(47:47):
that for them through verbal,visual stuff and then
collaborating.
I've seen a lot of thathappening which was not
happening before.

Speaker 1 (48:11):
And then collaborating.
I'm seeing a lot of thathappening now, which was not
happening before.
It was everybody.
All these guys were playing itreally close to the chest and
not wanting to credit and notwanting to get involved in these
collaborative efforts orwhatever.
Now you're starting to see thathappen and I think that's an't
matter what tab you had, whatberet you had, what anything.
It's like I've seen a ton ofcivilian instructors out there
who are solid Yep, who are likehey, you know what, and like the
one who taught me my basiccourse and then got my
instructor course was like afemale, no, LEO, no, nothing,
calm and coached me.
Because I'm like, hey, I knowwhat I'm doing, blah, blah, blah

(48:32):
.
And I'm like, hey, listen, I'mnot I.
Back then I was maybe a littlepigheaded, but now I'm like,
okay, you know what, but you'reright, it's like you're seeing a
different shift and I think alot of people are seeing it now
and it's a true.
It's like vetting.
How do you know how to vet?
I mean, really, you see thesocial media, you see this, you

(48:59):
see that word of mouth, um, butyeah, and the equipment thing.
Man, I, let's talk aboutequipment here.
It's my favorite thing, the edc.
I fucking love when people saythis is my edc and they show
like this full size, sick 320legion that weighs like five
pounds, it's got optics on it,it's got a under light and it's
got there.
They carry around three magsand they carry a fixed blade, a
foldable, and they got like aflash bang in her back pocket.
All of it.
I, um, you know what I tellpeople.

(49:19):
I'm like look, I have differentguns for different scenarios.
I got my movie theater gun,which is now it's a glock 48.
Um, I'm going to get somegroceries.
I got a damn smith bodyguard380 with seven shots, because I
know I'm going to be able towear that in sweatpants or
shorts.
I know I'm going to carry it.
Listen, I'm going to get hatefor it, but it's the truth.
I know I'm going to carry it.

(49:40):
I can't carry a full-size gunall the time.
I can't.
I'm not as heavy as I used tobe, but when I was really heavy
it was tough to stick a damn gunin my hip.
That you're not going to rollaround with fanny packs, but the
the thing is they get online.
You're like oh man, that guy'scarrying this, that girl's
carrying this, I gotta carrythat, and you know well, just as

(50:01):
well as I do, that the industryis like this a new gun comes
out, they send about 20 or 30,amount to influencers and then
it's next big thing.
Yep, every reality, every time,every single time yeah it.

Speaker 2 (50:14):
I mean that, again, there's layers right To all of
those you talk about that thereason they're they're sticking
that you know, five and a halfinch gun in their pants is
because somebody told themthat's what they should do.
Right, this is.
This is not something that mostconsumers are generally coming
up on their own, in my opinion.
They're taking that advice,they're being influenced to do

(50:37):
that by someone or somewhere,and the gun you put in your
retention holster or yourcompetition holster and take to
the range to do certain thingsis not the same gun you're
likely putting in your pants.
When you talk to people thatcarry whether it's for a living
or carry period that areresponsible gun owners,

(50:59):
responsible American gun ownersthat actually train, it's a
whole other thing, right, like,just because you stick in a gun
in your pants doesn't meanyou're proficient at using it.
So the point of this being is,people are confused and, yes,
when they do it long enough,where they they start to, they
start to realize a few things.

(51:19):
That's when this confusion kindof starts to come in and I was
like well, I heard that a smallgun is bad because it's not as
accurate, right, or it doesn'thave the.
You know it doesn't have thesame carrying capacity, right,
as my, again, my five and a halfinch double stack gun.
Whatever it happens to be,don't carry a 1911 because that
thing's going to go off in yourpants or if you drop it, or

(51:40):
whatever.
There's so many things thatthey're trying to get through
versus like what are you doing?
Why are you doing that?
And those whys are, I think,are starting to become more
developed.
But, to your point, people aretrying to find a gun that's
going to solve all of theirproblems, right?
Or a piece of equipment that'sgoing to solve all their
problems.
You have put the cart way infront of the horse.

(52:02):
Number one, number two what isyour problem, right?
What problem are you trying tosolve?
Right, is the thing.
That is what the message shouldbe.
And then from there, let's workbackwards, let's reverse
engineer this, and could therebe some truth to a smaller, you
know, pistol, in this case is alittle takes well, let's just

(52:24):
put it this way takes a higherlevel of fundamentals and
practice to be as accurate withit than some of these larger
pistols that are maybe, I wouldsay, like driving a Ferrari
versus driving a, you know, aFord Taurus or something like
that, you know kind of thing.
But they're they're trying tofind like the solution.
Right, there's never one way.

(52:46):
There's all there's.
There's a way and then there'smany different ways within that
way to come to the, come to theanswer for yourself.
And that that takes time, ittakes a, it takes a takes.
There's a journey involved here.
It's finance, it's time, it'spractice, it's getting out there
and having, you know, not doingwell, it's going out there and

(53:06):
doing really well and takingthose things and trying to find
the gap there and and figuringit out.
But yeah, I went through thattoo.
I mean, my EDC is a 48 mls,yeah, with a, with a uh rmrcc on
it.
You know that's, that's what itis.
People will go dude, that's soinaccurate that that little gun
you know you can't.
I do just listen, brother, why?

(53:28):
because I practice with it Ijust went from.

Speaker 1 (53:31):
So I had a 365 for a long time and I'm like I carry
glocks forever, man, clock 19,this last agency clock 22, I
mean.
And I'm like, hey, you knowwhat, I'm gonna try it out.
I got myself a clock 48.
The only issue I've had is myoptics.
Um, I have to, um, shave downmy optic screw a little bit
because it's screwing with myejector.

(53:52):
So once in a while I'm like huh.
So I don't completely vouch forthat gun yet until I figure out
my optics I took the optics offit.
Oh yes, it's a whole thing.
Because, uh, I want to love thegun so much, I took the optics
off it and here's the deals Ithat's another problem, what you
just said.

Speaker 2 (54:09):
Right, there is somebody marrying themselves to
something and then trying towork out their problem around
that, when that is the problemyep, and here's the deal is like
I I have a small following onsocial media, like 6700.

Speaker 1 (54:21):
I'm not an influencer , but I tell these companies.
I'm like I've been pitchingsome of them because I go on tv
all the time.
The core tv shit is aquote-unquote expert, a firearm.
So I'm like, hey, look, I willtake.
I can only vouch for the gunsthat I have and that I use, and
there's only a certain amount ofthem.
I mean I got some decent amountof guns but I won't.
Don't send me a gun and have mevouch for it unless I beat the

(54:43):
living shit out of it.
I mean I want to, and that'sthe thing is I took this Glock
48 and I literally ran with theoptics.
I ran five to 600 rounds throughit and it was jamming a lot.
So I'm like, okay, I popped thesights off it.
I threw about 2 000 roundsthrough that thing.
No issue, it was fine, no issueat all.
I know, I know what the problemis.
I know I would rely on that guyon 110.

(55:06):
So now when I shave down theoptics, I'm gonna throw another
2 000 rounds through, but I'mnot running 2 000 rounds worth
of fucking prime ammo here Iwant, and I tell these companies
.
I'm like, look, I pitched a fewof them lately.
And I'm like, look, I willgladly rep you and I'll, I
guarantee you I'll sell this gunto a million different people.

(55:26):
Because it's true, I'm notgoing to be doing fancy videos,
but I want to put the shittiestammo through it and I did that
with this.
My buddy my buddy was hebrought literally ziploc bags of
the shittiest ammo he had foryears and we shot it and the gun
had no issue.
I want to.
I want to take a bucket of ammoand put a thousand rounds into
it and I want to just fill itwith sand and water and then

(55:48):
load it up in mags.
I want to kill the gun becauseI don't want to be one of these
people where it's like here's agun, shoot, make a cool video
and sell some.

Speaker 2 (56:03):
Right?
Well, listen, I.
I really appreciate thatstatement because, again, going
back to the influencer thing,don't sell yourself short, jason
.
I think you're doing a greatjob out there with the things
that you do and and you arereaching people.
You certainly reached me, uh,for whatever that's worth.
But the point of that being ispeople not understanding how to
problem solve.
And you know, going back toinfluencers or whatever and and
I don't, glock doesn't pay me,right?

(56:26):
So you know, I mentioned thatguy, they don't pay me, I don't.
I don't get paid by guncompanies or equipment companies
or anything like that.
I learned very early on that'sthat's a slippery slope and that
there are things that need togo into that.
And the most important thingyou need to do as a gun owner is
you need to go shoot your guns.
You need to go shoot your guns.

(56:46):
You don't just decide becausesomebody else is doing it.
Then you go out to the rangeand you put 500 rounds through
it that you're good to go.
That is not what I mean.
And when you shoot things longenough, you will figure things
out about them, as you justdescribed, and you will be able
to diagnose.
You need to understand how thegun works.
Number one, which I think is ahuge missing piece in a lot of
this instruction there's a lotof assumptions made that people

(57:08):
understand how their firearmactually works.
How do you break it down?
If something's not workingright?
How do you know what that is?
Is that you?
Is it the gun?
Is it what you've strapped toit?
You know?
Is it any modifications youmade to it?
Again, people want to go rightinto this.
You know well, here's all thebest things for your thing.
With regard to equipment,there's a lot of great things

(57:36):
and there is no one gun or oneoptic or one piece of equipment
that solves all of your problems.
And even if it does solve the80%, it doesn't mean it's the
right thing for you.
There's a concept ofindividuality here and going
back to the testing and beatingthings up, I think that's one of
the major things.
People make decisions andthey'll die on a hill about
something, whether it's afirearm or, again, some type of

(57:57):
equipment that goes on thatthing or that you're carrying it
in or whatever else, and theyreally have no basis for saying
that.
Outside of, there's a camp ofpeople that says this is the
right thing.
I'm part of that camp.
There's safety in numbers.
I'm going to go with whatthey're saying.
They may have more experiencethan me, so I'm going to trust.

(58:18):
Trust them on this, versus I'mgonna go out and figure this out
on my own.
People need to go shoot theirguns more.
They need to shoot the gunthey're gonna carry or they've
decided to carry before they,because they might change their
mind.
They might.
They may figure that that is a,that was a.
That was something I had tolearn.
You know, and I've got severalfirearms and they're.
There's purposes for those,versus going to the store
letting the guy behind the guncounter sell you what he thinks

(58:40):
you should have, versus youfiguring that process out your
own.
But it goes all the way back toeducating a consumer and
putting these things in front ofthem and I think it's getting
better.
I really do.
It is it's getting better.

Speaker 1 (58:54):
And you know which turn I'm getting rid of my SIGs?
I'm not, you know.
Yeah, that's another story.

Speaker 2 (59:02):
That's an interesting statement.

Speaker 1 (59:03):
Jason, it's an interesting story, but hey, you
know what, sig, I'm sorry If youcould come up with something.
It's great Because, listen, Igot like a bunch of them, man,
border Patrol commemorative ohnice.
No way I'm going to get rid ofthat thing.
And I got a Sig Scorpion 1911.
Love that gun so much, but theother ones, eh, you know.
But then all of a sudden I'mlike okay, this is what happens

(59:25):
when I get into a gun shop.
Well, a gun shop, my range uphere.
It's a place called X-Cal and Ihad to wait.
I didn't reserve a range, alane, that day, so I had an hour
and a half to kill.
So I go up.
I'm like, huh, that clock 45looks really cool, okay.
So an hour later I'm walkingout of there.

Speaker 2 (59:41):
You got another one, that's often how it happens,
that's the other thing we shouldwarn people that may be
listening to this for the firsttime or trying to trying to
learn and understand things becareful, they're like tattoos
they're worse than tattoos.

Speaker 1 (59:56):
Listen, let me look at my, look at this.
I can't stop I got tattooseverywhere.

Speaker 2 (01:00:00):
They're still, you know they're fun, they all do
something a little bit different.
You know, in a sense they havea different feel and there's a
lot of personalization that goesinto into those things.
But yeah, to your, to.
You know, to the point, I think, what you know you mentioned.
You mentioned that brand therea second ago.
That's another thing that Ithink the consumer market is

(01:00:20):
confused by, and this consumermarket includes mill and LEO as
well is that you have these.
You have some companies outthere that have a major
footprint and they've been doinga thing for a very long time
and they have a name.
The brand name behind therekind of precedes itself and
people are making decisionsbased on, you know, that brand
or whatever they've said, ordude carried it 15 years ago.

(01:00:43):
You know, in this particularsituation and this war and this
duty assignment or whatever itis, and you're going back to
your.
This leads back to the.
You testing guns, yeah, and theconsumer market is now left to
test a lot of these things, andso what you're seeing is those
that are using them a lot arebreaking them, and that will

(01:01:06):
happen.
If you shoot things long enough, you use things long enough,
equipment breaks, as like theone that you just mentioned, and
there's nothing coming fromthat company about what's being
publicized out there because ofthat brand, I think, and the

(01:01:27):
name that it has has precededitself.
But there's some very obviousthings Now going back to testing
and buying equipment that isless likely to break or has been
put through the ringer by boththe consumer, but I'm talking
about more of the manufacturer.
There are more companies now, Ithink, than ever that are
building or manufacturingfirearms that have done due

(01:01:50):
diligence by going through aprocess that's much different
than just hanging on their brand, because they are trying to
build their brand while behind,not in front of, they're
building the brand behind thequality of the firearm or the
piece of equipment that they'rebringing to market, and they
feel very strongly about that.
And they are small enough, in asense I just mean that from an

(01:02:12):
organizational perspective andfocused enough as a provider to
still care about that.
And they are making some.
There are some wild stuffhappening in the firearms market
right now and I mean that inthe best kind of way in terms of
the quality that's coming outum, the consistency, the
durability, the precision.

(01:02:33):
There's so much tech that'shappening.
There's good and bad with that,because that just provides more
things for the consumer to haveto get through.
Right, but there are, there are.
There are companies out therethat beat the crap out of their
stuff in a really good way.
It's not, they just fulfilled acontract and we'll let somebody
else figure that out.
Now it's nope, we're not goingto release anything.

(01:02:54):
We're not going to put anythingout.
Could it have problems?
Everything will.
There's going to be bumps inthe road, but we are going to do
everything we can and consumersneed to understand that who
those companies are and whatthey're, what they're doing and
what they're about yeah, I needit.

Speaker 1 (01:03:08):
I wish I had more money, you know, but because
there are so many guns, I wantto try.
Yes, I, you know, I want tostart getting into long range,
but right now I'm still at thispoint where I'm like oh, that's
a man.
That's a rabbit hole, jason I'mnot gonna and that's why I'm not
gonna talk about it right nowis, uh, I, but I want to.
I want to find the perfectthing.

(01:03:30):
Because here's the other thingwhen it comes to pistols is like
I can't personally vouch forsomething unless I personally
beat the shit out of it andshoot it and carry it.
You know, and this is one ofthose those things where it's
like I've, over the past, I usedto have sponsors that would
give me some brand stuff and I'mlike, oh, you know it's good
and but it's like you, I feeldirty.
You know, unless I could vouchfor that thing, I'm like,

(01:03:55):
because here's the deal, man,it's like tattoos, like not
everybody could afford them.
Guns, and everybody afford them.
I don't want to be vouching outto my audience or the people
that I know and having themspend their hard-earned money on
something that's not 110% andunderstanding sales and
understanding process, you know,and let's just say, agendas.

Speaker 2 (01:04:28):
That's what something I was looking for, which was an
impetus for the podcast andhaving a lot of the
conversations I was having as Iwas reaching out to people to
get honest, non-disingenuous Iguess the right word there is
genuine, authentic, you know,well-informed answers to
questions I had about that verything.
Like I don't want to make a$600 mistake, I realized I'm and
I did.
I made a lot of those right.

(01:04:48):
I don't want to make a 2000,3000, 4000, you know, dollar
mistake.
Nobody wants to do that, um,and unfortunately I think a lot
of people do.
We've.
I think we talked about a lotof what those things could be
already.
But because they're takingsomebody else's word for it, who
has taken a paycheck fromsomebody and is saying what they

(01:05:10):
want or need to say in order tocontinue to have those
paychecks coming in.
More than ever, I think you'realso seeing a shift in that
there are some folks out therethat do a really good job of not
marrying themselves or anybodyand they just give a very honest
opinion.
That comes with consequences,and I don't mean that in a
negative way, just like it's thenatural.
I think that's what makes theworld turn.

(01:05:32):
They're going to get negativity.
People are going to hate themfor being honest about the
testing or the beating up ofthat that you know, that that
brand that they are so in lovewith, for whatever the reasons
are uh and and could be making alot of money.
Right, they could be takingsome, probably some really large
checks by just going, uh, yeah,I'll take that and I'll say

(01:05:55):
your stuff's good, when inreality I don't.
So when you're talking aboutvetting instructors and know,
buying equipment and things likethat, I think, again, that's
another challenge for consumersand I think it's a it's.
It became a really largechallenge for instructors that
were trying to build a businessand also trying to build, you
know, relationships, business tobusiness with people.

(01:06:15):
They got themselves in some hotwater.
Uh, in a sense, and the problemwith it is the real problem with
it is, first off, this is avery unforgiving industry when
it comes to relationships in alot of ways.
In other ways, I'm just like doyou not remember that that guy?
You have short-term memory loss.
Do you not remember what thatguy said or did?
Or what that company, company x, said or did?

(01:06:35):
But, um, I guess you know my,my, my, my point in saying that
is it's very easy for people tofall into that trap or be preyed
upon, and I think you're.
Once you've done that, onceyou've walked into that.
This was the caution to anybodyout there, any instructor, any
you know business or company andany consumers.

(01:06:57):
Once, once you make thatdecision, no amount of
toothpaste will wash that tasteout of your audience's mouth,
out of your it's amazing,sometimes it will.
Some people are again haveshort-term memory loss, but out
of your mouth and out of thatcompany's mouth.
When it, when it wasn't donefrom a place of integrity and we

(01:07:22):
saw a lot of that during thathuge uptick in 2021 and whatever
and people still have, theyhave hurt feelings about this.
Feelings are okay, but theyhave some serious hurt feelings
about it.
And it made the, it muddied thewaters, you know, for people to
make good decisions and know ifthey were making the right one
or not.

Speaker 1 (01:07:41):
Uh, which was an interesting thing for me to
explore, as I, you know, kind ofcontinue my journey you know,
man, I'm just uh, this wholeconversation we've had, we're
going to get a couple morethings here real quick, sure man
, then I'll let you go.
But the I was giggling tomyself a little while ago
because I remember, uh, 1995there's a movie called get
shorty, yeah, with dennisfarina's in it, and it's one guy

(01:08:03):
who's like the henchman pullsout this gun and dennis farina
pulls out his.
Dennis farina has like a 32 andit's like some cheap shit gun
and the guy goes you know, I'veheard those things jam a lot and
blah, blah, blah and dennisfarina's like and pops them.
It's the same thing.
It's like you hear all thesethings about guns and I think
about that.
That scenario is like the thingworks, but he heard so much at

(01:08:25):
a jams, he's like it works fineright now yeah, people have
selective hearing.

Speaker 2 (01:08:29):
Um in, in this day and age, with all the
information that's out there, ifyou do some due diligence, it's
very easy to get informationand to be it's.
I think it's it's harder forpeople to be discerning when
there's so much information.
But that just means a littlebit, I think, deeper level of
patience and commitment tounderstanding that this is a

(01:08:51):
process.
All of this is a process andlearning what works, who's
giving you your information, thevetting of anything out there,
and there's no, there's neverbeen another time in history
where there's there's moreavenues to be able to do that.
And again, I just I'll give ashout out to all the people that
are doing such a great job withit, like the YouTube channels,
the Instagram, you know pages.

(01:09:13):
Uh, they have there's discordsand things like that.
Where man, it's not hard, itisn't hard.
I mean, people will complainabout things being throttled and
the information not getting outthere.
Yeah, there's been some truthto that and there is some truth
to that.
But if you really want it, I'mproof positive of that, like I
have proof of concept to that Ifyou just reach out to people

(01:09:34):
and you actually start to haveconversations instead of just
consuming all the time, butengage and be a participant in
those conversations, no matterwhere you're coming into it.
I came into it.
I think I described myself asbeing an infant or a baby when I
came in the amount ofconfidence, right, and knowledge
and uh aptitude that you can,you can accrue over time, right,

(01:10:00):
and building theserelationships, but also having
the conversations even when youare the the whitest white belt
in the room.
Right, you can, you canovercome this stuff.
Just it will be.
That's matched, that has to bematched with how much commitment
you have into actually applyingand practicing, not just
learning.
Right, there has to be apractice and I think, more than

(01:10:23):
ever, like, people are startingto make that connection between
the practice and the or you know, in the, in the knowledge base,
and you're it's, it's.
It's a very positive time.
There's still a bunch of noiseout there there's always going
to be, but I think it's a verypositive time for people to be
entering into the space andfiguring it out.
It's.
It's very cool and things likethis, this podcast, and the

(01:10:44):
things like you're doing andother people are doing are, are
where people can get that honestanswer right.
Like I don't know, jason, Idon't know who sponsors are,
sure, or whatever, but what I doknow right now is I'm not
looking at a million you know adthings popping up on the screen
right now or whatever else, andand I think that's what the
consumer is looking for it'slooking like where's this

(01:11:06):
message coming from, like who'sgiven it to me and why should I
listen?
And even if you don't like whatyou're hearing right now, like
there's going to be value in itsomewhere.
Um, what can you extractinstead of what are you focused
on hating and not liking aboutit?
Anyway, that's my tangent andsoapbox.

Speaker 1 (01:11:23):
No, it's true, man, but the actually the end of the
day.
There is something else we wealways fail to remember with
firearms is you can have a hellof a lot of fun with a man.
Oh man, it's not always aboutlike tactics, techniques,
procedures and shoot, move,communicate.
You could have a lot of.
I tell people I'm like compete,but I'm scared.

(01:11:44):
I'm like listen, when I go tothese competitions, man, there's
, like you know, you got aspattering of mill and leos and
stuff, but you got a ton ofcivilians, man, and it's fun.

Speaker 2 (01:11:54):
There's so many things so many things with
community.
There's competition.
If you want to get involved inthat and when we talk about
competition, dude, it's endless,right.
I mean you mentioned thedistance shooting or long range
stuff go do that.
If that's, you're gonna go tryit.
You know uspsa, idpa, oh man,steel matches, uh, just going
out and shooting cans.
You know if you got property,you know tin cans or aluminum

(01:12:15):
cans to do that, like all ofthat.
That stuff.
It brings people together.
But it can also be if you'relooking for solitude, right, and
you're looking for just alonetime to focus.
For some people that's likegolf, right.
I get outside, I golf by myselfor I go golf with my buddies on
the weekends.
It brings people together.
You get to have conversations.
You get outside of work.

(01:12:36):
For those people that work andcarry for a living like police
officers to work for thosepeople that work and carry for a
living like police officers.
It gets you off of the job.
But it also it's like you'realso improving a skill and you
can add some competition to it.
So you go back to the testingand the stress and those kind of
things where you're beingpushed and even on the days you
don't really want to do it.
Somebody there is going to kindof pull you along or drag you

(01:12:56):
along.
Man, there's so much value init Family time and and the value
that, that, that that that hasin my life but in so many other
places and people's lives andbringing bringing people
together to do stuff andintroducing them to things in a
very safe.
When I say safe environment, Idon't mean that like from the
firearm safety perspective, thatalways goes along with firearms

(01:13:18):
.
But uh, you know just the it's.
It's a, it's a comfortableenvironment where you're you,
you can, you can ease peopleinto into the thing and you can
be a vehicle for introducing.
You know somebody reintroducingsomebody to their second
amendment, right, you know theprotected second amendment right
here, and all the things thatcome along with it.
Maybe they like it, maybe theydon't, but it's man, it's so

(01:13:41):
much fun.
I have some of the best friendsI've ever made in the world.
Uh are, you can directly draw,connect the dot to it somewhere.
Firearms are involved in itthat's my life too, man.

Speaker 1 (01:13:52):
Yeah, you know we're gonna have to have another
episode.
Uh, maybe, maybe I'll cruiseout that way.
I didn't even talk about thepodcast, the Honor Sites podcast
and the Red Dot Fitness, butwe'll get into that next time,
brother.

Speaker 2 (01:14:03):
Yeah, man, I appreciate you.
These kind of conversations arealways fun for me and I always
appreciate when people have meon just to talk about whatever.
So, man, if there's anything Ican do to help you with your
message and putting it out there, I'm totally available.
For that.
I'd love to jump on anytime,man.
We just got to, like we didthis time, figure out a way to

(01:14:25):
get it on the calendar and I'mthere, man, absolutely, brother.

All Episodes

523 | Scott Howell

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

On Purpose with Jay Shetty

Dateline NBC

Cold Case Files: Miami

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}523 | Scott Howell