# Course Review: "Secrets" and "Mastering" snub courses with Michael deBethencourt



## Andy Moynihan (Jun 28, 2010)

18 hours is a lot to take in over one weekend, so exactly which exercises were covered on which day will not be specified, as there was so much covered.

No photos since even if I had a camera there was no time to use it, we were a very busy group.

I had decided that, after all, it simply wouldn't do for any firearms instructor worth his title to not know how to run a revolver as a self defense gun, and since, while the full size "service" wheelguns now only exist as competition/hunting arms, the "snubby" has enjoyed something of a resurgence in the concealed carry area, and has never left the law enforcement backup role, and since I myself choose a snubby as a backup to my SIG P220, and as a summer primary when it's too much hassle to bother with a concealing garment at the belt, it would then behoove me to seek out the guy whose field of specialization is to maximize the snub's effectiveness and minimize its limitations.

And so it was I found myself pulling into the Southern Maine Fish and Game club which was the backup locale for the class( the classroom-only portions were to be held at Kittery Trading Post but that fell through. Lesson: always have a backup plan). I had brought with me my two personal snubs: A bobbed-hammer Ruger SP101 in .357 Magnum, and an older, but still in great shape, S&W model 60 in .38 Special( an all stainless steel model that though not officially rated for it, handles +P ammo just fine, already had the hammer bobbbed and rendered double action only when I bought it, and WITHOUT that asinine frame mounted suicide lock now foisted on all new S&W revolvers despite all protestations from consumers).

I, of course, knew of the wisdom of having any guns one carried for duty or defense being either bought or rendered double action only for practical and legal reasons before I took these courses, but it was a point Michael addressed very early on, and used the example of the Luis Alvarez case as well as some of his own personal experiences to support the point.

Michael deBethencourt himself is a man that is very unlikely to be forgotten once you meet him. His youthful beginnings as a carnival barker become obvious in his speaking and instruction style, he has that unique skill of making you crack up and yet still remaining serious enough about the topic to make the material stick. He also likes to "Bushwhack" his students, and give them instructions which they'll follow, only to throw a wrench in the works after they're done and make the point as to why it was "wrong" to do. "This is an artificial environment", Michael told us,"If I bushwhack you here, nobody dies." The point is to make the students cognizant of what they do on the range that doesn't serve them as far as getting ready for the self defense situation they hope never occurs, but are training for.

Our first classroom drill was to learn a new "manual of arms" for reloading the snub. I and the other three students the first day were all right handed, and so learned that one, but Michael has a manual of arms for the left handed amongst us as well, which he taught to the two left handers who joined us the second day.

This much I will say about it: that when we first began learning it, it was at least no slower than the "old way" I was taught of loading with the strong hand and losing the firing grip on the gun, but by the end of day two it was the fastest revolver reload I'd ever done, AND because the snub stays in the shooting hand all throughout, one carries the spare ammo on the left side, which is a boon to those of us who carry autos, since there is commonality with the auto's manual of arms and therefore less to mentally trip up over should the transition from one to the other need to happen midfight. *I* can still reload an auto faster than *I* can reload a revolver, but I can confidently state that now *I* can reload a revolver faster than homeboy can reload HIS stolen auto.

Once we had that down, we were then introduced to reload drills with loose rounds, Speed Strips, and three different brands of speedloaders( DADE loaders, HKS, and Safariland). We learned a different way to use the speed strips as well( they are strips of rubberized plastic that hold 6 rounds. Massad Ayoob, back in the way back when, came up with a technique loading them only up to 5, curling a finger under the empty hole and laying the index finger across the strip like a scalpel, because with 6 one had no leverage to peel the strip and always lost a round). But Ayoob's method is designed to use the older, offhand loading method, and Michael showed us a technique that, while only loading 4 in the center of the strip, was much faster than I thought possible and worked no matter which end of the strip you grab from your pocket.

Okay--we had the manual of arms and some reloads down, getting pretty confident. Those of us familiar with such training know what that means: Time for a bushwhacking.

Michael gave us the instructions for the drill: " Let's say you've taken down two out of three attackers, but the third is about to blow right past you and get to your loved ones.You're empty, you've got your speed strip. I want you to load the gun as quickly as you can and get back in the fight, you're against the clock here. Grab your deathmaster 2000.....ready, GO!"

(All reload drills start with you dryfiring as if shooting, and clicking( If you pull the gun and it goes BANG-BANG-BANG, there's no need to reload--since the revolver has no visible way of transmitting that it's empty, such as the slide locking back on an auto, the point is to internalize that feeling/hearing "Click-click-click" is Nature's way of telling you that it is TIME TO RELOAD). With Michael yelling out instructions the whole way through, we each perform the manual of arms, slap out the dummy rounds, grab the dummy-loaded speed strip,snap in all four and get back in the fight.

When we are done, Michael asks us if we are happy with how quick we performed the reload, indicating each of us in turn: "are ya happy?" "Ya happy?" "Ya happy?" After we answer yes, he then makes his point: "I'M not. None of you did what I asked you to do. I told you to load as quickly as you can and get back in the fight before the bad guy got past you. after you loaded the gun, what did you do? You CONTINUED TO LOAD THE GUN". The bad guy outflanked and ran right past you while you stood there fingerlovin' the gun".

He then told us the story of the Newhall Massacre in 1970, during which two heavily armed felons killed 4 California Highway Patrolmen. At the end of the gunfight, the final officer, wounded in the chest and both legs, was trying to reload his revolver. Under the enormous stress of the situation, he reverted to his training( he'd been taught to shoot 6, reload 6, shoot 6 more and so on). So intent did he become on loading those 6 that he failed to notice one of the felons had flanked him. Making direct muzzle contact with his stolen .45, the felon said, "Got you now, mother****er", and blew the officer's head off just as he was closing the cylinder on the full load.

Lesson: ONE ROUND LOADS THE GUN. Knowing which way your cylinder rotates will let you know where to roll the cylinder so it's the first hole the hammer hits.

Related to this , we were taught during loose round drills that if we could help it we ought not load rounds right next to each other in the cylinder--dispersed rounds in the cylinder means not having to click through a whole cylinder before you get a bang.

It's late and I'm tired, but tomorrow I will post more on the drills we did on day two( and oh yes, there was much much more).


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## Andy Moynihan (Jun 29, 2010)

Right. End of day one, rest of day two (approximately):

Most of our shooting was done at 5 and 9 feet because though we're all familiar with the Tueller drill and the 21-foot rule, FBI statistics put only about 10% of gunfights at that range, 40% at 9feet in, and 50% at 5 feet to contact distance. No sense in only training to have a 10% advantage.

I was the only one of us who'd brought a .357 snub, and one of a very few people Michael's apparently taught, who brought a .357 and actually FIRED .357 through it all the first day and part of the second (I ran out but had .38 later). I'm a believer in practicing with what you carry, and if I can't handle .357 in real time, I need to know BEFORE any Impending Wretchedness impends. Fortunately I am one of those who, between exercise and genetics, does in fact have the grip strength to pull it off. Great confidence builder for me--I was about as tight and as fast as those wielding .38s, and went through the weekend with only light swelling/bruising of the web of my hand which though annoying, didn't compromise my movement or any significant amount of my grip. Good natured joking abounded about the concussion slapping the shooter next to me in the face, and one guy wanting to dig a hole in the dirt on hearing it, and everyone else's target just having holes in it, but there's mine with all the paper ripped off the staples. 

However, that was with a Ruger SP101--of all the "baby Magnums" by far the most controllable. I wouldn't dare try that with any S&W J-frame even if it WERE .357 rated. But i needed to know--as Michael likes to say "You have the whole rest of your life to get the tools and training you need, but the rest of your life may not be as long as you think".

During the drills it also becomes apparent that the other point Michael makes is very important--you will need to pay attention to your grips because grip makers don't always care about making grips relieved to allow speedloaders to pass, because grip makers aren't in the business of selling speedloaders. My SP101 had a set of Eagle Secret Service grips( the older model, according to Michael, the newer sets don't have this problem) which had a token relieving of the grip on the left side for speedloaders but not quite enough to allow the DADE or Safariland to work( I COULD, however, get the HKS's to work by holding them above the grip and twisting the knob and letting the partially inserted rounds just fall). These again are things you need to learn before "the balloon goes up". Got me rethinking about selling the J frame, that could just be my smartest buy ever without even knowing, and thank goodness when I ordered those Safarilands awhile back I KEPT all my HKS's. 

Another thing drilled into us both in the classroom and at the range was "DON'T PICK UP CRAP!" Once a spent casing, speed strip, speedloader has fulfilled its intended purpose, it becomes "crap" and is dropped and forgotten. An additional story from LA in the 70's drove home the point that officers killed in gunfights had been found with spent brass in their pockets and holding empty guns. They'd been drilled all through Academy to pick up their brass after firing a cylinder, and so did it for real, and it gave the vermin enough of an edge to win that one  .

Related to this is the more modern fact that if you pick up any brass you've just tampered with evidence( a felony) in the presence of a gun (double felony). "Don't pick up my crap" Michael told us, "Stay AWAY from my toilet!" All picking up of "crap" was done AFTER all shooting was finished, or after each drill was done prior to a break.

Okay--Time for another bushwhacking.

We set up some different targets with a center mass, a skull, and a pelvic girdle. The skulls up top made it necesary for us to lower the targets so as to keep all rounds below the berm. I made the obligatory crack about being attacked by the Seven Dwarves, which actually got laughter to my surprise. Michael then gave us the instructions: "When I say 'Sic 'em', I want you to gimme some clicks, realize it's time to reload, load 5, put 3 in the pelvic girdle, 2 in the brain pan, reload 5 more, 3 in the pelvic girdle, 2 in the brain pan."

We each do so. Michael comes and checks, apparently pleased. "So, are ya happy?" "I'M not, because no one did what I asked. I said 3 in the pelvic girdle, 2 in the brain pan. "Watch this". He then runs up to each of us and without making any contact, mimes a kick to the groin. I was the first to make a defensive reaction and he says "Aha! somebody gets it".

Michael then walks back to the targets and peels off the sheets with the pelvic girdles. "You just shot a guy 3 times in the balls( points at me) and YOU, you just shot a guy 3 times in the balls with a .357, and you think that's where his brain pan is gonna be"? He then restaples the sheets to the center of the targets and on the back of each pelvic girdle sheet is the TOP of a skull. "Okay, go again with your last five".

This being the last of my .357 ammo, once again I end up with the paper flying off, and I had to quip, "well, one way or the other, I turned Grumpy into Sleepy awful quick."

We then did some drills for a left hand draw from a right hand holster in the event of the right hand/arm becoming inoperable( shot/injured/whatever), Then did a drill where we began with our guns on the ground and an orange "sim" gun in our hands, and on command we'd drop it as if injured and pick up the live gun from the ground. We did this three different ways: Once, as if our dominant arm was still together enough to shoot, next as if it was together enough to hand off to the support hand, third , just with the support hand.

What opened my eyes to the usefulness of the J frame, even just a .38 model, was the wounded, left hand ONLY reload. One of the movements involves gripping the piece with the fingers gripping the topstrap, thumb on the butt, and shoving the thumb under the belt preparatory to opening the cylinder left handed and then shoving the piece as high up to the cylinder under the belt as it will go to prevent the cylinder's rotation while reloading.

What I could have done easily with a J frame I could not do easily with the SP101, that thing's just a MONSTER in the grip by comparison. Also, Michael had fitted it for the day with a set of Crimson Trace grips, which, being rubber( on this particular model), resisted going under my belt that much more. ( Michael's seemingly outlandish advice on rubberized, non polymer lasergrips, of spraying a thin layer of clear acrylic on all rubber surfaces, now appeared very sound and functional to me, now that I had to actually TRY some of these techniques I'd only heard about before.

We continued with a few drills concerning the way to make a contact shot, Reloads with gun in one hand, flashlight in other, teamwork/bodyguard drills, firing through pants to simulate firing through clothing using body indexing, drills using alternate aiming techniques from front sight only to intentionally messing up sight alignment, to using the cylinder as the aim point, and seeing that at practical ranges all worked about the same but showing us all alternatives because "If you don't have time to miss, you better FIND time to aim". 

Okay, time for one final bushwhacking.

Michael breaks out Simunitions and uses his red-cylindered gun made for them. He calls us down one by one with the others not allowed to watch till after they've gone through the exercise. My turn comes. I give him my empty Ruger, he starts lkoading it with simunition as he gives me the rules in front of the last point blank target: " In a gunfight, there are no rules. In THIS gunfight, there are TWO rules. You cannot leave this area ( 3 foot by three foot square) and you have two minutes to shoot the bad guy." He then tosses my Ruger well outside the box. "GO!"

I must confess it took me a second or so to begin to run at my gun, quickly be reminded of the rule, and within another second or two, twig what's going on, turn back, grab MICHAEL's gun and shoot the target. I was a little bit pissed at not "getting it" sooner, but Michael appreared well pleased. He then told us why after we were all done--He had done this drill all over the country with tons of people, and quite a few of them took the whole two minutes to figure it out or have to be told. They had a tendency to overthink the problem: "Can I use..?" "Am I allowed to ask for..?" and so on. He was glad we were all walking away from the course with the attitude he wanted to instill of "I'm gonna DO THIS!", because of all six of us the second day, NO one took more than 5 seconds to get it, and it turned out the only two to get it faster than me were the woman who'd taken the class before, and the cop who'd taken the class before.

Which leads me to point out another benefit to attending a class by Michael deBethencourt--once you've paid to take a given class once, you can come back any time, as many times as you want and take a refresher of that same class again , free.

Summary: Anyone who carries a snubby revolver for any serious purpose NEEDS this class.

Revolvers "Dead" or "obsolete"? NOT HARDLY.


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## KenpoTex (Jun 29, 2010)

Great review, thanks.

I will agree that I definitely like his method of loading (gun stays in strong hand) and speed-strip setup (4 in the middle).  I've found this method to be pretty quick, relatively speaking, once one has had some practice.


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## Deaf Smith (Jun 29, 2010)

Andy if you could photo the reload you used, step by step, that would be mucho appreciated. While I pack a Glock, I also pack a 642 Centennial, and sometimes in the boondocks a Smith 15 or Ruger Security Six.

I consider myself a good revolver shot. Ive won first place twice, expert division, in IDPA State using a Speed Six in one match and the Smith M15 Combat Masterpiece in the other. But if there is a better way, I sure want to know!

That's a good class you went to. I'll re-read it many times to get all I can from what you did.

Thanks,

Deaf


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## Andy Moynihan (Jun 29, 2010)

Deaf Smith said:


> Andy if you could photo the reload you used, step by step, that would be mucho appreciated. While I pack a Glock, I also pack a 642 Centennial, and sometimes in the boondocks a Smith 15 or Ruger Security Six.
> 
> I consider myself a good revolver shot. Ive won first place twice, expert division, in IDPA State using a Speed Six in one match and the Smith M15 Combat Masterpiece in the other. But if there is a better way, I sure want to know!
> 
> ...


 
You can watch Michael do it himself on a youtube clip right on the homepage of his site.

www.snubtraining.com


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## Brian R. VanCise (Jun 29, 2010)

KenpoTex said:


> Great review, thanks.
> 
> I will agree that I definitely like his method of loading (gun stays in strong hand) and speed-strip setup (4 in the middle).  I've found this method to be pretty quick, relatively speaking, once one has had some practice.



I definitely agree with this!


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## Stick Dummy (Jun 30, 2010)

Andy,

Thanks for posting the info.

Back in the day LOL (can you say early 1970's) all of this was commonly taught to wheel gunners.

I carried a 3" S&W model 65 with two speedloaders Dades if memory serves, a dump pouch ( later replaced by a desantis 2x2x2 pouch.

Wheelgun mastery calls for skills with both hands to be practiced with more diligence than an auto.

Did you get run through "no see" reloads?

IMHE They are probably the most critical test of survival skills.


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## Andy Moynihan (Jun 30, 2010)

Stick Dummy said:


> Andy,
> 
> Thanks for posting the info.
> 
> ...


 
Sort of--all through both days we were told to try, if we could, once we knew the reloads, to keep our eyes on the "threat" and not look at reloading.

It was tough for some at the start of day one, but by the end of day two we'd been doing it so much it was no problem.


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