Time continues to march on whether you want it to or not, and May was no exception to that as it flew by for us! We had a lot going on with Caylen and Phil running classes in multiple locations up in the Northwest. It’s been an awesome month of progress and we’ve got some awesome stuff coming up for you guys in short order! (Ahem, ahem, Positional Shooting Masterclass…)
Class Recap
Heart Mountain – Cody, Wyoming
May brought us to a new venue on the outskirts of Cody, WY. Heart Mountain is an iconic sight for Cody. It’s an unmistakable landmark on the north end of town and anyone who’s spent any time in Cody knows that the element of wind is always present, like it or not! We had an opportunity to work with the landowner who allowed us to run two courses there, a PR 101 and a PR 201. As I write this, I’m doing so with a tinge of jealousy because it looked like an incredible place to shoot and learn more about mountain winds. We had some very happy students, even though the weather threw us some curveballs! It’s springtime in Wyoming and that means anything is possible, but the truth is that there’s no such thing as bad weather, only a poor selection in clothing.
Heart Mountain was a great opportunity for all those in attendance, and you can expect to see more courses from us at this venue in the future. Think about a Mountain Shooting Clinic, a Wind Reading Clinic, and a Technical Rifle Hunter Clinic. Keep your eyes on the calendar!
Mountain States Tactical Officers Association (MSTOA)
The Mountain States Tactical Officers Association is a growing organization and every year that we’ve gone we see impressive growth of officers coming to get a week of solid training in a variety of disciplines. With courses covering tactical medicine, close quarters battle, pistol/carbine, executive protection, basic and advanced sniper there’s something for everyone within the community of tactical officers in the Northwest and mountain states. With this being our 4th year in attendance, this is one week of training we won’t miss. We’ve had such a huge demand for our law enforcement sniper courses that this year we elected to run both a basic and advanced course concurrently. With both courses filled within a week, we saw some familiar faces, but many attendees were new to the Modern Day Sniper thought process.
We learned a lot from the week of training, and it caused us to have some deep conversations at the end of the day on our philosophy of training and what really separates a basically trained law enforcement sniper from a sniper with “advanced” skills. At the end of the day, regardless of your skill level, there’s not much that separates the two when the time comes to grab your kit and head to a call-out. A basically trained sniper can find themselves presented with a complex situation the same as an advanced sniper as many departments don’t have the ability to choose who’s going to respond and who’s not. Needless to say, we’ll be making some adjustments to our training program to reflect these thought processes. Expect to hear about that in some upcoming podcast episodes.
When it was all said and done, we had 18 snipers that got a face-full of awesome training for the week working on everything from the fundamentals of marksmanship, tripod deployments, positional shooting, equipment management, and an overall skills evaluation. Solid work in a week that just didn’t have enough hours in the day.
Match Recap
National Rifle League Hunter Series
The newly released NRL Hunter series is garnering quite a bit of attention, and for good reason. It’s a welcome break from the traditional “PRS” match format which really hasn’t seen much evolution in the last decade aside from the level of participation. The NRL Hunter series is more of a field match, focusing on the skills that a hunter would use in most hunting scenarios. Blind stages, tricky positions and locating and ranging your own targets breathes a breath of fresh air into the competitive shooting scene. Our own Phillip Velayo has shot a couple of them so far and based on his recaps, he’s really liking the new format because it’s most in-line with what we use a rifle for, and most in-line with the skills our students need for their use as well. Phillip managed to grab a 10th place finish at the Snake River Outdoorsman last weekend. He had some awesome debrief points and we’ll definitely be discussing those in an upcoming podcast episode.
Bottom line, get out there and compete! We can’t stress enough how important it is for the development of your skills to move yourself outside your comfort zone and solve someone else’s problems with your rifle. Every new venue is a new battlespace for professional snipers, and it’s a new hunting spot for the hunters and enthusiasts.
The Modern Day Rifleman Network
The Modern Day Rifleman Network is growing by the day with new members coming into both the free section and the paid sections. Our mission with this platform is to create a community of like-minded enthusiasts who want the finest information pertaining to the journey of the rifleman available today. We’re on the way, and it shows with the conversations that are happening there right now. Everything from reloading, match debriefs and recaps, hunting, external ballistics, and deeper esoteric conversations on the intricacies of life in general. If you’re not there yet you’re missing out.
We’ve Moved
We shot out an email about this once already, but by the numbers we’re seeing within the Mighty Network, we’ve still got a LOT of our students from the old MDS Schoolhouse to come over to the new Schoolhouse located within the Modern Day Rifleman network. Everyone with an account at the old MDS Schoolhouse site should have gotten an email with the instructions to cross-deck. If that’s still sitting in your inbox, search that up or hit up Kassandra and she’ll get you taken care of.
The old MDS Schoolhouse will be up for a while so don’t worry, you won’t lose your access to your purchases, but we’d like to get everyone moved over ASAP so we can communicate with you easier. Really guys, the network is where you want to be.
The Modern Day Sniper Podcast
Ok, ya’ll can browbeat us on the podcast. We deserve it. We’ve been slacking on and we’re really sorry… Ok, I won’t speak for anyone but myself; I’m really sorry! We’re doing better, I promise; we’re recording an episode this evening with the hilarious David Baker of the Just F’n Send It Podcast. Always someone we look forward to chatting with, David is a great conversationalist.
In the event you haven’t listened to our latest episode #0043 Training With Intention brush up and get current. We’ll have another dropping this week. With a bunch of classes and matches in the rear-view, we’ve got lots to talk about.
Regardless of our tardiness with the Podcast, you guys have been killing it with the support! As of my typing this, we’re at 311,462 downloads in just 43 episodes! That’s crazy cool, so thank you guys so much for your support!
In closing, I have to say that I’m incredibly humbled to be able to serve our community. Everyone within our network, everyone who’s a podcast listener, all of our alumni, all of you are awesome! From everyone that’s worked within our team, all I hear is that our customers are some of the nicest people they’ve ever interacted with. That says a lot guys, so thank you for being you. We’re beyond stoked to have you within a community that really is yours at the end of the day. We’re just here to act as guides, coaches, and mentors.
Keep crushing it. Keep training.
Elevate yourself. Elevate your awareness of yourself.
Uplevel each and every day.
And whatever you do, keep your face on the gun…
Cheers!
Caylen W and the Modern Day Sniper Team
