Shh, don’t tell my wife, but the reason I teach is so that I can continue to fund my training without causing any disruptions in domestic finances or harmony. I’m privileged to have trained under many superior instructors; I’d like to take this opportunity to thank them and list them here.
Please note that I’m not claiming these folks endorse me, and indeed many of them helped clean up the clumsy game I brought to the table. I’ll link to, or provide contact information, for as many as I can. They are welcome to chime in on this post in any manner they wish. And please note that I’m not claiming any top tier capabilities, but rather making it clear just which instructors I count as major influences.
Though I had plenty of various types of martial instruction from grade school on, a lot of it was what Bruce Lee termed of the “classical mess” variety. As such I’m only listing post-mess learning, more or less in the order I encountered it:
Pat Tray. Sifu Tray is a warrior in every sense of the word. A twenty year SEAL, with thirteen of those spent on Team 6 (an unheard of length of time), Pat served at the tip of the spear in numerous engagements on many continents, and trained a lot of folks on the pointy end, too. Under his tutelage I studied Thai Boxing, Filipino Martial Arts, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, and put it all together with Bruce Lee’s Jeet Kune Do. I could spend the balance of this essay describing Pat’s profound influence on me. Instead I’ll focus on several key points. First orthodoxy is an afterthought where Pat’s concerned. He’s far more concerned with a technique being effective than he is with coloring between the lines, an ethos that my 6’6” carcass greatly appreciated once I no longer had to execute techniques developed by 5’3” folks in a by-the-book manner. Second, Pat is well regarded by major martial arts players, which meant I got to train under excellent guest instructors such as Guro Dan Inasanto, Erik Paulson, Ajarn Chai Sirisute, among others I’ll mention later. And though I could ramble on, the final thing I’ll mention is that Mr. Tray attracts very good students, which means that I had the opportunity to train hard with with switched on folks able to leave their ego at the door. It’s difficult to overstate how much learning occurs where good partners are involved.
Pat’s Trident Martial Arts web page can be found here: http://www.tridentmartialarts.com
And his Facebook page here: https://www.facebook.com/tridentmmaacademy?fref=ts
Ben Gilbert. Ben has been Pat’s student for decades, was his lead instructor, and is the gent I’ve done most of my hand to hand training under. Ben understands that I march to a different drummer and learn by finding all the ways to do it wrong before I find out how to make it right for me. Indeed, Ben learned early on that the surest way to drum effective techniques into my noggin was to smack me in educational ways. Ben is the gent who certified me as an instructor in Sifu Tray’s USA Combatives curriculum and is one of the nicest guys you’ll ever meet. I would not be the instructor I am today without having Ben as the friend and role model that he is.
Coach Charlie Doll. The late Coach Doll was one of those self-effacing, uber-competent, very accomplished gents you find all over the shooting world, and the more time you spend with him the more you learn of his outstanding shotgun marksmanship and instructional abilities. Charlie was part of an NCAA coaching dynasty that won a decade’s worth of sequential college trap and skeet championships, a feat you won’t find occurring in any other college sport. He went over 5000 rounds of shooting trap without missing a clay bird, and regularly went thousands of rounds without missing a target. His daughter is a shotgun Olympian, one he coached. And so on. On a lark I took his trap and skeet class, came back the following semester and assisted as a range safety officer, and then began instructing students myself. Charlie taught me much of what I know about diagnosing shooter problems, long gun fitment, and working with new shooters.
Coach never got down with the whole internet thing, but his son is now running his gun shop, which can be found here:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Powder-Horn-Gun-Shop/142477052464762
I miss working with Coach greatly.
John Murphy. Not only did John take my feeble defensive pistol game to respectable heights, he is also the person I’ve stolen the most shamelessly from as I developed my defensive pistol skills. If anyone can lay claim as the author of my defensive firearm instructional abilities, it is John. A retired Marine, John’s instructional method could be described as drill instructor lite, but saying so doesn’t do justice to the nuance and perceptive abilities he brings to his teaching. John thinks about his instructional methods all the time, arrives at any table with considerable talents, and works harder than any instructor I’ve met to get inside the heads of his students and fix what’s broken in their defensive firearm game. If you are in the Northern Virginia area you owe it to yourself to train with John as you will learn a spectacular amount about effective firearm use under stress. Note further that all of the people I mention from this point on I met through John. You can tell a lot about a person from the company they keep.
His Facebook page can be found here: https://www.facebook.com/pages/FPF-Training/134979619866863?fref=ts
And his web page here: http://www.fpftraining.com
Tom and Lynn Givens. What if someone told you that Yoda from Star Wars and Glinda the Good Witch from the Wizard of Oz were available to provide you with the most important martial training of your life? And what if these two folks had a documented track record of success few others can emulate? Tom and Lynn Givens are the only two people on the planet able to match these criteria and have done the most to advance my game of late. Through both their pistol and shotgun instructional offerings, to their instructor’s class (which I passed by the skin of my teeth as you have to perform at the 90 percent or better level on three separate tests) to Tom’s many videos, articles, and books, I can’t think of any two people who have their level of concentrated, well delivered wisdom available and easily accessed. If you are only to train with one top tier firearm organization in your life, make it Tom and Lynn’s Rangemaster classes.
You can find their Facebook page here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/234643425923/
And their web site here: http://www.rangemaster.com
Greg Ellifritz. An Ohio police officer, Greg is an aggregator, the best I’ve met. Most the hand to hand skills I’ve seen him teach are things I’ve encountered elsewhere, as are the knife, ground, emergency medical, and other sorts of classes of his I’ve attended. Greg, however, does the finest job of paring a given skill set down to its most essential elements and disseminating them in context and in a manner students are likely to retain. Though nowhere near the polymath Greg is, I do have a diverse set of skills and have struggled with how best to integrate and teach them to my students, at least until I met Greg. The only person I’ve stolen more shamelessly from is John Murphy; I’ve adopted a lot of Greg’s methodologies when conveying skills, particularly to new students. If you are only going to take one close quarters firearms, knife, ground, stick, emergency medical or other class, take one of Greg’s offerings.
Greg’s aggregation abilities are on display in his Facebook feed, found here:
https://www.facebook.com/greg.ellifritz?fref=ts&ref=br_tf
And his web site is here: http://www.activeresponsetraining.net
William Aprill. I’ve only taken one of William's classes, a two day seminar co-taught by Greg Ellifritz. Though my exposure to him is limited, the impact he’s had on my thinking is far from that. William is a a psychologist and risk consultant with a law enforcement background, one who has spent a lot of time dealing with and researching violent criminal actors (VCA), their tools, techniques, and their world views. Though I’ve not spent much time being trained by him, the training he has provided particularly in regard to VCAs, has deeply informed my thinking. It is not often you sit in a classroom or on a training floor and feel your cognitive framework shifting, but that happens on a regular basis when William is standing at the front of the room.
His Facebook page is here: https://www.facebook.com/william.aprill?fref=ts
Craig Douglas. Last, but certainly far from least. I started this essay by mentioning Bruce Lee’s “classical mess.” Well the anti-classical mess movement has spawned some contemporary orthodoxies every bit as rigid as their classical antecedents. Along comes Craig, another been there, done that gent. While working as an undercover narcotics officer, Craig found himself in a lot of dicey situations, situations which the contemporary orthodoxy didn’t well address. As such Craig took all his martial assumptions, followed them back to their roots, and then ruthlessly examined what does and doesn’t work in the real world while under threat of life or death. Again, I could devote thousands of words to the answers Craig developed; suffice to say he created a root martial integration where skills across the martial continuum—be they ground, stand up, knife, impact weapon, standing grapple, pepper spray, firearms, skills, et al—were together in a manner where the life and death needs of the moment trumped all other considerations and demanded the highest percentage response via the most deliverable method, integrated in a manner where the practitioner had a high likelihood of being able to apply those skills under high stress. I’ve taken Craig’s Extreme Close Quarters Concept class, and am proud to be hosting his Edged Weapons Overview training next April. Training of this breadth and caliber is difficult to obtain; I highly recommend all of Craig’s offerings.
His Facebook page is here:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Shivworks-and-Shivworks-Alumni/384993038366814?fref=ts
And his web site here: http://shivworks.com/?page_id=720
There are plenty of other folks out there who have influenced me greatly, from Marc Denny of Dogbrothers fame (http://dogbrothers.com), to Ray Terry of the former Eskrima Digest (http://www.martialartsresource.com/filipino/filframe.htm), to Mrs. Judy Bishop—my first firearms instructor--to friends and training partners such as Dave Carter (http://www.relentlessmmagym.com we were always the two biggest dudes at any given seminar and so always partnered up to spare others), In Chun Kim, and plenty of others I’m doubtless forgetting. I’m deeply grateful for all the skills and knowledge all these folks imparted and hope to contribute to others they way they have all contributed to my martial development.
Please note that I’m not claiming these folks endorse me, and indeed many of them helped clean up the clumsy game I brought to the table. I’ll link to, or provide contact information, for as many as I can. They are welcome to chime in on this post in any manner they wish. And please note that I’m not claiming any top tier capabilities, but rather making it clear just which instructors I count as major influences.
Though I had plenty of various types of martial instruction from grade school on, a lot of it was what Bruce Lee termed of the “classical mess” variety. As such I’m only listing post-mess learning, more or less in the order I encountered it:
Pat Tray. Sifu Tray is a warrior in every sense of the word. A twenty year SEAL, with thirteen of those spent on Team 6 (an unheard of length of time), Pat served at the tip of the spear in numerous engagements on many continents, and trained a lot of folks on the pointy end, too. Under his tutelage I studied Thai Boxing, Filipino Martial Arts, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, and put it all together with Bruce Lee’s Jeet Kune Do. I could spend the balance of this essay describing Pat’s profound influence on me. Instead I’ll focus on several key points. First orthodoxy is an afterthought where Pat’s concerned. He’s far more concerned with a technique being effective than he is with coloring between the lines, an ethos that my 6’6” carcass greatly appreciated once I no longer had to execute techniques developed by 5’3” folks in a by-the-book manner. Second, Pat is well regarded by major martial arts players, which meant I got to train under excellent guest instructors such as Guro Dan Inasanto, Erik Paulson, Ajarn Chai Sirisute, among others I’ll mention later. And though I could ramble on, the final thing I’ll mention is that Mr. Tray attracts very good students, which means that I had the opportunity to train hard with with switched on folks able to leave their ego at the door. It’s difficult to overstate how much learning occurs where good partners are involved.
Pat’s Trident Martial Arts web page can be found here: http://www.tridentmartialarts.com
And his Facebook page here: https://www.facebook.com/tridentmmaacademy?fref=ts
Ben Gilbert. Ben has been Pat’s student for decades, was his lead instructor, and is the gent I’ve done most of my hand to hand training under. Ben understands that I march to a different drummer and learn by finding all the ways to do it wrong before I find out how to make it right for me. Indeed, Ben learned early on that the surest way to drum effective techniques into my noggin was to smack me in educational ways. Ben is the gent who certified me as an instructor in Sifu Tray’s USA Combatives curriculum and is one of the nicest guys you’ll ever meet. I would not be the instructor I am today without having Ben as the friend and role model that he is.
Coach Charlie Doll. The late Coach Doll was one of those self-effacing, uber-competent, very accomplished gents you find all over the shooting world, and the more time you spend with him the more you learn of his outstanding shotgun marksmanship and instructional abilities. Charlie was part of an NCAA coaching dynasty that won a decade’s worth of sequential college trap and skeet championships, a feat you won’t find occurring in any other college sport. He went over 5000 rounds of shooting trap without missing a clay bird, and regularly went thousands of rounds without missing a target. His daughter is a shotgun Olympian, one he coached. And so on. On a lark I took his trap and skeet class, came back the following semester and assisted as a range safety officer, and then began instructing students myself. Charlie taught me much of what I know about diagnosing shooter problems, long gun fitment, and working with new shooters.
Coach never got down with the whole internet thing, but his son is now running his gun shop, which can be found here:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Powder-Horn-Gun-Shop/142477052464762
I miss working with Coach greatly.
John Murphy. Not only did John take my feeble defensive pistol game to respectable heights, he is also the person I’ve stolen the most shamelessly from as I developed my defensive pistol skills. If anyone can lay claim as the author of my defensive firearm instructional abilities, it is John. A retired Marine, John’s instructional method could be described as drill instructor lite, but saying so doesn’t do justice to the nuance and perceptive abilities he brings to his teaching. John thinks about his instructional methods all the time, arrives at any table with considerable talents, and works harder than any instructor I’ve met to get inside the heads of his students and fix what’s broken in their defensive firearm game. If you are in the Northern Virginia area you owe it to yourself to train with John as you will learn a spectacular amount about effective firearm use under stress. Note further that all of the people I mention from this point on I met through John. You can tell a lot about a person from the company they keep.
His Facebook page can be found here: https://www.facebook.com/pages/FPF-Training/134979619866863?fref=ts
And his web page here: http://www.fpftraining.com
Tom and Lynn Givens. What if someone told you that Yoda from Star Wars and Glinda the Good Witch from the Wizard of Oz were available to provide you with the most important martial training of your life? And what if these two folks had a documented track record of success few others can emulate? Tom and Lynn Givens are the only two people on the planet able to match these criteria and have done the most to advance my game of late. Through both their pistol and shotgun instructional offerings, to their instructor’s class (which I passed by the skin of my teeth as you have to perform at the 90 percent or better level on three separate tests) to Tom’s many videos, articles, and books, I can’t think of any two people who have their level of concentrated, well delivered wisdom available and easily accessed. If you are only to train with one top tier firearm organization in your life, make it Tom and Lynn’s Rangemaster classes.
You can find their Facebook page here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/234643425923/
And their web site here: http://www.rangemaster.com
Greg Ellifritz. An Ohio police officer, Greg is an aggregator, the best I’ve met. Most the hand to hand skills I’ve seen him teach are things I’ve encountered elsewhere, as are the knife, ground, emergency medical, and other sorts of classes of his I’ve attended. Greg, however, does the finest job of paring a given skill set down to its most essential elements and disseminating them in context and in a manner students are likely to retain. Though nowhere near the polymath Greg is, I do have a diverse set of skills and have struggled with how best to integrate and teach them to my students, at least until I met Greg. The only person I’ve stolen more shamelessly from is John Murphy; I’ve adopted a lot of Greg’s methodologies when conveying skills, particularly to new students. If you are only going to take one close quarters firearms, knife, ground, stick, emergency medical or other class, take one of Greg’s offerings.
Greg’s aggregation abilities are on display in his Facebook feed, found here:
https://www.facebook.com/greg.ellifritz?fref=ts&ref=br_tf
And his web site is here: http://www.activeresponsetraining.net
William Aprill. I’ve only taken one of William's classes, a two day seminar co-taught by Greg Ellifritz. Though my exposure to him is limited, the impact he’s had on my thinking is far from that. William is a a psychologist and risk consultant with a law enforcement background, one who has spent a lot of time dealing with and researching violent criminal actors (VCA), their tools, techniques, and their world views. Though I’ve not spent much time being trained by him, the training he has provided particularly in regard to VCAs, has deeply informed my thinking. It is not often you sit in a classroom or on a training floor and feel your cognitive framework shifting, but that happens on a regular basis when William is standing at the front of the room.
His Facebook page is here: https://www.facebook.com/william.aprill?fref=ts
Craig Douglas. Last, but certainly far from least. I started this essay by mentioning Bruce Lee’s “classical mess.” Well the anti-classical mess movement has spawned some contemporary orthodoxies every bit as rigid as their classical antecedents. Along comes Craig, another been there, done that gent. While working as an undercover narcotics officer, Craig found himself in a lot of dicey situations, situations which the contemporary orthodoxy didn’t well address. As such Craig took all his martial assumptions, followed them back to their roots, and then ruthlessly examined what does and doesn’t work in the real world while under threat of life or death. Again, I could devote thousands of words to the answers Craig developed; suffice to say he created a root martial integration where skills across the martial continuum—be they ground, stand up, knife, impact weapon, standing grapple, pepper spray, firearms, skills, et al—were together in a manner where the life and death needs of the moment trumped all other considerations and demanded the highest percentage response via the most deliverable method, integrated in a manner where the practitioner had a high likelihood of being able to apply those skills under high stress. I’ve taken Craig’s Extreme Close Quarters Concept class, and am proud to be hosting his Edged Weapons Overview training next April. Training of this breadth and caliber is difficult to obtain; I highly recommend all of Craig’s offerings.
His Facebook page is here:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Shivworks-and-Shivworks-Alumni/384993038366814?fref=ts
And his web site here: http://shivworks.com/?page_id=720
There are plenty of other folks out there who have influenced me greatly, from Marc Denny of Dogbrothers fame (http://dogbrothers.com), to Ray Terry of the former Eskrima Digest (http://www.martialartsresource.com/filipino/filframe.htm), to Mrs. Judy Bishop—my first firearms instructor--to friends and training partners such as Dave Carter (http://www.relentlessmmagym.com we were always the two biggest dudes at any given seminar and so always partnered up to spare others), In Chun Kim, and plenty of others I’m doubtless forgetting. I’m deeply grateful for all the skills and knowledge all these folks imparted and hope to contribute to others they way they have all contributed to my martial development.