PMCI - February 2017

pmcimagazine.com
TRAINING TOOLS: MANTISX
NEXT GENERATION FIREARMS TRAINING
When I visit any of the major shooting and tactical shows I’m always on the lookout for something
that I find truly “game changing” and for this year’s SHOT Show there was one product that stood
out for me. “MantisX” is a relatively new training tool that quite literally puts a top-level shooting
instructor in your pocket!
How often do we rail on about the importance
of regular and thorough training when it
comes to firearms, but for many of us getting
that all important “range time” is not quite
as simple as it sounds. When I lived in the
USA I would shoot handgun at least once,
if not twice, a week at my local range and
take as many courses as I could with highly
experienced instructors at hand. Having
now returned to the UK though my regular
handgun training has been relegated to using either air or
airsoft replicas in order to “keep my hand and eye” in, and
given that there is no handgun culture here it’s very difficult
to find instruction of any kind as handguns fall under the
“Section 5” banner which is restricted pretty much to Mil and LE.
I do travel abroad when it’s feasible and there it is possible
to shoot handgun, but sadly constraints in both finances and
simply time make this a lot rarer an occurrence than I’d like
in an ideal world. Whilst the replica handguns do allow me
to work on my holster work and manipulations, they are in
reality a poor second to the “real deal”. Although there are
numerous highly effective laser training solutions out there
these sadly cost considerable amounts of money and once
again having the space to make proper and full use of them
is an issue; not really an ideal situation when it comes to
training at home and on a really regular basis.
Even with a home training setup though there’s another
element that comes into play; although you may hit a target
with a laser trace or indeed some form of “pellet” projectile
it could be that without the remedial input of an experienced
instructor/mentor you are actually setting possible bad habits
in stone which will undoubtedly affect your competence and
performance when it comes time to “go loud”. I’ve been
searching for a training solution that I could use effectively
and regularly at home, but to date hadn’t found one that I
was comfortable with.
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