Innovative Tactical Concepts is the most controversial self defense and firearms school in the United States. One of the reasons we are so controversial is because we speak out about the fallacies of typical defensive handgun and martial arts training.Although we are not popular among either of these training communities because we are so outspoken, our training remains the most realistic, practical, and effective training available exposing civilians to the least amount of risk possible, yet bringing the highest reward.

The primary reason we are different is that our self defense training is based upon sound empty-hand skills. Because our system is based upon empty-hand skills, unlike traditional firearms training, our system provides you with solutions that you can use anywhere at any time. You should depend upon your unarmed skills to save your life and not the use of any tool, including a handgun. One advantage of our training methods is that you are learning one system to defend yourself. Why should you have to go to the “gun experts” to learn how to defend yourself with a gun and to the “empty-hand experts” to learn to defend yourself unarmed? Truth is, you shouldn’t.

Another thing that separates us from others is that we train realistically on the scenarios that are most likely to happen to you. Typical handgun training focuses on the least likely situations you would ever face. In fact, typical firearms training is at best, “good” for about 10% or less of situations you would ever encounter.

The majority of defensive handgun training and martial arts training poses high risk with low reward. This is what you can expect from typical handgun training:

• A 20% average hit ratio. In real life threatening situations, you are unlikely to be successful in immediately reducing a threat with a handgun.
• A reliance on text book scenarios.  Text book training teaches that you will survive long enough to draw your gun, hit your threat, and immediately reduce the threat. Not only is this unlikely, this mindset alone places you in danger because threatening scenarios are not predictable. They are not “text book”. Firearms instructors don’t teach you how to stay alive long enough to have the opportunity to draw your gun, much less decide if using your gun is the right thing to do. So ask yourself: is their training really necessary when their instruction applies less than 10% of the time? And if they don’t teach you how to stay alive what’s the point?
• A reliance on the use of a gun. Typical defensive handgun training is based solely upon the use of a gun for survival. So the training helps only if you have a gun on you. Most people don’t carry a gun everywhere. So, what good is the training if you don’t have a gun on your person?

You won’t hear this information from a firearms instructor! So accept this reality check, courtesy of the experts at Innovative Tactical Concepts. But there’s more. Firearms training has some inherent weaknesses. Read on:

• Typical defensive handgun training hasn’t changed much over the past 20+ years
• Firearms training yields an average 20% hit ratio, yet only 20% of people who are shot die from being shot! That means the threat will remain in the fight long enough to injure or kill you in 90% of situations. Surprised? Don’t be. ‘Insanity’ is doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different result.
• Most firearms instructors don’t have empty-hand skills and they are too reliant on the handgun to get the job done. Sadly, they don’t fully understand how things happen in real life fights and they can’t teach you how to have the best chance of survival because of their lack of knowledge.
•  Firearms instructors only teach a very small portion of what you need to know, and it is unlikely that you will ever use what they are teaching.

Now, handgun training doesn’t really sound that good, does it?

If the training yields poor results then why are people still teaching it? Some instructors will say that firearms training has stood the test of time. We beg to differ. If that is true then why are the hit ratio and death rates so low? Use of a firearm is unlikely to resolve the situation immediately. To help you see this more clearly, watch our YouTube video called, “Reality vs. The Matrix Handgun Training”.

As far as martial arts systems are concerned, the principles most systems are founded upon actually place the defender in a dangerous position when executing a technique. Typical martial arts training relies on strength, power, and speed. Techniques commonly taught are not effective against an attacker who is larger and stronger than you. With most martial arts, you have to train for years to have a chance of getting good at what they teach. Do you have the time to invest in a system that is ineffective and takes years to learn? No, you don’t.

However, our system is simple, effective, and works against threatening persons of all sizes and strength because our methods utilize the whole body to deliver a strike as opposed to using just a limb as martial arts disciplines do.

Most firearms and self defense training actually places you in great danger. One reason for this is that the principles on which the training is founded are not good. For example, defensive handgun training is based upon the attack scenario happening the way the trainer taught you. How often do you think a real-life threat situation happens the way it does in the classroom? Get real! Also, the teaching of extending your arms towards an attacker who is within 10 feet of you is not wise because your gun can be taken away, both your hands can be shot causing you to drop your gun. How do you expect to defend yourself with two injured hands? Again, this teaching is common because most firearms instructors don’t understand how things really happen. Yet, firearms instructors teach this method more often than not.

Martial arts training is just as bad. Most martial arts disciplines don’t train realistically and give you a false sense of security about what you can do. One would think that these empty-hand experts should have it right. However, their training is not based upon real world situations. What works in a dojo or training environment does not necessarily work in the real world where the attackers are not going along with what you are trying to do.

One thing that most people miss, including instructors, is that the approach to the fight is different for law enforcement, military, and civilians. This is important because a large portion of the firearms instructor community has a law enforcement or military background. People tend to think that because of their background they are qualified to teach you how to use a handgun in a self defense situation. Contrary to popular belief, nothing is farther from the truth because their approach to the fight is different than what yours is going to be. However, the approach to the fight is what makes the biggest difference. Since the approach is different, the tactics must be different because the approach is the most important factor in determining what will and won’t work in a life threatening encounter. 

You might be saying to yourself, if what we are saying is true, then why aren’t other instructors teaching the same thing? There are several reasons for this. First, most people are lazy, including instructors, and they don’t want to invest the time into learning unarmed skills. People in general want to feel good about putting forth minimal effort, yet achieving maximum results. Furthermore, most instructors don’t train realistically so they never learn the things they are doing wrong and how things really happen in confrontations. Secondly, instructors often take the word of their instructor and never train in a manner that will enlighten them to the weaknesses of their training methods.

Truth be known, most instructors are not prepared to successfully deal with a life threatening situation. As time goes on, you WILL see more instructors adopting our methods. Other schools are teaching integrated combatives, but their systems are also inferior due to the foundation upon which the unarmed skills are based. There are flaws in every system, tactic or technique. What it boils down to is risk verses reward. Ideally, you want low risk with high reward. However, there will be times when it is high risk with low reward. We feel this is the exception to the rule and not the norm. However, most defensive handgun training is high risk low reward because they rely upon the gun to get the job done.

If the training is yielding poor results WHY would you want to train using their methods? That is a question you have to answer on your own. If you limit yourself to typical firearms training or martial arts training, you may very well die or become seriously injured in a confrontation. Is it true that some training is better than no training? The answer is ‘no’. Because you can place yourself in danger attempting a tactic taught in a dojo that isn’t effective in real world situations. So, if a teaching places you in danger or is not practical for real world solutions, isn’t the training worthless? ‘Insanity’ is doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different result. Don’t be foolish. Don’t be insane!

We have solutions that are effective and simple to perform. Having said that, you will have to put in dirt time in order to be proficient in defending yourself using our methods.

We understand that time and money are issues for most people. However, we have a solution for you that you can use in your own home. Sure, live fire training is important and you should do that. However, you can train realistically without ever firing a shot. We have an innovative online training venue that is affordable, simple and effective. And you don’t have to leave your house to use it. If you are truly interested in learning how to defend yourself, then you should follow this link (hyperlink) to learn more about our best-in-class online training program. Some people will tell you that you won’t be able to learn how to effectively defend yourself from videos, etc. That is true in most cases. However, our training is interactive which changes the playing field. Click here to learn more about our online training program.

Our pledge to you is that we will never compromise our commitment to teaching realistic and practical self defense and tactical skills - period! Even when others won’t stand up for what is right or don’t agree with what we say, we will not waiver from reality based training. Teaching endorsed by a big name school does not make it effective or practical. Mark our words, sooner or later other instructors will be forced to face the things we’ve talked about, and we are willing to be pioneers.

You can be a part of our unique and realistic training right where you are.  Use our interactive online training program. Click here to learn more about this awesome one of a kind training venue. And continue to watch free videos provided to you by Innovative Tactical Concepts.