Staging Your Concealed Carry Firearm

Normally, when we talk about staging a defensive firearm, we're talking about a firearm, that's off your body. One that's going to be either loaded or maybe you have a magazine in it, may be loaded and chambered. Maybe it's going to be unloaded next to a magazine and inside of a clandestine storage area or a quick access safe. Or maybe it's in a bag that you carry around with you. And it's staged for defensive use. It's not one that you're carrying. Staging a concealed carry firearm is something that you're going to do when there is an imminent threat. Now, not an actual threat, but one that is imminent. One that you are pretty sure that something's wrong. You want to have better access to your firearm. And you're not just going to be standing here, you know, in a ready position, like you would be on a training range or a competition range, needing to go through your concealment garment, get your hand on your gun and present. If you're, let's say in a convenience store, and you are pretty sure that something's going on up at that counter, that you don't want to get involved in, but you need to be ready to defend yourself, if it is what you think it is. Maybe it's a guy having an argument. There's a heated argument going on. Maybe it's a guy who's threatening the clerk. Maybe there's two people in front of the clerk that are arguing amongst each other, and you're a little bit worried that someone might present a weapon. Somebody might threaten someone, somebody might threaten you with lethal force that you're going to have to respond to. Well, there's no reason to be standing there with a bag of chips and a water in your hand and your gun underneath of a concealment garment. And that's what I mean by staging a concealed carry firearm. There are absolutely going to be times when you're not just blindsided and ambushed and completely caught off-guard by someone who threatens you or someone else. Now, if you're standing there looking at the chip aisle and a shot goes off, and you have your startle reaction, and you realize you need to shoot, obviously you're going to have to clear your concealment garment, get your hand on the gun, present it and shoot. But if you see this coming ahead of time, if you hear the argument and you turn around and look, and you see a guy with a knife, or a bat, or maybe someone is gesturing towards their hand, maybe they're showing their firearm to someone and saying, 'Hey, give me all your money' or 'Hey, you better shut up or else'. Whenever you see this thing agitating to the point where you're thinking, 'Wow I may need to defend myself, I may need to defend someone else.' Why not put the chips down, put the drink down, get into a position of advantage, stay, at least concealed, if not behind something that represents cover, and go ahead and open up the concealment garment, expose your firearm. And once you expose your firearm, it's probably a pretty good idea to go ahead and put your hand on the gun. See, there's not much reason to go from completely oblivious to what's going on, to, well, I'm going to open carry now all of a sudden. Y'know, we don't want to expose the firearm as a threat or as an intimidation. The reason that you might expose your firearm is because you believe it's imminently likely that you're going to need to draw it. So, once the firearm is exposed, go ahead and put your hand on the gun. One of the things we tell people when they go to this staged position, and this happens a lot in law enforcement, is that once you put your hand on the gun, you should also defeat any retention devices. Now, in this case, there's nothing here, but friction in terms of a retention device on this particular holster. But if I had a snap, or if I had a button, or if I had a lever that I had to push, this would be the time to do it. As soon as I put my hand on the gun, I am now staged and prepared to draw. Now, this isn't something you're very likely to do if you're the one being confronted, because if you are the one being confronted, then go ahead and draw. Come out to a ready position, put your hand on the gun and stage it in a ready position. Now you may tell someone, 'Hey stop threatening me, back away. I will use this firearm to defend myself or defend my family. Defend whoever it is I'm interested in and I care about defending, if I need to. Stay back, yes, I will use the firearm.' So, no reason to simply go to a point of saying, 'Hey, I've got a gun,' no reason to say, 'Hey, I've got a gun and I'll use it.' If I'm being confronted, I'm going right to my ready position. And, of course, the next step would be going from the ready position, extending and shooting. I don't think it's a good idea to drive your gun out and threaten someone with it at an extended position. If they haven't responded to this, then I don't think this is a good place to be. If I'm already out and extended in a shooting position, but what else happens when I go to an extended shooting position? When I go to extended shooting position, I put my finger on the trigger. That's what I'm training to do. In fact, as I extend, I'm moving my finger to the trigger. So, an extended shooting position makes it much more likely that your finger is going to be on the trigger, because that's where you shoot, right? On the way out, if I'm now going to make this an extended ready position, I don't want to have to think about keeping my finger off the trigger when it's out here in the shooting position. I don't want my gun below my line of sight to where if I decide to shoot, I'm going to be bringing it up instead of driving it out. So, when you're in the ready position your finger is off the trigger and you're ready. When you're driving out, your finger is going to go to the trigger, think about it. If I'm out here with my finger on the trigger, and this is what some people refer to as trigger checking, if I'm in a position where I think I might need to shoot, but I'm not ready to shoot, and I drive that gun out, and I start checking the trigger, and then I get startled, or then I get nervous, or then there's a sudden movement, maybe a sudden surrender movement, or a sudden turn to run. And in that movement, in that furtive movement, as they say, I squeeze that trigger and shoot someone I don't need to shoot? That's a tragedy. And it's a tragedy that comes from recklessness. Stage the firearm in your hand, with your finger off the trigger, in a compressed ready position. Stage the firearm in the holster before you can feel compelled to draw, obviously, with your finger getting ready to go into a stage position, along the frame or the side of the slide. When the gun's in the holster, I'm going to touch the gun, defeat my retention devices, and stay hidden. Stay concealed as a human being. If I need to expose the gun, my hand should probably go to it. Or, if I don't need to expose the gun, maybe I'm just going to be peeking around the corner a little bit to see what's going on. There's a lot of different levels of readiness. The first level is just simply having training, and having the gear. I'm going about my daily life, and I am generally ready. The next level of readiness is a focus of attention. So, something's happened, it's got my attention and I'm really thinking now what's going on over there? Again, I escalate to, 'Oh wow, I may need to draw my gun.' I expose my gun, put my hand on the gun. The next thing I'm going to do is actually draw the gun and go to the ready. And this is where readiness ends. I'm in my ready position. If this gun goes out any further, it's because I intend to shoot. Can I take it back? Absolutely. But driving out is what I do when I'm going to the shooting position. Think about these staging positions, when we think about concealed carry firearm in the public space, it's not all or nothing. And we talk about counter-ambush training. It may seem that way, right? We're walking through our daily lives, the guns hidden, we're carrying it. All of a sudden we need to shoot. But there are some in-betweens, if you know what your pre-contact cues are, and if you're paying attention to the world around you.