Most of you are familiar with the term “shadow boxing” right?

The activity where a person throws, slips, and ducks punches while watching in the mirror or moving around the ring by themselves.  Go to any wrestling practice and you’ll see wrestlers of all ages taking shots, defending shots, and getting off the bottom, with intensity, smoothness, and without a partner while “shadow wrestling”. 

How could borrow from these time-honored combat sports and improve law enforcement training?

In our classes we call it “shadow drilling”.  After students have shown proficiency in doing the techniques with partners, and towards the end of classes, we have them put on their full duty gear. We will lead them repetitions of all the skills we worked on that session. Elevated heart rate to match the real world demands they can anticipate, verbal commands, follow up transitional decision making, all done without a partner. 

Watch this video to see a demonstration of shadow drills in a recent training session

https://youtu.be/-WQiCsWhmsQ?si=cgUPtL6w5r1e7PUI

What are the benefits of this?

-       Mental repetitions are a great way to increase skill building and confidence

-       Students with pre-existing injuries or physical limitations can still participate

-       Reduce injury potential to role playing bad guys, who are usually other students in full gear repetitions

-       Evaluation of gear placement, practicality, and functionality

-       Students can do this type of training on their own outside of normal class times to elevate their skills, confidence, and performance

One of the things I pride our team of coaches on is the ability to think outside of the box, to get creative, and to look forward in how to best coach our law enforcement students to be their best!