Posted: 2/19/2026 9:38:46 AM EDT
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Once upon a time, GCC ran patrol rifle classes through their Criminal Justice (?) program that were open to the general public. They were basically Gunsite 223 without the simulators, and one of the Stock brothers was really involved in those classes. Are they, or anything like that, still a thing? |
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Not only is it a thing, it is the best bang for the buck going (pun intended). What you seek is AJS140AA. Two days of training...it is a college class and it used to be and still may be continuing education credits for AZ POST. Granted the class can only move as fast as the slowest student, but regardless, it is hella fun. 10 seats remain available for this April's class. Class size is limited. |
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I did the 1st Carbine and the 1st Shotgun class. MCSO did, and still do the instruction, and at the time, they would only put on the classes for the little people, if there was a AZPOST certified Cop present in the class, not that it took a lot of arm twisting to do it. It gave me a chance to meet the three instructors who would teach my AZPOST rifle instructor class in April 07', which was the last live fire range activity at the old Sun City range. Jay |
Just to close the loop--I went. It's a terrible, yucky class and you should avoid it at all costs (which will free up slots for me to return  ).Great class, great instruction, and a solid student set. One of the students was on his 26th (!) repetition of the class. Maybe a slow learner... Seriously, he was a good dude, and sort of the student coordinator (more on that in a sec). The POI does not follow the published syllabus. They've swapped Day 1 and Day 2 to put the night shoot up front and get people headed home a few hours earlier on Sunday. Smart move. Course advertises 700 rounds of rifle, I came in right at 600 expended. Pistol use was negligible, but present. About 100 rounds. Day 1 started with a qual. I'm not sure which agency's standards they used, since there isn't an actual AZPOST rifle standard, but I suspect it was MCSO's. If you showed up without a workable zero, you were SOL. No one showed up without a workable zero. Some folks showed up zeroed at 100, most showed up zeroed at 50 (as did I). No 36s, no 25s. After the qual, a study of your personal hold-overs and how your rounds behaved in your barrel from 3 to 100. There was time and consultation here for guys who wanted to throw in a few clicks of adjustment. I didn't see anyone making major shifts. Study and application of field positions (bring elbow pads!), repeated ready-ups with a few more agency quals mixed in as benchmarks, shooting on the move. Then a brief pause while we waited for dark. The brief pause was a potluck barbeque. Great food, including some South African sausage brought by the guy who came from South Africa (okay, he wasn't here just for the shoot, but still...). Make sure you've got good email comms with the class; the repeat offender coordinated the potluck via the instructors' welcome email to the class body. The low-light shoot was really a night shoot; we were far enough into the sticks that there wasn't the usual urban glow to kinda help you out. Flashlight work, and we did everything we'd done in the light again in darkness. That includes shooting some more standards, and it sucked to be you if you didn't have a light with enough throw. This leads to my single complaint about the facilities: the target line had numbered targets, and the reflective signs threw enough light back on the shooters that they washed out my dot. Problem solved weirdly by running the rifle in the dark with the dot cranked up to daylight settings. Day 2 was mostly individual drills. The class split in half (ten students were present). Barricades, shooting around cars, moving to new positions. Lunch, more of the potluck BBQ, then more individual drills. They've pretty well replicated the Gunsite Donga: the school provided 20 rounds of frang, and we did a half-mile or so stalk through a wash whacking pepper poppers. Multiple runs on their shoothouse, shooting with our zero at plates at unknown distances, shooting at plates at known distances out to 360 yards. BTW, a 50-yard zero works just fine out that far. Then, the traditional double-pump handshake, course critique, certificates of attendance (yes, the couple of cops in the class got POST credit) and out the door we went. I haven't talked much about equipment, and I don't intend to. This was a skills class, not a gear class. With one exception, everything that people brought--agency guns, Colts, homebuilds, a WWSD on a Cav Arms lower--worked fine. The optics--Aimpoint, Holosuns, EOTech, LVPOs by who knows--worked fine. Support gear--duty belts, plate carriers, Gucci belts with sub-loads--worked fine. The exception was a Ruger bolt whose firing pin hole was literally mis-bored giving failures to fire due once it got some carbon build-up. Don't know how that slipped through QC, the defect was visible to the naked eye; swapped the bolt, and the gun ran fine for the remainder of the class. Hugely helpful and approachable staff. Jeff and Stephan were really smart practitioners (not theoretical gurus) with an eye to what works, and emphatically *not* my-way-or-the-highway types. They easily meet or exceed the levels of the "name" guys doing this commercially. Great facility, as it should be. Recommendations: take the class. You'll either learn something that matters on the practical level, or you'll validate your skills and equipment choices. Bring elbow and knee pads. Don't worry about notetaking, ain't nobody got time for that. |
I was also in that class, and was the one that brought the South African sausage (boerewors). For the record, I'm from USA, it's my wife that is South African.  It was my first time attending, and I'm glad I had some heads up on gear, especially the knee and elbow protection. Another plus was to have a crap ton (approx 20) of mags pre-loaded so that break time is spent chilling rather than loading mags for the next training evolution. As already mentioned, the staff is first rate, using real world examples, and allowed us to try a few things to illustrate the point. I definitely learned a few things about my gear and my shooting. There will be adjustments. I don't normally consider myself a gear guy and try to keep thing minimalist/functional, but you'd be surprised at what works and what doesn't. One funny thing I figured out quickly is that my elbow pads were too loose. Despite wearing them, I got essentially rug burns on my support elbow from the chafing inside the elbow pad. Yeah, we spent some time prone. I will do this again. There was a lot of info coming in, and some didn't stick well. I guess I'm still learning. |
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Quoted: Great class, great instruction, and a solid student set. One of the students was on his 26th (!) repetition of the class. Maybe a slow learner... Seriously, he was a good dude, and sort of the student coordinator (more on that in a sec). Day 1 started with a qual. I'm not sure which agency's standards they used, since there isn't an actual AZPOST rifle standard, but I suspect it was MCSO's. Hugely helpful and approachable staff. Jeff and Stephan were really smart practitioners (not theoretical gurus) with an eye to what works, and emphatically *not* my-way-or-the-highway types. They easily meet or exceed the levels of the "name" guys doing this commercially. Great facility, as it should be. Recommendations: take the class. You'll either learn something that matters on the practical level, or you'll validate your skills and equipment choices. Bring elbow and knee pads. Don't worry about notetaking, ain't nobody got time for that. Actually, only my 22nd class, but who's counting. The cold qual is in reality the AZPOST rifle qual. The instructors are top notch, and have been to so many different courses and instructors - they are a good gauge and to what is current and relevant versus what is crap. And the note, the lead instructor is the lead instructor for MCSO as well as a board member of AZ POST. -Unicorn  .... out! |
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Quoted: I definitely learned a few things about my gear and my shooting. There will be adjustments. I don't normally consider myself a gear guy and try to keep thing minimalist/functional, but you'd be surprised at what works and what doesn't. One funny thing I figured out quickly is that my elbow pads were too loose. Despite wearing them, I got essentially rug burns on my support elbow from the chafing inside the elbow pad. Yeah, we spent some time prone. I will do this again. There was a lot of info coming in, and some didn't stick well. I guess I'm still learning. We will slowly but surely turn you into a gear queer. I am very good about spending other people's money. |
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Quoted: The cold qual is in reality the AZPOST rifle qual. Sorry, there is no AZ POST rifle qual. That was a MCSO qual; I emailed Jeff afterwards. https://post.az.gov/training/basic-training/firearm-qualifications But that's a little thing. A fine time was had by all. |