What Is W.O.F.T. Training?

By Adam Scepaniak

Editor’s Note: This article is not legal advice and does not necessarily represent the views of The Armory Life. You should always consult local laws and qualified legal counsel regarding any questions you have about firearms, deadly force and self-defense.

There is a misconception that simply having a firearm can solve any problem, but this is flatly wrong. If someone approaches you in a dimly lit parking lot yelling out at you, your natural response shouldn’t be to draw your concealed firearm and deposit some hollow points into them.

It could be an elderly man that’s lost, a woman with dementia, a teenager with a flat tire and a dead phone needing to call a tow truck, or something else that is totally innocuous and harmless. The point is, we need “soft skills” so we can vigilantly protect ourselves without incorrectly applying lethal force.

A famous quote from firearm instructor Chuck Haggard warns us, “there should be something between a harsh word and a gun.” This is where W.O.F.T. comes in.

I first attended Where Our Families Train (W.O.F.T.) three years ago during an industry media event and was fortunate enough to have been introduced to this world-class facility.

W.O.F.T. has instructors to teach you a full spectrum of defensive tactics about situational awareness, knives, flashlights, using your voice powerfully, medical training, pepper spray, tasers, hand-to-hand, and yes, firearms.

In this article, I am going to provide you with an overview of the W.O.F.T. facility. I believe it is one of the best training facilities I have ever visited.

W.O.F.T.

The W.O.F.T. facility is comprised of various stations where subject matter expert (SME) instructors cover various topics relevant to home and self-defense. Since my prior visit, the company added several stations to bring the facility up to covering eight important topics:

• Station #2 — Dirt Medicine/Stop the Bleed
• Station #3 — Lowlight Scenario Training
• Station #4 — Coffee Shop — Real World Scenarios
• Station #5 — Combative Room — Situational Combatives with/without Flashlight
• Station #6 — 100 Yard Gun Bay — Anti-Carjacking
• Station #7 — 50 Yard Gun Bay — Handgun Evaluation
• Station #8 — Shoot House — Skills Evaluation
• Station #9 — Covered Rifle Area

While each station is unique, they do share one thing in common: W.O.F.T. strives to make you well-rounded when it comes to protecting yourself and your loved ones.

Sometimes we need a mirror held to our own face to realize what our individual weaknesses are. This could come about because of a harrowing self-defense incident that you narrowly escaped and were wholly unprepared for. It could be because of something that happens to a loved one or friend and “hits really close to home” for you.

While unnerving events can often open our eyes to the need for more training, it is much better to be proactive and seek out more training, intelligence and education before something bad happens.

OODA Loop

If you read about self-defense or taken a few courses, you may have heard along the way about the OODA loop. That is something that is taught to fighter pilots when they are in a “dog fight” for their life in the sky. You need to Observe a threat, Orient yourself to that threat, Decide on a course of action, and then Act. Observe, Orient, Decide, Act.

This OODA loop can be repeated an infinite number of times for a fighter pilot until they finally shoot down their enemy. In everyday life for us, we could apply the OODA loop while leaving a grocery store, watching our children in a park, or being at a mall.

Safe Stress Inoculation

While none of us want to be subjected to a threat or scary situation, that is the only way to know how we will respond under pressure. We need to have our feet put to the fire. We need to be inoculated to stress, or to paraphrase the instructors at W.O.F.T. — “we provide a stimulus, and you need to respond.”

In my opinion, W.O.F.T. is world-class at applying necessary stimuli or stress to students to train proper responses. Stimuli events can occur in the Coffee Shop scenario room, Anti-Carjacking and Lowlight Scenario Training.

If the thought of being stressed out — even if simply training spikes your blood pressure — that’s okay. W.O.F.T. can moderate and gear their training specifically to everyone. If you think you’re John Wick and can handle extreme events, that’s okay as well. W.O.F.T. will ratchet up their training to appropriately stress and test everyone who comes to train.

These stress-response scenarios are valuable for many reasons, including:

• By understanding your weaknesses, you can plan for training in these areas.
• You learn how you will respond to specific threats, and what you can do to improve.
• You have an opportunity to use tools you may not have used before, including non-lethal marking cartridges (Simunition), Tasers, pepper spray, medical supplies, flashlights and more.
• You learn to observe pattern disruptions, have situational awareness, and “people watch” with a purpose.

Conclusion

When you become intimate with stress in a safe, family-friendly environment, you can become better prepared for that once-in-a-lifetime event that could change the course of your life. If you are ever forced into a defensive encounter, this kind of training will help. We all pray none of us never experience such events, but it can happen. W.O.F.T. training can help you prepare.

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