Living Legends | Interview with Bruce Cartwright [2025]

In the previous edition of Living Legends we spoke with Rob Haught. Today we have the opportunity to chat with Bruce Cartwright of SAC Tactical.

Interview with Bruce Cartwright

I first met Bruce Cartwright at the Pat Rogers Memorial Revolver Roundup in 2023. While I wasn’t familiar with Bruce’s work prior to that course, he came highly recommended by those I trust. With their endorsement, I jumped into a block with Bruce. When 2024 registration opened up, I made sure to get another seat in class with Bruce.

Q: We’ll start off with a little bit of your background. What first got you into guns, your professional experience, etc.

My father supported my interest in guns.  I was five and wanted to shoot a gun and my father indulged me.  He passed on an interest in firearms and the outdoors.  My dad served as an infantry man at the end of the Second World War.  Most of the gentlemen I grew up around had served in the military and that helped foster my interest in guns and shooting.  At the age of twelve, I wanted to learn how to reload ammunition.  One of my father’s friends was a devout handloader who had served as a Marine sniper on Tarawa in the Pacific.  He taught me about the absolute need for consistency in ammunition.  It was folks like this that steered me along in my formative years.

Q: If there was a discernable shift to “being serious” about guns, what brought that about?

What turned me towards the serious side of firearms was partly due to the serious nature of many of my father’s (and in turn, my) friends that encouraged my shooting.  Most of these friends had seen combat and realized the need to be skilled with arms.  I also read everything that Bill Jordan, Jeff Cooper, Skeeter Skelton and Ken Hackathorn wrote.  Their writings and a desire to get into the fledgling activity of combat shooting, intrigued me.  I saw these folks and my Dad’s friends as serious no-nonsense men whom I wanted to emulate.   I wanted to learn about this type of shooting. 

My first real mentor, after being taught by my father, was a local shooter, Dan Smith, who did very well in International Practical Shooting Confederation (“IPSC”) matches.  Dan taught me all sorts of things.  He would spend time shooting with me and helped me refine my performance and mindset.   

Q: Over the past two years I’ve taken blocks of training from you during the Pat Rogers Memorial Revolver Roundup at Gunsite Academy. During these blocks you’ve had your son acting as an assistant instructor. Can you tell us a little bit about what it’s like to work alongside your son both on and off the range?

Absolutely.  Working and teaching with my son has been a great experience.  He is a dedicated shooter and student of firearms (as well as a budding author).  He brings the perspective and high energy of today’s younger shooters to our classes.  This perspective is important if we are to bring younger folks into shooting.  He spent significant time with many of the quiet professionals I worked with and as a result developed a “no excuses” attitude that drives him to excellence in his own shooting. That is a refreshing attitude. 

He has chosen to become an instructor and has worked hard to learn the craft of teaching.  As a dad, I am proud to see how he has developed into a shooter, teacher and man.  Teaching with Will is also a humbling experience.  He is almighty fast and accurate.  When we train, he keeps me on my toes.  He and my other staff instructor, Jack A., help push me to further refine my own shooting and teaching.  We constantly rib and tease each other.  It is a joy to work with both of them. 

Off the range, our relationship is pretty much the same.  He is currently helping me to refine my cooking and baking skills.  His enthusiasm is infectious!

Q: Outside of your law enforcement experience, you spent some time as a trial attorney and assistant district attorney. How has your experience with multiple facets of the legal system impacted your teaching methodology?

There are actually two conflicts that occur when a person is attacked by a criminal.  The first is surviving and prevailing in the criminal attack.  The second is what Colonel Jeff Cooper called “ Problem Two” and that is the fight you will encounter with the legal system in the aftermath of a justified shooting.  Everything you do has to be able to be justified if you are to prevail in the second fight of your life.  Everything you do in a defensive encounter will be looked at under a microscope and needs to be grounded in reality and legal justifiability. 

I teach based on those concerns.  I stress the need to be as discerning as possible, as accurate as possible and fire as few rounds as necessary to accomplish the mission.  I teach folks how to interact with responding law enforcement.  Many folks only see the problem through their own eyes and perspective.  I teach folks that others who you will interact with, will view your actions through their perspectives and it is hugely important to understand that and adapt your tactics to take those perspectives into consideration. 

For example, responding officers may very well handcuff you in the aftermath of a justified shooting.  Some folks take offense at this.  Those folks have never executed a search warrant at a home filled with people whose motives you do not know and are hard to ascertain.  An officer responding to a shots fired call is probably responding Code Three (lights and siren).  Physiologically, their bodies have dumped adrenaline into their bloodstream.  They will be tense and worried.  Being aware of things like that and taking them into consideration in terms of your interactions with them is as important as being able to shoot well.       

Q: As someone who has been a firearms instructor for the FBI, a foreign weapons advisor for the USMC, and who trains normal citizens in open enrollment courses, how does your approach to students change between those coming from law enforcement, the military, and the average person?

The principles of what I am teaching, typically, remain the same.  What differs is the language I use, how I deliver information, and how hard I can ”push” folks.  Teaching Marines versus in-service law enforcement versus non-sworn citizens all looks a bit different.  I tailor my message for the folks I am teaching.  I use humor whenever I can, especially self-deprecating humor, because I find it puts people at ease, especially newer shooters. 

I also work very hard to decipher my students’ reactions.  My job is to ensure that they are learning what they need to learn, so I am constantly on the lookout for behavioral clues that help me make that assessment and adjust my delivery as necessary.  Humor tends to loosen folks up and once they start talking, you can get a pretty good idea of where they are in terms of understanding your material.  

Q: Do you have any especially notable mentors? If so, what are some things that they did for/to you which stand out?

I was blessed to have some many mentors help me along the way.  In terms of shooting, there were several:

Dan Smith:  Question everything.  Try stuff out for yourself and find/use what works best for you.  Don’t be a slave to someone else’s biases.  

Pat Rogers:  Pat was a dear friend and mentor.  I cannot begin to count the things Pat taught me.  Off the top of my head, two things stand out.  Have a thick skin/sense of humor.  Also, if whatever “universal” technique you teach/practice doesn’t work at night, then it is not a good technique.  

Team Two at the FBI Academy Firearms Training Unit:  Excellence and professionalism matter.  You should always be critiquing and improving your own performance.

Ken Hackathorn:   I have known Ken for a number of years.  Learning from Ken is like learning from Obi-Wan how to run your light saber.   Pay attention, little things matter.

My second partner on the Job:  This individual shall remain nameless.  Everybody talks a good game.  Why don’t you show us how good you are.  In other words, money talks, BS walks.

The Tactical Arts Group in New England.  I shot with these folks for a number of years when stationed in New Hampshire and learned so many things from the various members, it isn’t even funny.  We shot weekly and it was a wonderful shooting laboratory to learn real world skills.  I miss training with those folks.

Q: Tell us about any especially fond memories you have from your career, as an instructor,  other firearms or defense related experiences?

This is a much more difficult question than I initially realized.  I was blessed to have a number of fabulous experiences that resulted in many great memories.  Some of my fondest memories are of watching my son interact with folks like my old partner or my mentors.

My failures that turned into “learning moments” are also especially fond.  For example, I earned the coveted “Moose Cock” award from Pat Rogers in a Carbine Operators class in Harrisonburg Virgina.  I was in a mixed class with lots of other law enforcement folks.  Pat knew who I was and introduced me as an FBI agent and instructor.  He genuflected during that intro.  Later during class, I begin to shoot a string of fire and my fully filled AR magazine departed from my carbine.  I looked down.  I groaned.  I knew what’s coming. 

Pat then loudly announced that at 11:34 on TD1 (“training day”) that he had failed to teach the “feeb” (Nickname for FBI agents) how to properly load his carbine and that he, Pat, must be a bad instructor.  Pat’s students will remember that speech.  Pat then does a school circle where he awards me the Moose Cock patch.  Having a thick skin let me laugh at my misfortune and learn a couple of things that day.  First make damn sure you “Push/Pull” on your magazine.  Second:  Pat gave a damn about me and my development as a student and instructor.  It’s the day Pat and I became friends.  

I will always treasure the long telephone calls I had with folks like Ken Hackathorn, Pat Rogers and many others.  

Q: Are there any hard lessons learned for you that changed the way you do things, or that you’d like to relay to the readers?

My son said it best:  “Develop a healthy relationship with failure.”  Once you realize that you can learn an awful lot from your mistakes, you tend to progress much more quickly.  By looking at your mistakes rationally and limiting your emotional response to them, you gain a clarity that is amazing.  Put your emotions in check, analyze the problem and devise a plan to fix it.  This is something I do across the spectrum of life, whether its cooking, shooting, martial arts, work or relationships.  We talk about this very issue in classes.  We see people fail to shoot well.  We then see their body language and head shakes and we analyze that and give people a path to overcome their emotional responses and move toward success.  

Develop mental toughness.  I recently successfully completed the “75 Hard Challenge”; it was a great learning experience.  Pat Roger’s said it best:  “Harden the fuck up.”

Stay humble and shoot with people who perform at a higher level than you. 

All things come with a price.  The question is whether you are willing to pay it.  If you possess the mental toughness to “pay the price”, you will improve.  We can help you along that path, but it takes lots of hard work and isn’t for the faint of heart. 

Q: Is there anything you’d like to pass onto readers, whether they be instructors, competitors, or regular earth people?

Critical thinking is the hallmark of the professional. Asking “why” is the most dangerous question there is, and will earn you more enemies than you could imagine. Our mission at SAC tactical is developing unconscious competence with those who live in a dangerous world, and by extension offering the Truth. We want our students to question us, and it is our duty to offer the best training our students can have. We love our job, and helping develop students into their fullest capacity is one of our great rewards.

Q: Where can people find you, your work, or train with you?

Our website:  https://saconsco.com/

Our email:  info@saconsco.com

Please reach out and we will add you to our email contact list.

Our telephone:  (406)360-6371

Our Instagram Page:  https://www.instagram.com/sac_tactical/

We have been doing more teaching locally in the Kalispell area but we are looking to expand our offerings at other host ranges.  If you are interested in hosting an SAC Tactical course, please reach out via telephone or email and we’ll put something together.  

Wrapping Up Living Legends Interview with Bruce Cartwright

Thanks to Bruce Cartwright for taking the time to answer my questions! If you find yourself at Revolver Roundup and are looking for a good block of training, give Bruce some serious thought. You can also train with him outside of Roundup with SAC Tactical.

Make sure to check out the other entries in this ongoing series below!

Living Legends | Interview with Tom Givens

Living Legends | Interview with Rob Haught

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