Chris Sizelove — Director of Training, Cohort / Joint Training Facility
Chris Sizelove — Director of Training, Cohort / Joint Training Facility
Official organization: Cohort / Joint Training Facility
Professional Biography
Chris Sizelove is a retired U.S. Army Master Sergeant, former 75th Ranger Regiment senior noncommissioned officer, firearms and tactics instructor, former Regimental Master Breacher, sniper/reconnaissance leader, former Defense Intelligence Agency professional, and current Director of Training for Cohort / Joint Training Facility in Georgia. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
Sizelove retired after approximately 20 years of Army service, including 16 years in the 75th Ranger Regiment followed by roughly four years associated with the Defense Intelligence Agency. His documented military roles included infantryman, assaulter, strike-force senior NCO, sniper, sniper/reconnaissance element leader, firearms and CQB instructor, and Master Breacher for the 75th Ranger Regiment. He also helped develop and teach covert-carry and vehicle tactics for specialized missions. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
Blue Force Gear’s historical biography adds further detail. Sizelove entered the Army in 1999 and served across the Regiment’s 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Battalions, worked as a Pre-Ranger instructor, participated in establishing the Regimental Special Troops Battalion, and ultimately occupied senior instructional and operational positions within the organization. (Blue Force Gear)
His operational history includes approximately 13 combat deployments and overseas tours. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
But the most useful way to understand Sizelove professionally is not simply by counting deployments.
His significance lies in the repeated intersection of:
operational experience
training development
instruction
equipment evaluation
and
institutional knowledge transfer.
While serving in the 75th Ranger Regiment, Sizelove became a subject-matter expert and instructor in:
carbine
pistol
close-quarters battle
forced entry / breaching
and broader joint and assault-force TTPs. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
He also developed and instructed specialized covert-carry and vehicle tactics, including work later associated with his Defense Intelligence Agency service. (Greenline Tactical)
After retiring from military service, Sizelove moved into professional training and industry work with organizations including Forge Tactical and Blue Force Gear, eventually taking responsibility for training strategy and curriculum development. At Blue Force Gear, he became Senior Manager of Training and helped develop the company’s Joint Training Facility as both a professional training venue and an environment for evaluating equipment under realistic conditions. (South Magazine)
Today, he serves as Director of Training for Cohort / Joint Training Facility, a purpose-built modular CQB training environment in the Savannah, Georgia area supporting military, law-enforcement, and civilian training. (Cohort)
His current instructional work therefore represents a continuation of the same professional pattern that characterized his military career:
identify operational requirements → develop a training solution → create an environment where it can be practiced realistically → pressure-test performance → refine the solution → teach it to others.
That is the strongest framework for understanding Chris Sizelove’s influence.
His concise professional description is:
Chris Sizelove is a retired 75th Ranger Regiment Master Sergeant, former Regimental Master Breacher and Defense Intelligence Agency professional whose career has centered on converting operational lessons in firearms, CQB, breaching, vehicles, covert carry, low-light operations, and team tactics into practical training systems for military, law-enforcement, and responsible civilian students.
Key Areas of Expertise / Notable Contributions
75th Ranger Regiment
Sizelove spent approximately 16 years in the 75th Ranger Regiment, one of the longest and most professionally significant periods of his career. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
During that period he served across a range of positions rather than remaining confined to one specialty.
His documented experience includes:
rifleman,
assaulter,
sniper,
sniper/reconnaissance element leader,
strike-force senior NCO,
firearms instructor,
CQB instructor,
forced-entry subject-matter expert,
and Regimental Master Breacher. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
That breadth matters.
It means his later instruction is not based solely on one technical specialty.
He worked with the firearm both as an individual weapon and as one component of larger team operations.
Senior NCO Perspective
The progression from individual operator to senior NCO is particularly important.
An individual operator asks:
Can I perform this task?
A senior NCO responsible for training must additionally ask:
Can the unit perform it?
Can we teach it consistently?
Can we diagnose failures?
Can the technique survive variation among personnel?
Does it integrate with the larger mission?
That is a different level of professional responsibility.
Instructor Inside an Operational Organization
Sizelove became an instructor and SME for:
carbine,
pistol,
CQB,
forced entry,
and associated joint-operation tactics while still operating within the Ranger Regiment. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
This distinction matters.
He was not simply teaching material remembered years after leaving operational service.
He was involved in the feedback loop while still inside the organization.
Operational Feedback Loop
That creates a powerful training cycle:
train
→
operate
→
identify friction
→
debrief
→
modify procedures
→
train again.
Organizations exposed repeatedly to real-world operational feedback can refine techniques much faster than institutions whose doctrine is tested only in training.
Sizelove’s career occurred inside that environment.
Close-Quarters Battle
CQB is one of the clearest recurring themes in Sizelove’s professional work.
His Ranger biography identifies him as both an operator and instructor in CQB TTPs. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
His post-military work continued in the same domain.
The current Joint Training Facility is specifically designed around a 4,000-plus-square-foot modular CQB environment with configurable layouts, lighting, realistic doors and hallways, furniture, and a classroom attached to the training space. (Cohort)
The facility itself reflects a major part of Sizelove’s teaching philosophy:
environment matters.
CQB Cannot Be Learned Only on a Flat Range
A shooter can learn:
presentation,
trigger control,
reloads,
and weapon manipulation
on a conventional range.
But structures introduce entirely different problems:
angles,
unknown spaces,
doorways,
other people,
lighting,
communication,
movement,
and rapidly changing information.
A purpose-built environment allows those variables to be introduced deliberately.
Training Environment as a Teaching Tool
The current Joint Training Facility includes:
modular wall configurations,
adjustable lighting,
realistic doors,
movable furniture,
and dedicated classroom space. (Cohort)
Those features make the building itself part of the curriculum.
The instructor can alter the environment.
That prevents students from simply memorizing one shoothouse.
Forced Entry and Breaching
Sizelove also held the position of Master Breacher for the 75th Ranger Regiment. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
This is a substantial technical specialty.
Forced entry requires integration of:
mechanical breaching,
ballistic breaching,
explosive methods,
structural understanding,
team movement,
timing,
and risk management.
The breacher is solving an access problem while supporting the larger tactical mission.
Breaching Is Systems Work
The technical act of opening a door is only one part of breaching.
A breaching solution must account for:
the structure,
the assault force,
the threat,
the desired speed,
the available tools,
and the people positioned around the breach point.
This makes breaching a useful example of Sizelove’s larger systems-oriented background.
Forge Tactical
After retirement, Sizelove joined Forge Tactical as a principal instructor and Breaching Program Manager. (Soldier Systems Daily)
That role is important because it demonstrates continuity.
He did not leave military service and simply begin teaching generic carbine classes.
He was initially brought into an established government and law-enforcement training company specifically to apply his specialized expertise.
Carbine and Pistol
Sizelove’s military biography also identifies him as an SME and instructor in both carbine and pistol. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
His current training continues to include practical carbine instruction.
For example, the Joint Training Facility’s 2026 Malfunction Junction course identifies Sizelove as lead instructor for a program integrating carbine malfunction management, pistol transitions, and low-light shooting. (OPFOB)
This illustrates another recurring feature of his instruction:
technical skills are commonly taught inside a broader operational problem.
Malfunctions as Performance Problems
A malfunction is not primarily a taxonomy exercise.
The useful question is:
Can the shooter recognize that the weapon is no longer producing the desired outcome and restore capability quickly?
That may involve:
diagnosing,
clearing,
transitioning,
or changing tactics.
Sizelove’s current curriculum explicitly emphasizes performance when the firearm fails. (OPFOB)
Vehicles
One of Sizelove’s best documented civilian-training contributions is his work on vehicle environments.
Long before his current JTF role, he taught Concealed Carry Vehicle Environment Skills with John Murphy’s FPF Training.
Scott Jedlinski attended that course in 2015 and published a detailed after-action review. (Big Tex Ordnance)
Independent coverage from Breach Bang Clear likewise describes Sizelove as primary instructor and highlights his ability to translate his extensive Ranger training experience into the vehicle environment. (Breach Bang Clear)
Vehicle Context
Americans spend enormous amounts of time:
inside vehicles,
entering vehicles,
leaving vehicles,
and standing around them.
Yet traditional firearms training frequently ignores the environment.
A vehicle introduces:
restricted movement,
seat belts,
glass,
doors,
passengers,
children,
awkward weapon access,
and changing lines of fire.
It deserves specific study.
Translation to the Armed Citizen
The 2015 vehicle course is particularly valuable for understanding Sizelove because it was not simply a military vehicle-tactics class copied for civilians.
The AAR notes that the curriculum began by discussing why vehicle-specific training is relevant to the armed citizen, including approach, movement, positioning, and situational awareness. (Big Tex Ordnance)
That demonstrates contextual translation.
Covert Carry
Sizelove also helped develop and instruct covert-carry TTPs for specialized military and DIA roles. (Greenline Tactical)
This creates another useful bridge between operational and civilian disciplines.
Covert carriage requires thinking differently from overt fighting equipment.
Constraints include:
concealment,
limited equipment,
access under clothing,
reduced visual signature,
and maintaining normal appearance.
Those concerns overlap substantially with serious concealed-carry practice.
Sniper / Reconnaissance Experience
Sizelove also served as a sniper and within a sniper/reconnaissance element, eventually occupying element-leadership responsibilities. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
This adds another layer to his professional development.
Reconnaissance rewards:
observation,
patience,
information gathering,
discipline,
and understanding terrain.
Those are different cognitive demands from direct-action assault work.
Multiple Operational Frames
That breadth matters because instructors can become trapped by one problem set.
The assault-force solution is not always the reconnaissance solution.
The overt military solution is not always the covert solution.
The team solution is not always the individual solution.
Exposure to different mission sets makes it easier to recognize that tactics are contextual rather than universal.
Defense Intelligence Agency
Following his Ranger service, Sizelove spent approximately four years associated with the Defense Intelligence Agency. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
Public descriptions understandably provide fewer specifics about those duties.
The strongest defensible claim is that his DIA period included further development and instruction of specialized vehicle and covert-carry TTPs. (Greenline Tactical)
Anything beyond the documented public record should be treated cautiously.
Gunsite Lineage
Sizelove’s relationship with professional firearms training began even before his Army service.
He grew up near Gunsite and worked there during high school as a range hand.
Through that environment he encountered figures including:
Jeff Cooper,
Louis Awerbuck,
Chris Dwiggins,
and Pat Rogers. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
That is an unusual professional lineage.
Exposure Before the Army
Sizelove therefore encountered serious firearms instruction before joining the military.
That means his later training philosophy developed at the intersection of two substantial traditions:
the American professional firearms-training community
and
institutional special-operations training.
Those ecosystems overlap, but they are not identical.
Pat Rogers and Louis Awerbuck
The connection to Pat Rogers and Louis Awerbuck is especially meaningful historically.
Both were influential in developing modern professional firearms instruction beyond rigid qualification-course thinking.
Their instructional cultures emphasized:
problem solving,
relevant standards,
gun handling,
and practical application.
Sizelove encountered those influences before building his own military experience.
Blue Force Gear
After military retirement and his work with Forge Tactical, Sizelove became deeply involved with Blue Force Gear.
He ultimately served as Senior Manager of Training and later as Director of Training associated with the company’s training facility. (South Magazine)
This role combined several of his professional strengths.
Training and Product Development
Blue Force Gear described the Joint Training Facility as serving two related functions:
professional training for military and law enforcement,
and a development laboratory for evaluating load-carriage equipment. (South Magazine)
That linkage is important.
Equipment should not be evaluated solely on a design table.
It should be used:
while moving,
shooting,
climbing,
breaching,
working in structures,
and performing realistic tasks.
Practitioner Feedback
Sizelove had already worked with Blue Force Gear as a subject-matter expert on load-carriage equipment development before taking over training responsibilities. (South Magazine)
This creates another feedback loop:
identify user problem
→
design equipment
→
use it in realistic training
→
observe friction
→
refine design.
This interaction between equipment and training is a recurring feature of mature professional organizations.
MARCO and Tactical Marking
Sizelove’s Blue Force Gear work also included public technical education on equipment such as the company’s MARCO tactical marking system.
In a discussion with Jared Reston, Sizelove framed tactical marking as a recurring operational requirement involving the identification of people, places, and objects while emphasizing the value of simplifying cumbersome legacy methods. (Blue Force Gear)
The significance is less the particular product than the mindset:
identify a recurring operational task and reduce unnecessary friction.
Low Light and Night Vision
The Blue Force Gear training program developed under Sizelove included:
low-light,
no-light,
night-vision device use,
force-on-force,
breaching,
and emergency medical components. (South Magazine)
Current industry activity continues that involvement.
Sizelove is scheduled as a guest instructor at the 2026 Greenline Tactical Night Operations Summit. (Greenline Tactical)
This provides strong evidence that his low-light/NVG expertise remains professionally relevant.
Darkness Changes the Problem
Low-light training should not simply mean:
perform the daytime drill while holding a flashlight.
Darkness changes:
identification,
navigation,
communication,
visual information,
and decision-making.
Night-vision equipment changes the problem again.
Sizelove’s experience encompasses both individual weapon work and team operations in these environments.
Force-on-Force
The Blue Force Gear Joint Training Facility also incorporated force-on-force training using marking cartridges in a modular structure. (Soldier Systems Daily)
That matters because force-on-force introduces:
another thinking person,
uncertainty,
pain penalty,
decision-making,
and unexpected behavior.
It exposes weaknesses that inert-target training cannot.
Training Must Eventually Become Adversarial
A student can develop mechanics on paper.
But tactical concepts should eventually be exposed to resistance.
The progression looks roughly like:
learn
→
practice
→
integrate
→
add complexity
→
add opposition
→
observe failure
→
adapt.
That model aligns closely with Sizelove’s institutional training background.
Current Joint Training Facility
By 2026, Sizelove is publicly identified as Director of Training for Cohort / Joint Training Facility. (Cohort)
The facility explicitly serves:
military
law enforcement
and
U.S. civilians. (Cohort)
This makes the current phase of his career particularly interesting.
One Facility, Different Missions
Serving all three populations requires discipline.
Military personnel,
police officers,
and private citizens
may share mechanical skills.
Their missions are different.
Professional instruction must determine what transfers and what does not.
Sizelove’s previous work teaching civilian vehicle skills suggests a longstanding ability to make that distinction. (Big Tex Ordnance)
Cross-Pollination Without Role Confusion
This is probably the best description of the opportunity.
Military experience may reveal useful principles.
Police experience may reveal others.
Competition can expose performance inefficiencies.
Civilian defensive training raises different contextual questions.
The objective is not to make each group imitate the others.
It is to identify transferable principles without transferring inappropriate assumptions.
Downstream Evidence
There is also measurable downstream evidence that other serious instructors have sought Sizelove’s training.
Scott Jedlinski documented training with Sizelove before later becoming one of the most prominent pistol-optics instructors in the country. (Big Tex Ordnance)
John Murphy’s current professional biography lists Sizelove among the instructors from whom he has trained. (Citizen-Defender)
Steve Shields likewise lists Sizelove among the professional instructors who contributed to his development. (High Desert Cartridge Company)
This is significant.
Instructor-to-Instructor Influence
The value of instructor development compounds.
If Sizelove teaches:
one serious instructor,
one police trainer,
or one military training cadre member,
the lesson can reach many future students.
That produces a multiplier far larger than the original class size.
Scott Jedlinski Example
Jedlinski’s 2015 AAR is especially useful because it documents the instructional quality before Sizelove’s post-retirement commercial reputation had fully developed.
Jedlinski sought the class based on recommendations from other respected industry contacts and specifically praised Sizelove’s ability to deliver vehicle-context instruction effectively. (Big Tex Ordnance)
That is early downstream evidence of influence.
John Murphy Example
John Murphy later became strongly associated with contextual armed-citizen education, concealed carry, criminal-assault dynamics, and vehicle work.
His current professional biography includes Sizelove among his training influences. (Citizen-Defender)
This does not prove that any single Murphy concept originated with Sizelove.
It does show knowledge transmission within a serious instructor network.
Steve Shields Example
Steve Shields likewise identifies training with Sizelove among a long list of professional development that informed decades of police firearms instruction and later commercial training. (High Desert Cartridge Company)
Again, the relevant evidence is:
instructors train other instructors.
Training Culture
Sizelove also remains active in events such as Lowcountry Range Days, which bring together instructors from different professional backgrounds. (Lowcountry Range Days)
These events create another form of professional value:
cross-pollination.
Instructors see each other’s material.
Students compare systems.
Techniques are discussed.
Weak assumptions become easier to expose.
Operational Experience Is Raw Material
One important distinction should be maintained throughout Sizelove’s profile.
Operational experience does not automatically make someone a good instructor.
It provides raw material.
Teaching requires another capability:
the ability to isolate what mattered,
explain why,
build progression,
identify student errors,
and transfer knowledge to someone who did not share the experience.
Sizelove’s career contains unusually strong evidence of both sides.
Operator and Instructor
The case for his expertise therefore does not rest solely on:
16 years in the 75th Ranger Regiment,
13 deployments,
or senior rank.
It also includes repeated evidence that he was specifically responsible for:
instruction,
curriculum,
SME functions,
training strategy,
and later commercial training development. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
That is a stronger basis for instructor credibility.
Professional Assessment
Chris Sizelove should be considered an influential professional firearms and tactics instructor whose principal contribution is the conversion of extensive special-operations experience into structured, transferable training systems across firearms, CQB, breaching, vehicles, covert carry, low-light operations, and realistic training-environment design.
The evidentiary basis is substantial.
He served approximately 20 years in the Army. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
Sixteen of those years were spent in the 75th Ranger Regiment. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
His roles included:
infantryman,
assaulter,
strike-force senior NCO,
sniper,
sniper/reconnaissance leader,
carbine instructor,
pistol instructor,
CQB instructor,
forced-entry SME,
and Regimental Master Breacher. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
He participated in approximately 13 combat deployments and overseas tours. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
He later spent roughly four years associated with the Defense Intelligence Agency and helped develop and teach covert-carry and vehicle TTPs for specialized roles. (Greenline Tactical)
Before the Army, he had already been exposed to the professional firearms-training community through Gunsite, where he worked as a teenager and encountered Jeff Cooper, Louis Awerbuck, Chris Dwiggins, and Pat Rogers. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
After military retirement he joined Forge Tactical as principal instructor and Breaching Program Manager. (Soldier Systems Daily)
He subsequently helped develop Blue Force Gear’s training program and Joint Training Facility, integrating professional instruction with realistic facilities and equipment development. (South Magazine)
He currently serves as Director of Training for Cohort / Joint Training Facility, where military, law-enforcement, and civilian students train in a configurable purpose-built CQB environment. (Cohort)
His continued work includes carbine performance, malfunction management, CQB, low-light and night-vision instruction, and professional training events. (OPFOB)
There is also downstream evidence of influence.
Scott Jedlinski trained with him and documented the experience. (Big Tex Ordnance)
John Murphy identifies Sizelove among his professional training influences. (Citizen-Defender)
Steve Shields does the same. (High Desert Cartridge Company)
Those relationships matter because they demonstrate his knowledge moving through the instructor network rather than remaining confined to his own students.
The best concise description is:
Chris Sizelove is a retired 75th Ranger Regiment Master Sergeant, former Regimental Master Breacher and Defense Intelligence Agency professional who has spent much of his career not only performing complex firearms and tactical tasks, but developing, teaching, testing, and transmitting them—first inside elite military organizations and later to military, law-enforcement, and civilian students through professional training organizations and purpose-built training environments.
His professional methodology can be summarized as:
Identify the mission.
Identify the performance requirement.
Develop the skill.
Build a realistic training environment.
Integrate the equipment.
Introduce complexity.
Add resistance and uncertainty.
Observe where the system fails.
Refine the technique.
Teach the lesson forward.
That is the strongest basis for Chris Sizelove’s influence on contemporary professional firearms and tactical training.
Selected Sources
Cohort / Joint Training Facility. Current primary source identifying Chris Sizelove as lead instructor and describing the modular purpose-built CQB training facility serving military, law-enforcement, and civilian users. (Cohort)
Forge Tactical — Chris Sizelove biography. One of the strongest detailed professional biographies documenting his 20-year Army career, 16 years in the 75th Ranger Regiment, DIA service, firearms/CQB/forced-entry SME roles, sniper background, Master Breacher position, specialized vehicle and covert-carry work, Gunsite history, and combat deployments. (Forge Tactical LLC.)
Soldier Systems — Chris Sizelove Joins Forge Tactical. Independent industry corroboration identifying Sizelove as Forge Tactical principal instructor and Breaching Program Manager and detailing his operational and instructional background. (Soldier Systems Daily)
Blue Force Gear / South Magazine — Joint Training Facility. Documents Sizelove’s transition to Senior Manager of Training, prior involvement as a load-carriage equipment SME, development of BFG’s professional training strategy, and integration of training with equipment evaluation. (South Magazine)
Soldier Systems — Joint Training Facility at Blue Force Gear. Documents Sizelove’s role instructing at the facility and specifically identifies his Regimental Master Breacher and vehicle/covert-carry background. (Soldier Systems Daily)
Blue Force Gear — Chris Sizelove biography. Adds detail regarding his service across Ranger battalions, Pre-Ranger instructor role, involvement in standing up RSTB, Master Breacher position, and DIA transition. (Blue Force Gear)
Big Tex Ordnance — Concealed Carry Vehicle Environment Skills AAR. Independent Scott Jedlinski after-action review documenting Sizelove teaching civilian-oriented vehicle tactics and providing early downstream evidence of influence on another future nationally recognized instructor. (Big Tex Ordnance)
Breach Bang Clear — FPF Vehicle Environment Skills. Independent account describing Sizelove’s extensive Ranger instructional experience and effectiveness teaching vehicle-specific material. (Breach Bang Clear)
Greenline Tactical — 2026 Night Operations Summit. Current evidence of Sizelove continuing to teach in the professional low-light/night-vision community. (Greenline Tactical)
OPFOB — Malfunction Junction. Current evidence of Sizelove serving as lead instructor for carbine malfunction, pistol-transition, and low-light curriculum. (OPFOB)
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