Meet the Cadre: Shane Parman
- Scott Witner
- Apr 29
- 6 min read
If you've been around Achilles Heel Tactical lately, you've probably already seen Shane on the line. He's the newest face in the cadre, but the road that got him here isn't a short one — it runs through small-business life, a pro soccer career, a private security firm, and more than a few moments where the training either held up or it didn't.
Here's his story, in his words.
Raised Around It
Shane's grandfather was Army. His grandfather carried a trench shotgun back in his own Army days. So the idea of a firearm in the house wasn't foreign — it was just part of how the family operated.
What made it serious, though, was the liquor store.
Shane's parents were small business owners, and at a very young age, they got robbed at gunpoint. That moment shifted everything. His dad's logic was simple: our son's going to be around this stuff, so he needs to know how to safely handle a firearm.
So Shane started young. Real young. First gun he ever shot was his dad's Gen 2 Glock 21 — the .45. "The Lord's caliber," as his dad called it. Before the Glock, it was a big seven-or-eight-inch revolver his dad carried, very much in keeping with the old man's love of westerns.
That's the foundation. A family that took safety seriously because they'd already seen the other side of the counter.
The Athlete Years
Here's the part most people don't know about Shane: for a long stretch of his life, guns weren't the focus at all.
He was a soccer player. A professional one. From childhood up until about 21, the range and everything that went with it got shelved. Training camps, travel, the life of an athlete state side and internationally — that was the priority.
Guns stayed an interest. Shotguns especially. But they weren't the work.
Bouncing, Then Security
Around 21, Shane got his first job working the door as a bouncer. That's when the switch flipped back on. The moment you're the guy standing between drunk strangers and everybody else, the equation changes fast: okay, I need to start carrying.
That led to the right conversations with the right people. A former boss of Shane's — a business guy, the admin, payroll, and client-comms type — came to him with a proposition: I'll run the back of the house if you run operations.
Shane said yes. He and two partners opened a private security firm. Shane became the face, the boots on the ground, the guy meeting with clients, walking with clients, flying with clients. Doing it all.
It took off fast.
The Wake-Up Call
Shane's firm started picking up work with some high-profile music clients, and that's where things got real in a hurry. He's standing there, getting shot at by gang members who don't know how to shoot, watching people get hit all around him, and having one very clear thought:
I am not prepared for this moment.
He was alive. His clients were alive. But that was luck and circumstance as much as anything else, and Shane knew it.
So he went looking for training.
Finding Rick
Shane began asking around his circle of friends who they’d recommend. The guys over at Blue Alpha Belts and CHMBRD Media pointed him at one name:
Go train with Rick Crawley. Go take a class at Achilles Heel Tactical.
Shane started checking the class schedule and found a class nearby that had one spot left and signed up two or three days before class.
The class itself answered the question. Rick's demeanor — the way he balances we're going to have a good time with we're going to get this done at a high level — landed hard. Shane walked away thinking about two things: what he needed personally as a shooter, and what he could take back to the guys running with him on client details.
The day he got home, his team started running drills with what he'd learned.
Training With Paul
Shane kept in touch with Rick after that first class — random questions, messages back and forth, the kind of thing you do when somebody's class just rewired how you think about your weapon. When Shane asked about taking another baseline, Rick told him straight up:
You're past baseline. Go take Paul's performance classes.
So Shane did. Pistol performance, carbine performance, both with Paul Costa. And as he kept showing up and kept shooting well, the conversation started shifting. Shane told Paul he wanted to stay operational with his company, but the itch for bullshit was fading the older he got. He was seeing guys lose their lives over nothing, and at 33, he was ready for the fresh grunts to carry more of that load while he put his focus somewhere with a longer shelf life.
Paul pointed him at the three-day RDS Instructor Development course in March of '25.
The Instructor Class
Shane went out to that class as a civilian — the only one in the room. The rest of the guys in there were law enforcement. A lot of them were taking it back to teach.
Shane's take, as a civilian watching it unfold: if I'm shooting and teaching better than these guys, there's something here for me.
Night of day two, he, Rick, and a couple of others went to dinner. That's where Shane brought up wanting to create a training company of his own in the Southeast. Shane saw an opportunity where the training footprint is small and he could use his network to continue with his passion of instructing. Seeking guidance on this new endeavour, one that was clearly established by AHT, Shane began discussing opportunities within the brand and Rick said it:
We're going to brand you as an AHT Assistant Instructor.
Shane didn't hesitate. Let's do it, dude, I'm here for it.
From Assistant Instructor to Cadre
Less than a month later, Shane was in Tennessee running his first class as an assistant instructor with Rick — the infamous 320 class, where a gun went off in the holster. Welcome to the team.
From there, he worked his way through the AI pipeline and into full cadre status. December of '25 was his first public class as a full instructor, down at the range in Kennesaw, Georgia. Rick came down, gave the public the heads-up that he was handing more of the teaching over, and that was the door officially opening.
The Shooting Speaks for Itself
If you want a quick look at what Shane brings to the range before you ever sign up for one of his classes, watch him run the DOPE drill. That's a guy who's put in the reps.
What Shane Teaches
Right now, Shane is running baseline classes, but he's not staying there. He shoots at a performance level — Master class USPSA in Carry Optics, knocking on the door of Grand Master — and the plan going forward is to add performance classes to his schedule.
The one thing Shane's quick to point out: the combatives class, the blade work, the savage stuff — that's Dave Acosta’s alley. He’s a different breed.
A Rundown of What Shane Carries
For the gear-head crowd:
Carry gun: Glock 17 with an X300 light and a Holosun 509T
Instruction gun: Glock 34
Competition gun: Glock 34 with an X300, Holosun 507K, Johnny Glock trigger, Glock Performance housing
Light: ModLite OKW handheld, always on him
Medical: Full kit, set up to run concealed in the appendix position alongside the 17 — chest seals, gloves, packing gauze, bandage wrap, tourniquet
Blade: Fixed blade when he's with a principal. G10 blades for everywhere a steel edge can't go. Daily civilian life? Not really a thing for him
Spare mag: Nope. Plus-five on the magazine and that's it. If he can't solve the problem with 17 + 5, a second mag wasn't going to save him anyway
On the 17 versus everything else: Shane can shoot anything, but he's not putting his life on a platform that isn't a Glock. Home is home.
Come Train With Shane
Shane's on the schedule. Baseline classes are up now, performance classes are coming. If you've been sitting on the fence, this is your sign to get off it.
Check the AHT training calendar and book a spot. You'll shoot better, you'll learn something, and you'll walk away with a clearer picture of what capable actually looks like.
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