Jump to content
Brian Enos's Forums... Maku mozo!

Need Holster Draw Help


Flea

Recommended Posts

In Ben S's Dryfire Reloaded book, he breaks down the draw into two micro drills: 0.4 seconds to get your hands from your sides to getting your shooting hand on the gun and your support hand into your normal position to receive the gun, and then 0.5 seconds par time to go from the end of the prior position to getting a good sight picture on a target 7 yards away. 

 

I seem to be near the par time for the first part of the draw but am having more difficulty with part two. Any tips on how to speed up the second part (other than do it 25,000 times)?

 

Thanks

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I can't clearly visualize where hands and gun are in step 1.

 

My regimen is:

 

1. Hands at side, then hand on gun, lift from holster to essentially low ready both hands on gun. 

 

2. Start at low ready, (gun gripped for firing at roughly 45 degrees)  lift, acquire sight picture and fire

 

The reason is only one range I shoot at allows drawing and then only in two dedicated, walled, armored booths which are often occupied.

 

I have no issues at any range giving me a problem shooting from low ready, but practicing at home #1 for the most part allowing that muscle memory at live fire will connect the two. I've trained many students this method who had very limited access to any range and they agreed that these two steps really helped them out. 

 

Oh, without a BANG, I also can't see how to time your drawing practice

 

Edited by gnappi
Link to comment
Share on other sites

What's the difficult part? Is it getting a solid grip or just getting the gun on target?

 

If your grip is solid and it's just taking too long to get the gun on target the I would recommend taking a video from a few different angles to look at the speed as well as try to look for any wasted movements. They key is speed and efficiently, so even if you're fast but add in extra movement, your times will suffer.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, SGT_Schultz said:

 

No, I'm not.  I'm dead serious.  There's no substitute for mileage.

Agreed but lowering it from the dreaded 25k to 10k made that statement clear (I hope) to the OP. AND it was funny 🙂

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

I work on my draw everyday. I work on low ready, hands above shoulders. I do at least 50-100 everyday. Yes I have change how I a grip the gun, how set my weak hand from when I started. You must try techniques till you find what works for you. I feel the first shoot is the most important shoot. If you start with a bad grip then it is in your head and you are playing chance up with your grip.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 months later...

Make sure you are practicing the technique properly.   Doing it wrong 10,000 times will not be a happy ending.   You can use a mirror or cell phone camera on a tripod.  Maybe you are doing the dirty harry thing.   When I do practice this I take it all the way to breaking the shot, don't train yourself to draw and not shoot.  (talking dry fire here), but it is also good to do wet fire practice.  If you are close to either side of 1.5 seconds to break shot, move on to more important skills like movement and positioning, there is way more time you can cut in those skills.   Practice other starts, table, and table unloaded, and reloads.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It comes down to speed and speed comes down to precise, relaxed movement. Tense up and your muscles will limit how fast your arms move. 

 

To work on raw speed, both reaction and movement, I set up 0.5s par time for the complete draw (about 0.2s faster than your normal par time) and force myself to get to the gun and jam it towards target, whether I get the sight picture in that time or not, whether I make it at the beginning, middle or by the end of the second beep or not, whether it's pretty or not... I am ingraining the raw speed of movement and reaction time. My focus is on how my muscles feel and what I need to do to get my arms to move that fast, filtering out any inconsistencies in the draw. Actually, I focus quite a bit on everything that is wrong during such a draw so that I can correct it at normal speed and then internalize it at top speed. 

 

But, as some pointed out, be careful and very deliberate with what, why and how you're working on in dry fire. A "bad" rep will NOT create bad habit if you recognize the problem. Only a bad rep that you believe is good will create scars. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 weeks later...
On 10/23/2020 at 3:56 PM, CocoBolo said:

 If you are close to either side of 1.5 seconds to break shot, move on to more important skills like movement and positioning, there is way more time you can cut in those skills.   Practice other starts, table, and table unloaded, and reloads.

Thank you I needed to read that.  I've been frustrated because I've been stuck at a fairly consistent 1.6s draw to first shot in dry fire, and while I can occasionally shave a couple tenths off that, I haven't made any real progress in a couple months.  

 

I will confess that I've been obsessed with getting a faster draw to first shot time. I think you are right, and probably make more overall progress if I devote more time to other skills. 

 

Thanks.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My problem (OK, one of my problems) was not getting a consistent grip on the gun.  I (mostly) solved that by having an index point on my holster that I could put my thumb on every time.  That let my hand come straight up to the gun and establish a solid grip every time because my hand was always starting from the same point and always moving the same distance.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

My take on the second part of this drill (from established strong hand grip to acquiring sight picture)is that it relies on two key factors.

 

1. how fast you bring your gun to the line of sight. 

2. how fast you capture an acceptable sight picture. 

 

On the surface those two look like they are independent, but in fact they work together. If you try to bring the gun up too fast and not knowing how to smooth out the last coupe of inches in a well controlled manner, it will cost you time to find a good sight picture. Its true for both iron and dot. Except dots are way more forgivable. 

 

My trick to assert more control in the process of bring gun up as quick as possible, is, paying more attention on your support/weak arm. making sure that you are not over using your strong arm. Ideally, you want to use even strength from both arm to bring the gun up. However, often I found it is more beneficial to use a bit more of your support arm. Due to the ways your hands supporting the gun differ between strong and weak hands, using the support/weak arm more doesn't disturb the gun during deceleration as much, a more relaxed strong arm allows your focusing more on the manipulation of trigger, such that you may pull the trigger as soon as your brain deems the sight picture acceptable. Hence, making faster and more accurate shot.

 

Hope this makes sense.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...