The question I have would what would be a reasonable goal with a cover garment?
IMO 1.5 and under is a good bar for concealment. Not too fast, not too slow, achievable by most, AND surpassable by most.
Fast and accurate draws are not about stomping on the gas. They are about no wasted motion in your draw stroke.
Absolutely. This is where a good coach comes in handy, or a buddy who is capable of identifying inefficient movement.
I'd start by looking at exactly HOW and WHERE you are carrying, and if there is anything you can do to improve efficiency. A gun cant here, an adjustment there, raising or lowering the holster, or even using a different type of holster altogether, can save you tenths of a second here and there, and that time starts to add up.
Next I'd look at the cover garment. I am faster using an untucked button down shirt than I am using a tucked shirt, so I try to go untucked as much as possible with the bottom 2 buttons unbuttoned to facilitate speed. Anything you can do to your cover garment to facilitate speed = good.
Practice and rehearse EACH step of your draw stroke, whichever type you use, and save time by doing things first, more efficiently, and second, faster. More often than not, when you take a hard look at your draw stroke, you will find little inefficiencies that can be cleaned up to save some time.
There is an urge to push yourself to go very fast in dryfire. Resist that urge.
That "HURRY UP GO FASTER!!!!" urge is the same thing you experience under stress, which NEEDS to be controlled, and the dry fire and live fire training is WHERE you learn to control it. Or not...
Train yourself in dryfire, test yourself in live fire. Understand that live fire times will almost always be slower that dryfire times.
This is CRUCIAL. Absolutely CRUCIAL.
You've GOT to know your capabilities and limitations, and If you KNOW it takes you 1.5 or 2.0 or WHATEVER do get off an accurate shot, than THAT'S how long it takes. Period. ACCEPT that. A first shot miss is useless, HITS are what counts.
Push speed during training, but always be deliberate and in control. You will soon find that times will start to drop, and know the speed you can reliably draw from that is neither TOO slow or TOO fast, but "just right".
you have to aim to do each draw perfectly even if it's slow - doesn't matter.
Absolutely.
The BEST draw speed is relative to each individual. A fast draw with the occasional flubb / miss is fine during training, however, real world draw speed needs to be deliberate and reliable EVERY time, and at the speed that lets you get rounds on target, be it sub 1, 1.something, or 2 and beyond.
Average human reaction time is around .25 ish. So if somebody has a gun on you, and the WILL to use it, you are not going to outdraw them before they get off a shot, whether from concealment or not. But it doesn't matter, because it's not about who gets off the first shot, but who gets off the first ACCURATE shots (note "shots" is plural), and when it comes down to it, you are not fighting the man, you are fighting the WILL of the man. Will can rapidly disappear when they start worrying more about saving their hide than completing their criminal act, especially when that worry involves a sucking chest wound.
Decreasing shot splits is a double edged sword because in order to shoot faster, you have to SEE faster, and in order to SEE faster, you have to SHOOT faster. Takes a LOT of ammo. An easy way to pick up speed and see faster is to run "rhythm" drills or "cadence" drills or whatever you want to call them. Simply fire a string of shots at an equal speed and in a rhythm / cadence that allows you to see the sights come back on target, and as you get used to the rhythm / cadence, you will be able to recognize the sight picture faster and faster as you progress. If you use a timer you can track your speed and watch your splits decrease.
1st: .8, .8, .8, .8, .8
2nd: .7, .7, .7, .7, .7
3rd: .6, .6, .6, .6, .6
4th: .5, .5, .5, .5, .5
etc...
When your groups get too big, slow down, too TIGHT, speed up.
Just like with the draw, you should be able to identify your "comfort zone". Most folks should be able to fire pretty comfortably and accurately around the .4 range up close, with the speedsters pushing sub .2's.
A good trainer can help immensely, as can regular practice and competition.
Best of luck.
88 day wait for the state to approve my constitutional right to bear arms...
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