The One Hole Drill starts with the shooter firing one shot at the center of a small, circular bullseye on the target. The next four shots are then aimed at the hole made by shot number one. It sounds fairly straightforward, but it takes intense concentration to master. The One Hole Drill is usually performed with a target that has six 3-inch dots spread out on a 24-by-36-inch piece of paper. The One Hole Drill begins with the shooter firing at the target from a distance of 3 yards. There is no time limit to begin with. Once the groups cluster within a 3-inch dot at 3 yards, the shooter can use a smaller dot and move the target back to 5, 7, 10 or 15 yards. Use a timer to add stress. When using a timer, the interval between the start and stop buzzer should initially be set at 10 seconds. As your skill increases the interval can be decreased a second at a time until accuracy starts to fall off. At that point, no further difficulty is added until the shooter is able to shrink the size of the groups.
The Loved-One Drill builds directly on skills learned in the One Hole Drill and increases stress by including a no-shoot target. The drill is set up by placing the no-shoot target over part of the hostile target to simulate an assailant holding a hostage. After the shoot and no-shoot targets are stapled in place, the name of someone who is important to the shooter is written on the no-shoot in order to increase the psychological impact of an errant shot. At first, a large portion of the hostile target should be unobstructed, and the shooter should stand at the 3-yard line. Making the drill less demanding in the beginning helps build shooter confidence. To start the drill, set the interval between the stop and start buzzers at five seconds and press the delayed start button. When the start buzzer sounds, the gun is drawn or raised from low ready and two rounds are fired at the hostile target. It’s important to use targets that have scoring rings that realistically represent vital areas of the body. Score each string of fire by adding the numerical value of each shot. Only count shots fired within the five-second interval and subtract the point value of any shots that hit the hostage. When the scores increase and there are no subtractions for hitting the no-shoot target, it’s time to increase the difficulty of the drill.
Bad guys don’t have scoring rings, so a person must be able to visualize a small aiming point in the upper center torso and precisely place quick shots on that small area under stress. The T-Shirt Drill deals directly with this problem. It involves placing a plain-colored T-shirt over a life-size silhouette target so the shooter can’t see the scoring rings. The shirt must be opaque, and if a T-shirt isn’t handy, then an old undershirt or even a large plastic trash bag will work. Like the Loved-One Drill, the T-Shirt Drill starts at the 3-yard line and has a five-second interval between the start and stop buzzers. At the start buzzer, the gun is drawn or raised from low ready and a two-shot string is fired into the center of the upper torso. Once the shooter can place two shots in the high-score ring, the level of difficulty can be increased by shortening the time limit, increasing the distance to the target, or shooting one-handed. When the shooter gets really good, he or she can combine the Loved-One and T-Shirt drills to add as much realism as possible.
Wyatt Earp spoke from experience when he said, “Fast is fine, but accuracy is everything!” Unfortunately, informal target shooting doesn’t do much to develop accuracy, speed or the ability to shoot well under stress. Fortunately, there are shooting drills specifically designed to promote these skills, and a number of them can be practiced at most shooting ranges.
This year, the American Tactical Shooting Association’s Study Camp focused on several of these drills. All you need are targets, a T-shirt and a shot timer. Experienced shooters can practice these range drills from the holster, or the drills can be conducted from low ready if the shooter has not been trained to draw or a shooting range does not allow fast draws. The shooter should use his or her defensive firearm and load the gun with ammo that duplicates the properties of their self-defense load.
