Is a fast draw the most important skill for deadly force encounters?

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HiBC.

Most of my fighting has been fists, and feet. Bouncing for 5 years in Liverpool UK. Part-time job. Thur/Fri/Sat nights. I won all my fights. Because I attacked first. See the threat, before the Person/Persons actually moved to attack me.

In the 60s in the UK, it was the way to go. Here as a Citizen of these United States, I carry a Glock 19. In my Wife shopping (me reading in my Jeep outside) at Publix. Cell phone call. "I am being followed by two scruffs, pants hanging down no basket, no cart" When my Wife exited, I was standing behind my Security Vehicle, shirt undone, G19 on right hip.
They saw me and ran.

Good ending.

You have to have the mindset to attack! Mine is alive and well, a threat to my Wife! I know what I am going to do. I have done it before, no gunplay, even though on one occasion I was armed. Again Glock 19.
But not gun time.

I have pointed guns, more than once, not fired, no need too. It really helps being in violent fights previously and just acted, no thought.

Crossing the waste of time, thinking helps. Just move.

In my late 20s, early 30s, I liked to fight. All part of the job. Now at 83, not so much! Very rarely do I go anywhere without my Wife. We love being together. And never without my holstered G19. And spare G17 magazine.
 
Bartholomew Roberts said:
I remember a Force-on-Force course I took where I was wearing a sweater with elastic around the bottom as a cover garment. I lifted with my weak hand to access the Glock. Then I pulled the Glock straight up and snagged the slide on the elastic, the elastic gave a little bit at first as I drew and then rubberbanded the Glock straight out of my hand and at the feet of my attacker as I tried to rotate it.

As comedy goes, it was a great success; but it did impress on me there were worse things than a slow, smooth, draw. Weapon manipulation is, of course, very important; but I just don’t think it is as important as the amount of attention it often receives.
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While safety is always a concern, this is what happens when you train with how you carry. Embarrassing, yes; but also immeasurably instructive. Once I started doing the timed 3-foot drills, speed is the last part of the equation. Yes, I want a fast draw, and at those engagement distances, you're shooting once you've cleared the holster (threat is an arm's length away).

Slow is smooth, smooth is fast. While I never dropped my handgun (yet), drawing quickly from concealment, funny things can happen. When you add a timer as a stressor, you start to realize how many parts play a role. While I would hope my situational awareness wouldn't let an attacker or threat get that close, it's a reality that can happen to anyone.

FireForged said:
The skills I consider most practical:

Awareness
Judgment
Mental Resolve (grit)
Tactics
Strategics
Marksmanship
Smooth, practiced and unencumbered presentation of a weapon
Fitness
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We've all mentioned the prevention methods of awareness and avoiding potential SD situations, but there are other extremely valuable skills FireForged mentioned. Tactics don't come into play after an engagement occurs. How you position yourself in a public bathroom, the distance you walk from a wall, don't round a corner to sharply, keep cover close, and always scope out escape routes; these are pre-engagement tactics and when combined with your awareness allows you to change your direction or actions before things go south.

I really like the "smooth, practiced and unencumber presentation" point. This simply can't be stressed enough and should be practiced routinely. It should be about speed, but slow, smooth practice will result in an "unencumbered" presentation that will increase in speed the more you practice.

Fitness is one I always harp on. I don't want to get on a soap box, but your activity, health, environmental conditions will affect your access, unencumbered speed of presentation, and very likely your marksmanship. Consider your adrenalin if the "event" is played out over several minutes; your heart-rate will spike, your hands may get sweaty, you may get tunnel vision. Do a 100 meter sprint before you start your drills and see how it impacts your time, motor skills, presentation, and accuracy.

Much to consider, and there are so many factors, but many can be integrated into your training. Start slow, focus on smooth, repetition will increase your reaction times, and that practice will minimize mistakes.

Always good info to hear here, even the reminders, and others' lessons learned.

ROCK6
 
there were worse things than a slow, smooth, draw.
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Slow is smooth...Smooth is fast.

The winner of every gun fight I have ever been involved with is not the first one to get their gun out...it is the first one to connect with at least an incapacitating shot.

As you found out, it does nothing to "rush to your death" or another common mistake in CQB, "clear the room with your feet".

Train with the set up and equipment you carry. Train from the holster to follow thru including the scan after the immediate threat/fight. Always incorporate magazine changes and reholstering.

When you get those nice big holes in the target and shot groups look all pretty...that is a clue to speed it up.

When your groups look like shotgun blast and you are having flyers....that is clue to slow it down again.

The two push/pull one another and with time on the range training....you get better.

Slow is smooth...smooth is fast.
 
HiBC,

You make some great points and those tactics will certainly give you advance warning that something is going down. I know that most criminals would prefer unwitting and unsuspecting targets, but if you have been chosen as the target, you still need to address the threat.

My response was to this:
Mike38 said:
I'd say the most important thing is situational awareness. Stay out of a bad situation, and drawing a weapon wouldn't even be necessary.
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Around here it is a popular game for guys on bikes to silently stalk people walking the trails and then shout as they reach them.

You really can't hear a bike coming on hard surface,and that sudden noise, at least in my case causes a real over-reaction. Since there have been a few attacks on these trails as they cross through woods, it leaves me rather edgy sometimes.

When I carried nothing but a fixed blade knife I actually drew my blade several times as I spun around. once a guy was coming up and rode through a pile of oak leaves, the racket could wake a dead deaf man. I had my pistol out of the holster as I turned but never presented it.

No matter how hard you work at it you can't be aware of what is behind you when you are on food on a curving path in dense second growth on heavy packed stone. You can hear a pedestrian usually. Hearing a bike? not until he is ten feet behind you. The slight crackling of the stone is drowned out by your own walking or the group's, your own breathing (and the creaking of your joints). The sound made by a person behind you is completely absorbed by the ambient noise that surrounds you.

Yes, if these had been actual attackers the speed of my draw would have mattered. Situational awareness is literally impossible when an invisible and silent adversary can appear at your back in a matter of seconds.

Most of the time "i didn't see it coming they came out of nowhere" is nothing but a lame excuse. A guy steps into a street and is mowed down, "gee, he came out of nowhere. he wasn't in the street when I got there!" Lame. You didn't see him wandering on the sidewalk with his face in his phone and his hand on his latte, or see him step off of the curb just before he stepped into your path? Speedy reaction time doesn't trump opening your eyes and trying to see future outcomes. the one most important reason for saying that is that only a tiny fraction of the people in this nation could draw and fire for effect under the circumstances of a guy sneaking up and whomping you on the back of the head in a bar.
 
44 AMP said:
cool, that's a bit of shooting, now what do those rounds HIT??? (or is it time from buzzer to trigger pull with no actual shooting??)

because the fastest draw means NOTHING without good hits.

There's a story in the movie UNFORGIVEN, about the guy who might have won the shootout, if he hadn't been the fastest draw...

Something to consider, despite the obvious risk, a slower accurate hit beats a faster miss.
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Sorry this is a bit belated, 44;

The 25 draws in the morning are usually in my man cave, usually with my Shield, which has a CTC laser mounted, so I can at least where I'm aiming and how steady/consistent my trigger press is that morning.

I'm aiming at an old Discountflies.com sticker I have pasted on the cork-board above my fly-tying desk; it's about the width of a softball, around five feet off the floor. Distance is about 15 feet.

In the winter I'll head over to Ben Avery, an outdoor range that allows drawing from the holster about once a week and run my 25 draws there at 5 or 10 yards. That's where I use the 6-inch x 10-inch sheets of paper.
 
A few years ago, a Buddy and I were at a PPC match in Rochester NY. The day of the Snubby part of the match, my Buddy went down with the nose drip of the year!

So I went on my own. My revolvers in a purpose-built instrument case. Looked like a camera case. But driving back to the Holiday Inn, my Colt Commander LW was holstered under my sweater.

Each floor of the Parking Garage was full! Except for the top floor. I backed into a spot, grabbed my case, and just then noticed two young guys, leaned against the two cars, facing each other, at the entrance to the stairs into the Hotel. Both very rudely feet up on the side of the cars they were leaning on.

They both were very interested in my case! In my left hand, in fact, very focused on it. The good old 7M distance from them, I bent from the waist and slid the case onto the gravel surface, towards them.

When I stood up, 45 was in both hands, at 45 degrees! Classic ready position, I was proud of my magic trick!

"You are in my way Lads" They just about died! Took off at a dead run, to my right, and the way I had just driven in from. One ran behind the vehicles, one in front. A loud scream from the behind the cars running young fellow.
Just after a clunk sound. He then switched to the front, with his buddy but limping like anything.

After they had disappeared around the curve, I walked over to look behind this big old Station Wagan. The type with the false wood grain finish.
The tow bar stood out about 2 ft! That must have hurt.

I told the Desk Clerk about this incident (Left out the gun part) he just looked bemused? The Liverpool accent? The 45 cal muzzle must have looked like a drain pipe! I think a change of careers might have taken place right there.
 
I am aware of a real life gunfight, (happened a couple of years ago) where I personally knew the good guys. Two thugs with hoodies come into a local gunshop. They have already made up there mind to kill all three of the people working in there, two men a woman.
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All three store workers are armed, the two men both have a 38 J-frame in their front pants pockets.
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Yikes..attacking a business with sales people who are known to be armed with handguns probably open carried. I guess criminals are pretty dumb..:eek:
 
Once again, I am seeing a thread drift in the direction of “You can’t have perfect situational awareness at all times so let’s all go work on our draw, which is more fun anyway.”

But not being able to remain in ninja-alertness at every moment doesn’t mean you can practice simple but effective tasks to aid the observation and orrientation parts of your loop. Play the “where are the exits?” game when you go into a place. Play the “What if?” game.

Walk with a purpose and look where you are going and you’ll be ahead of half the people around you.

Walk briskly - it is a lot harder to ambush someone if they keep on trucking right through the kill zone or they are out of your zone of control before you can even get the first few words of your sad story distraction out. If nothing else, that last tip alone will save you a lot of interaction with bums in urban areas.

Having a smooth draw that you can execute automatically and without thinking is important (but not most important). Your brain doesn’t have time to devote cycles to weapons manipulation and if you don’t do that like you breathe, you’ll make your OODA loop unnecessarily long.

Once you can do that though, contiuing to hone down your draw time 0.1 second at a time gives you no practical edge in force on force. There are just too many other places in the OODA loop where you can pick up multiple seconds instead of tenths of a second.
 
I can't remember where I saw it -- YouTube, surely -- and someone was opining that the most important, but usually least practiced, skill for CCW was a lightning fast draw from concealment.
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I think situational awareness is another subject and deserving of its own thread. While it is extremely important if not the most important skill, one need only study the greatest aces in history to realize SA breaks down and everyone gets surprised. Which is why all the world's greatest aces have been shot down at one time or another.

The OP wants to know the importance of the old west concept of the "fastest gun."
 
This video was posted here earlier. it's a good example of a number of things.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sr6UtCW5zZs

1. All quiet in the bank. 3 tellers and one armed guard chatting. Note that the guard is in a position where he can see the whole bank (the lobby and behind the heavy counters) from where he stands talking and is also behind cover.

2. Armed, masked robber runs into the bank, drawing attention to himself before he enters the bank. This alerts all inside even before he begins waving the gun.

3. The tellers take cover (good cover not just concealment) as the robber enters the bank. The guard also sees him, as he enters, and reaches for his gun, drawing it and firing at the robber. The guard stumbles as he does so and avoids a fall. He has good position behind cover.

4. The robber sees the guard for the first time, meaning he realizes that the guard is a guard, and points the weapon in his direction as the guard fires.

5. The guard has made a draw that is neither fast nor smooth but very good for the situation. The guard saw the armed robber before the robber knew the guard was a guard and armed. After firing the guard steps back out of the line of the robber 's fire and stumbles for the second time and again avoids a fall. He and the robber exchange fire and it's over quickly.

Points to note:The guard and tellers were given advance warning by the robber drawing attention to himself and that he was armed before he actually entered the bank proper (got through the foyer).

The guard and tellers had good cover and made use of it. This allowed the guard to focus on the robber. The robber had none.

The guard had a second, given him by the robber, to take stock, reach for his weapon, while stumbling, and draw, all before the robber was fully aware that he was an armed guard. The guard took aim and shot first.

The guard's draw was not fast. It was practiced and smooth under the circumstances. It was made while he was moving and trying not to fall down.

The robber was an amateur and paid the price for it.

This is a very good example of good situational awareness and a guy doing his job well. The draw is a part of what's going right. But it's not the key part. It would be a mistake to think it's "the most important skill."

tipoc
 
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The bottom line is that although speed is certainly helpful, you don't want to be a one trick pony. Being fast doesn't mean you can fight or even know how to fight. I have seen this in FoF training on many occasions. The more practical thing is to refrain from narrowly focusing on any one skill. Armed conflict is very much a comprehensive Kwan and if that is the case, its very much about many things and not one thing.
 
The one thing the Guard did not do, which is quite common! He did not freeze! He kept his cool and dealt with the situation.

One up for the good guys. Wonder what his blood pressure was?
 
Situational awareness is important but I suspect most violent encounters are very much spur of the moment-no build up or signalling, more like an ambush. An ability to switch gears, to go from Condition White to Condition Red-0 to 60 in 3 seconds flat. I doubt if many of us will ever match Bill Jordan's time, but a fast, smooth fluid draw is a skill worth mastering.
 
Situational awareness is important but I suspect most violent encounters are very much spur of the moment-no build up or signalling, more like an ambush. An ability to switch gears, to go from Condition White to Condition Red-0 to 60 in 3 seconds flat. I doubt if many of us will ever match Bill Jordan's time, but a fast, smooth fluid draw is a skill worth mastering.
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Two things, of course it's a skill worth having. It's also down the line of the tools you need to stay alive.

Actually most violent encounters are not spur of the moment and have plenty of signalling. Most deadly violent encounters involve either family and friends or folks who move in the same social circles, according to FBI figures. It's the cases of "familiarity breeds attempts". It's these shootings that are the most common and also the least trained for or considered.

A gun is the last tool in your toolbox. Not the first. A lot of trainers and schools and scenarios don't don't train for that or discuss it. It's not a good sale. We imagine home invasions and random robbery attempts or stranger rapes and train for that sudden violent attack. But those are rare. The most common you can see it coming and often step right into it.

tipoc
 
We did the Tueller Drill using a mannequin on a pulley during one of our practical shooting days. One of the fastest guys in the club was pulling the rope. He knows I am pretty quick so he purposely distracted me by asking if I understood the course of fire. The moment I turned my head, he took off. I have pretty quick reflexes so I cleared the holster in just under half a second. I then got off 2 shots in 1 second. I side stepped and took a 3rd shot aiming for the head. All 3 shots were hits and (first 2 went into the shoulder and the 3rd right through the ear). Total time the mannequin moved was about 2.5 seconds. Of course I knew it was a drill and had an open holster so that really helped. I'll still take some credit since all 3 shots were hits and the guy running the drill distracted me. :p Some of the other guys didn't even clear the holster.
 
Thanks for posting the article. It provides an interesting perspective. I’m sure we have all seen videos where distraction was used before drawing the gun to engage the target. I’m not sure how fast you guys are, but if you club the speed draw on a drawn gun, you’re probably going to get shot. The article still doesn’t invalidate the importance of being able to draw your gun quickly and smoothly, but emphasizes having other skills as well.
 
The article still doesn’t invalidate the importance of being able to draw your gun quickly and smoothly, but emphasizes having other skills as well.
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Some of the comments here have made light of draw speed/ability, but I would never say it’s an invalid skill. You should not try to train to draw on a drawn gun. That was the premise of OPs question, and the answer is a resounding “NO.” That being said, mosT here agree there is a benefit of practicing the draw, with a focus on a smooth and fluid motion. Speed comes. From what I’ve read here, other places, and experienced at the range from my friends; a draw and fire with a COM hit (7 yards ala tueller drill) from concealment or retention is about 1.5 seconds on average with a non-novice but non-competitive shooter. Seeking much quicker is very much a point of diminishing returns, imo. Get there, maintain, then focus more on other aspects of SD.
 
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