Joining The One Percent

In his recent Shooting Illustrated article, Steve Tarani wrote: “The world is divided into two groups of shooters—those who train and those who do not.” Attending a course because you were forced to by the government isn’t the same as training. Mandatory instruction is associated with a carry permit, hunting license, military service or law enforcement job. For most, it’s the only training they ever attend. Was that training good enough?

Institutional minimums don’t answer the question “What skill level gives someone a good chance for survival in a gunfight?” They answer the question “What is the lowest standard we can use to deem a person safe to carry a gun in public?” Note that the bureaucratic goal doesn’t even consider the success of the shooter as part of the goal. The odds are in the bureaucrats’ favor, since most armed-citizen defensive-gun uses and law enforcement on-duty gun uses succeed without shots being fired. All that is required to avoid bad outcomes is to avoid negligent discharges and poor decisions about when to fire. For those with the goal of being well prepared to survive a violent attack, training to higher standards is the right path.

Gun owners, for the most part, only train when they are forced to. Out of an estimated 10.5 million gun owners in Texas in 2023, 1.4 million had active carry permits. How many people are motivated enough to participate in matches or classes? To figure this out I looked at state and NRA reports on students taught per year, membership data in competitive-shooting organizations and specialty gun groups such as A Girl And A Gun. I did online searches to identify all the instructors offering non-mandatory training in the state and estimated their typical student volume based on classes scheduled and information about class sizes. 

The result was an estimate that only 7 percent of Texas gun owners, in a typical year, attend any type of training or a match. Removing the state-mandated training and NRA courses (usually basic level courses, many run for youth groups), left only 1 percent. 

The most common reason gun owners give for not attending training beyond state minimums is “I shoot well enough.” When pressed to explain what “good enough” means, the response is usually “I passed the (mandatory) training class.”  

For decades instructors have studied gunfight performance as it relates to training standards. Even the lowest law enforcement agency standard, producing officers that hit less than 25 percent of their shots in real incidents, is higher than most state carry-permit training standards. The training standards for elite law enforcement and military units that regularly hit 80 percent or more of their shots are publicly available, as are the training standards used by the private sector Rangemaster school run by Tom Givens, whose 68 students involved in shootings (out of more than 50,000 trained) hit with 96 percent of their shots fired. The 1-percenter strives to meet those combat proven standards, which requires more dedication and effort.

I’m a 99 percenter when it comes to going to the gym. Ask a weightlifting 1 percenter what they think a “reasonable standard” for lifting ability is, and their answer is likely to be something that would take a moderately fit non-lifter months or more to achieve, if they really commit and get a lifting coach. A gun 1 percenter will tell a 99 percenter that they have to dry fire every day, take multiple weekend-long classes and shoot competitions. All those things are great, but setting the bar too high discourages people from taking action to improve.

Here are some simple suggestions to practice with purpose and develop better skills:

1. Anatomically useful accuracy goals. Fold an 8.5×11-inch sheet of paper in half to make an 8.5×5.5-inch rectangle. This is roughly the size of the heart/lung area on an adult human. Shots outside the rectangle are unacceptable hits. Training programs that produce successful gunfighters use a similar accuracy standard.
2. Dry fire at home before you go to the range, or at the range before you start your live fire drills. Ten minutes spent dry firing will significantly improve your live-fire performance. Most misses are the result of moving the gun as the trigger is pressed. Dry firing shows you gun movement that is missed in the blinking, noise and recoil of live fire.
3. Skill at practical distances. Arm’s length, car length, room length, hallway length. Three, 6, 10 and 15 yards. With no time limit, can you hit the 6-inch target at each distance with 100 percent of your shots?
4. Time to first shot. Start with gun at the ready, not aimed at the target, finger off trigger, preferably flat against the slide, not next to the trigger guard. The goal is to have controlled speed, smooth and efficient. Bring the gun up, take slack out of the trigger, see an acceptable sight picture and press the trigger straight back. Once you can get acceptable hits with no time pressure, add the quick presentation to each drill. 
5. Learn three shooting speeds: quickly (3 to 5 yards), carefully (7 to 10 yards) and precisely (15 yards and farther). The time it takes you to bring the gun up and fire five shots should speed up for close targets and slow down for far targets.