If you have been around the internet for a while, you might have seen a chart that breaks various drills into skill categories. That chart comes from John Hearne and his Who Wins, Who Loses, and Why presentation. We have reviewed that presentation on USA Carry. It is probably the most impactful class I have ever attended, and I have been in some really great classes.
The Chart
Back to the chart, though. It breaks skill levels into four categories. Not likely to suggest automaticity, suggest some automaticity, strongly suggest automaticity, there is definitely automaticity. If we want there to be a high likelihood that a skill will be available to us under high levels of stress, we need our skill level to be in one of the latter two categories.
I was specifically aiming for the line between the last two categories. The resource input necessary to maintain the highest levels of skill in the 4th category are significant. I am basically looking for the “good enough” line where maintenance is a bit easier, but the skill level is still high enough for it to likely be accessible under stress.
The Strategy
To develop this, I used Karl Rehn’s book Strategies and Standards for Defensive Handgun Training and his data on the difficulty of certain tasks relative to USPSA Grandmaster performance. Grandmaster-level performance is one of the benchmarks near the right extreme of John Hearne’s chart. Since I am going for the area more around IDPA Master or USPSA A Class, the strings of fire are dialed down slightly from what Grandmaster level would be in Karl Rehn’s book. Based on some online discussions with Karl, these times hover around 70%-75% of Grandmaster level. If we correlate that with John Hearne’s graph, it gets us close to where we want to be.
Course of Fire
| Distance | Start Pos. | String of Fire | Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5 Yards | Holstered | On signal, draw and fire 2 to the body. | 1.5 Sec |
| 5 Yards | Low Ready | On signal, fire 2 to the body and 1 to the head. | 1.5 Sec |
| 10 Yards | Holstered | On signal, draw and fire 3 to the body. | 2.5 Sec |
| 10 Yards | Low Ready | On signal, fire 2 to the body, emergency reload, fire 3 to the body. | 6 Sec |
| 10 Yards | Low Ready | On signal, fire 2 to the body and 1 to the head. | 3 Sec |
| 15 Yards | Holstered | On signal, draw and fire 4 to the body. | 3 Sec |
| 25 Yards | Holstered | On signal, draw and fire 2 to the body. | 3 Sec |
| 25 Yards | Low Ready | On signal, fire 3 to the body. | 3 Sec |
Scoring
The course of fire is meant to be shot on an IDPA target, scored 5/3/0. There are a total of 25 rounds in the course, making the highest possible score 125. In a perfect world, a score of 125 is what we are after. A score over 100 is respectable. Anything around 115 is really solid. The best I have been able to manage is around 110.
The Wrap
it would be interesting to hear people’s thoughts on this course of fire in the comments. I particularly enjoy it, but I am the guy who came up with it, so it doesn’t really count. It has consistently kicked my butt and kept me motivated to keep chasing something.
