When I read “The Bell-Curve: Shooting Practice by the Odds” over at the Growing Up Guns blog, it bore a striking resemblance to the article series I wrote last year on “Minimum Competency for Defensive Pistol“. Just shows that great minds think alike. 🙂

We took similar approaches: look at the realities of private citizen gunfights (vs. military or law enforcement engagements, which are a different context), see what actually happens in them, and thus what has the highest probability of happening. Based upon that, it makes sense for those of us with limited training budget (time, money) to at least initially focus our skills in those areas. I mean, if no encounter ever uses weak-hand-only behind-the-back while hanging from the rafters shooting skills… is that really something you should spend 90% of your practice time on? Instead, if 90% of encounters involve being able to draw from concealment, get acceptable hits, in a small area, from close range, quickly, with both hands… maybe that’s where you should focus your training time.

It’s not to say other skills should be ignored, it’s just a matter of prioritization due to the fact we are all limited on time and money. So, spend that time wisely.

We arrive at some slightly different conclusions, and provide a different set of drills (tho we both started with Gila Hayes’ drill). But ultimately we’re saying the same thing in different ways.

I encourage you to give the DefensiveDaddy’s article a read. It’s further perspective on this important topic.