Dry fire and live fire drills

Looking for Dry fire drills I can do at home and how much time you should be practicing them.
Also drills to do at the range so it doesn’t get boring. I did find some target a T-Rex Arms which helped out. Let me know what you do.

Mike

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You should check out the weekly training vids. That will give you some good ideas. Lots of really good info there! Just finished watching a couple myself! One thing that I can honestly say about USCCA they have plenty of information out there. … We just need to go and get it with a couple of clicks! Good luck! I know you will find some good training!
:+1:

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If while at the range you can practice malfunction drills. Load your magazines and put some dummy rounds in with your live rounds. Practice tap, rack and bang. You can dry fire at home and practice sight picture and trigger pull and breathing. Practice drawing from the holster with speed and lifting your outter garment if need be.

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Hopefully you can find something interesting here:

Mike Seeklander’s Drills:
http://www.dailydryfirechallenge.com/ddcreplays/

Chris Sajnog - look for “DRY FIRE” videos
https://www.youtube.com/c/CenterMassGroup/videos

How much time? There is no time limit. Even you find you do these drills perfectly, you keep doing them and practice.
This is the same as shooting - you don’t stop it because you know how to shoot.

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Tim Kennedy is an excellent firearms instructor and I have seen a lot of his videos and did not notice him being mentioned in the top 10.

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WARNING - as our YouTube channel is addictive to firearm/self-defense people as Pinterest is to crafters.

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A week or two ago, I had a squib load , from an extremely reputable company. I was running some personal training drills. Shocker? In a defense mode, to protect my family, I shuddered to think what the outcome , potentially could be. In an actual defensive situation, there is no time to clear. I wonder if that is why Clint Smith is an advocate of multiple carry?

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Ox Dryfire Training Cards are good.

Sirt training pistols are good.

Travis Haley has some tips on YouTube.

Also, if you’ve got a bit of space or a backyard, getting an airsoft for practice is great too. You can get biodegradable plastic BBs. There are options for a slide that has a blowback feature or not. Umarex is one company that makes them.

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Jerzy, could you give us some insight on your dry fire, since you are the master, and if you keep a log of your dry fire, etc. We have had some discussion in the “paper target thread”, and some input…etc. Any comments you could share on that thread?

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I’m not good with logging dry fire sessions. I know I should do this, but just never found time to do this.
My only logs are these from LASR app, but recently I’ve started to use my wall lamps as laser targets so no logs anymore…

Anyway my dry fire usually starts with warm up, so I shoot one target from low ready position (10 feet). Then I do the same with 2 targets.
Once I’m satisfied with results (hits) I do the same adding movements. Pattern - 1 hit on every target, then 2 hits on every target. I do not count misses. Good hit means threat stopped.
Usually it takes 5 - 6 minutes.
Next step is draw stroke. (concealment only)
First - draw slowly, counting every step…

  1. Grab your garment, make a good grip
  2. Draw straight up, rotate, move handgun forward, meet both hands
  3. Press out, sight picture, press the trigger.

I repeat it about 10 times then speed up 25%, 50%, 75%. If all goes smoothly then I do 100% of speed to see if still can hit the targets.
Whenever I see misses, I go back to slower speed and speed up if all good.
Last dry fire drill is reload. I’m ok with tactical (rarely used) so my goal is fast and reliable emergency reload. Again, start with slow, and finish with max speed.
I always finish combining everything together, so walk, draw, hit, reload, hit again.

This is my way… Perhaps not perfect, but it works for me. This is the closest to real gunfight I can do in basement.

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Jerzy,
I was shooting the other night with a fellow instructor Brett, was telling me one of his training sessions that he was involved in, a participant shot his finger. Drill was to grab garment, draw from holster, opposite hand to chest or belt, fire one shot, then move to present with both hands. Somewhere in that draw, he had his hand in the way and the shot removed his finger. IE somewhere the fellow did not have his hand on chest or belt.

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As we know, re-holstering is one of reasons of negligent discharge. Improper draw stroke can easily cause that we shoot ourselves… that is why I always recommend to practice it slowly first.
People don’t pay attention HOW both hand should meet. Supporting hand never should leave chest area (or release the garment) until the handgun’s grip is 3" - 4" in front of you. Supporting hand always follow the other hand, not vice versa.

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Doggone @Jerzees did you sneak into one of my classes? Good points all around. I will add, never be in a hurry to holster your weapon.

Cheers,

Craig6

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:joy:
I just learn a lot and fast… If I want to do something I want to do it correctly. (I’d like to write “perfectly”… but nobody is perfect :slightly_smiling_face:)

And the next advice (I should mentioned it before) - even we draw in rush… we never rush holstering back… the fight is already over when we put the firearm back.

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Simple draw stroke. This is what I expect everyday.

115 hits in 2" laser target from 30ft. Draw from concealment.
With 150 draws it gives 76% of accuracy.
Next step is to confirm this on the range. :muscle:
I’m still working on 100%. I don’t want any misses at all.
It seems slowing down will improve the accuracy… but on the other hand, I don’t want to be slower than 2 seconds.

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Thanks for resurrecting this thread. I have been focusing on working to rebuild my muscle since my medical event but now need to work a lot more on my muscle memory. All my old memory is for muscles that no longer exist:)

Agree with other posters above that Ox and Chris Sajnog have some very good dryfire advice. One thing I think they both stress is doing shorter practice sessions but doing them more often. Even just ten minutes a week can help maintain skills. More often is better but I find the 10ish minutes at a time really good for maintaining focus and not getting sloppy.

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10 minutes… everyday. :wink:
This is actually my goal… I usually miss weekends with this.

I spoke with S.W.A.T. Instructor some time ago about how long did it take to start doing things subconsciously. He told me - 10,000 - 12,000 repetitions.
Simple math showed that I needed about 65 days (over 3 months, no weekends) to achieve the goal.
Was it true statement? Yes, it was. I don’t need to think how to draw anymore. All movements are setup in my brain. Right now I can focus on keeping the time below 2 seconds with accurate shot in small target.

BTW:
This is one of the best threads and I’m hoping to keep it alive all the time.

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That sounds like a worthy goal. I’m shooting for 10 minutes 4 days/week. Really need a SIRT pistol I can just leave on my desk and pick up whenever I have a free moment.

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That’s what I’m doing whenever I work from my home office.

My SIRT is sitting there and waiting. :fist:

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