The Point and Shoot Shooter v. The Draw Developer

We all start out as Point and Shoot shooters. A novice is most concerned with not embarrassing himself and with hitting the target.  He will draw, point, cock, aim and then fire.  At the early part of this stage he will be shooting around 1 second give or take a tenth or two. Speed will be gained as he first drops the intentional aim.  As he moves through this stage he will progress to draw, cock, point and fire and then to cock, draw, point and fire.  He is now solidly in the 7s.  You can recognize the Point and Shoot Shooter by the fact that his arm will be extended towards the target. Competition draws his arm out more and slows him as he tries to be more accurate.  That is why he is slower in competition than in practice.  The point and shoot crowd are the majority of our shooters.  They are a dangerous bunch because they are accurate.  The classic point and shooter is the eight year old who is required to shoot point and shoot by rule and many times hitting 90%.  Mathematically he or she will beat any shooter shooting less 40% no matter how fast they are.

Some of these shooters will move on to the next stage, the Draw Developer.  These shooters become students of the game.  They are constantly tinkering for improvement in their times.  They work on their mechanics, their draw, their stance, their grip, their method of cocking, their holster, their gun, anything that will make them faster.  Most will have acquired a mentor, a rival, and practice mates.  There will be an immediate drop in their times by two tenths.  They become .55 shooters sometime dropping into the high 4s. The club will marvel at their seemly overnight development. One may think this is the final stage, but it is not because the very thing that brought the gains now restrict further improvement.  If you think about your draw, you're slow! If you think about anything, your grip, your stance, balance, aim, opponent, hitting, anything you are slow!  Any tinkering or thinking on the fire line costs you 1 or 2 tenths of a second.  To get faster you must move on to the Comfortable Gunslinger stage.