Skills
The cost for effective martial skills is a consistent expenditure of time, effort and energy. For the handgunner, the martial skills necessary to respond to a lethal assault is made up of several practiced sub-set skills including: draw stroke, acquiring the appropriate sight pictures, practical trigger control, (if necessary) trigger stroke with minimal disruption of the sight picture, and the ability to reload rapidly from unconventional positions. Each of these individual sub-set skills requires a constant investment of training time. There are no shortcuts to developing martial competence. Only a commitment to daily practice will produce a reliable level of fighting skills.
Physical Conditioning
Physical conditioning is one of the most ignored aspects of the self-defense shooter’s training program. Nationally known firearm instructors Ralph Mroz and Clint Smith have both written about the importance of physical conditioning in firearm training. To quote Clint Smith: “Physical conditioning, appropriate to your age and health … contributes to your survivability.” The single most common excuse for failing to add a physical fitness component to your training efforts is the lack of available time. Realistically though you have the time. Consider that with sixty minutes per hour and twenty four hours per day you are working with 1440 minutes every day. Dedicating only one-percent of that time daily offers you a fourteen minute training window (technically 14 minutes and 24 seconds.) If every day you can’t find a single fourteen minute stretch for exercising then try finding three or four stretches in the day that will add up to fourteen minutes. Let me also recommend that you find a physical activity that is personally appealing to you and that will require no initial gym equipment. When you have picked out one or two exercises, remember to start easy and plan for a training commitment that will stretch on first for years and then for decades. If it has been several years since your last exercise routine then consider restarting (after a physician’s OK) with a basic walking program. If you choose to make walking your first program, you can work up a number of tricks to support your new efforts. Consider developing the habit of parking your car in those spaces that are farther from but still within line-of-sight of the stores or businesses that you generally frequent. Once you get accustomed to a longer walk to and from the entrances, it is easy to then extend the distances. It is a simple default training tool and you can honestly remind yourself that you are improving your physical health and by extension your gunfighting abilities with every extra step.
