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I've been working on increasing times (less than 1.5s) on the Tueller Drill, which I know some of you refer to as the 21-foot drill. But I am interested to know if any of you work on it regularly as it seems to me to be a scenario almost all of us could get into this day and age.
We do this in our qualification but the well aimed shot is more or less 2 shots right out of the holster at belly level. I impressed upon a trooper doing our baton/oc recert class who thought he would show how the 21 ft works. He asked who the gunslingers were in the class and those that knew me pointed in my direction. He hands me an airsoft glock and tells me to put it in my holster. It didn't fit the retention so I tell him it will be easier to get a quick draw. He says well take the safety off and as I look down, makes his run. I side step, draw and shoot just as the gun clears holster as he is bringing the knife up to bare. Reaction is always slower that action and add stress into that and it all goes to crap. A shot timer would be a good guage of reaction time and moving back would give you an idea of your effectiveness of a hip shot.
Read your article and watched the video (for the gazillionth time). I am always surprised at the difference in draw speeds between the 15 and 21 foot repetitions. The Tueller Drill rationale is a completely surprise knife attack.
Unfortunately, some folks don't make that connection and regard 21 feet as the 'line of death' for a guy brandishing a knife. If you see a guy is brandishing a knife at 21 feet, or closer, or further, and your weapon is still holstered you are not responding appropriately.
Also notice in the video the officers essentially remained stationary - no movement off threat axis. Once the guy commits to the attack and is closing, movement will slow and distract him. The problem in vetting this with roleplayers is after the first rep the roleplayer is expecting movement and therefore expecting to counter the movement.
Get a 'virgin' don't explain what your response will be just tell him to attack you on the hand signal of someone standing behind you. As he begins, drive off your right foot, as drawing, and move forward and diagonally to your left. At about a 45 degree or greater angle.
This may be awkward to you upper body-wise as you twist on the draw, but feet-wise it is what a right handed person is geared to do. Most importantly, it is awkward for most attackers, because they need to drive right to get you, which means driving off their left foot. Right handers most often naturally want to drive off their right foot - why do you think we run track events turning to the left? - and this may cause some lag.
Why drive forward at an angle? You move faster going forward at an angle than you do laterally.
Try that on a 'virgin' and see if it works. Remember once he has seen your response, he will be expecting movement, so all other reps will be compromised. Get a couple folks, have them wait in a building/another room and do several variations.
See what works best then practice your responses using the most successful variations. Do not take my word - vet it yourself, remember, when someone tells you tactics, they are betting your life.
Do me a favor, though, erase this shit from your memory bank:
....there are some ways to combat the knife attacker’s advantage.
Two positions that work the best are either dropping to the ground on your back, where you can use the feet as fighting and pushing points while firing your weapon, or to roll to the side and fire.
Both of these points focus on changing your height so that the knife attacker would have to drop his attack point to hit you, as well as buy you time to draw your weapon and subdue the knife-attacker.
Sounds cool, looks cool, but unless you absolutely, certainly, guaranteed, put the guy down with a CNS, you are now in a knife fight with the opponent starting from a position of superior mobility.
As a general rule, never give up mobility in a close range confrontation, movement is your friend.
Every few years it comes up. Usually with a "virgin" who isn't familiar with it.
When I introduced it to the wife, I simply ran at her and didn't tell her about the foot long rubber knife I hid behind my back. I got her good.
I didn't give her instruction yet, I wanted to see what she came up with on her own.
We repeated the test. This time she knew I had the knife and how little time she had. She still went for her gun (Blue), realized she didn't have time, and then Krav Maga training came to her. I had so much momentum going at her I could not dodge her heal as it suddenly flew up and I impaled myself on it. (belly level) I lost the air in my lungs and it made a gutteral noise as it came out of my face. I hunched over in pain and surprise and found myself on one knee. I retained the knife.
When I looked over she had moved to the side, drawn the blue gun, and said "Bang! Bang! Bang!" while pointing it at my upper torso and head.
It was an awesome stop kick! Worked great. She said she would have driven it in harder if it was the real thing.
Anyway, I haven't done the T. Drill with her since.
We were running through the 21 foot drill last Saturday during a training class, and my times were not great. I was averaging around 1.8, which isn't too bad IF I have time, but that's a big if...I was consistently hitting center mass, though, so there's that...We were drawing from concealment.
Needless to say I have been practicing my draw and fire a good bit this week, but I haven't been timing myself. Just trying to be smooth and accurate, and I am quite certain my times would be better if I did the drill again right now. It is a natural thing for me to move side to side, duck, slip, etc, if someone is coming for me, so I try to incorporate some of this into my practice, while drawing.
I have never believed in the 21 foot rule. It is not nearly as far away as it sounds. I firmly believe in the reality of someone closing the distance quickly, so I use at least a 30 foot rule, if I have a choice. Of course if attacked, I won't have a choice. LOL