Drawing, holding and firing the pistol accurately with one hand at combat distances while focusing on the threat is easy when these skills are learned correctly. In my opinion, these skills should also be learned first by the new or prospective pistolero--introducing two-handed, sighted shooting only after one-hand point-shooting skills have been established.

The two-handed grip certainly has its place, but the single-hand hold is, in the author's opinion, a vital technique that really should be the first thing that defensive pistol shooters learn because it's what they'll most likely need.

When teaching people previously trained in the Modern Technique to do this, I've found there that there are two big obstacles to overcome. One is to ingrain in them that the pistol is indeed a handgun, not a "handsgun," and can be effectively employed as such if the proper technique is used. It's also difficult to wean them off their reliance on using the sights at all but contact distances during training.

Firing the pistol using the one-hand grip is usually the easier of the two obstacles to overcome for most people. If the pistol fits their hand properly, people will readily develop this skill with a bit of instruction.

Shifting the focus from the sights and maintaining it on the target is often more difficult because it's only natural to want to hit the target in training using the skills you've already established. And for so many people, two-handed, sighted fire is deeply ingrained. However, when these targets are replaced by an actual or realistically simulated, immediate threat, these target-oriented skill sets tend to dramatically degrade for all but the smallest minority of individuals.

That's why it's critical to use realistic, immediate threat stimuli instead of paper, plastic or metal targets when training. That might involve the use of Simunitions or blanks and a role-playing person holding a weapon and attacking the student--or through the use of a House of Horror target that moves toward the shooter.

The target needs to present some type of simulated danger in order to induce the physiological and psychological effects caused by the stress of an actual violent and spontaneous attack. And these effects--which range from experiencing the aforementioned overwhelming feeling of not having enough time to increased heart and respiration rates, tunnel vision, auditory selectivity and automatic behavior--are core components of the "element of danger" that do not generally surface in controlled training-range environments.

If these components are not present, then we are not actually training to prevail in the fight. Rather, we are simply training to become more proficient at shooting targets and achieving high scores on the range. And while these are both admirable endeavors, they are still as different as "chalk and cheese."