Averages are funny. I’ve observed before that the “average” American has approximately one testicle. Of course, this average conceals underlying diversity in the distribution of testicles in the population.

At the start of Pistol Metrics One at Apache Solutions Firearms Training, instructor Tim Kelly asked us to introduce ourselves and say something about our expectations for the class.

I described myself as an “average American gun owner.” Like testicles, this characterization conceals underlying diversity in my shooting practices and abilities. If “average” here means 50%, then my average is composed of sometimes being 100% in it and sometimes being 0%.

I signed up for this course, in part, because I have been in a 0% phase recently. The last time I shot was in August 2023 when I took my Sociology of Guns class on their range field trip.

One of the attractive aspects of this course was that it was only half a day long (4 hours), had a modest round count (150 rounds, though we may have shot less), and a reasonable fee ($100). This is much easier to fit into my schedule and budget than the full-day, two-day, or three-day (or more) courses requiring hundreds of rounds of ammunition that I have often observed or taken.

My hope for the course was to get a baseline assessment of my skill set, thereby determining what and how to improve.

According to Apache’s description, “The course is designed to emphasize three primary technical skills which are crucial to any pistol owner: managing recoil, presenting the pistol from a “ready” or “mid-draw stroke” position, and executing the concealed draw stroke.”

Before getting to those technical skills, we did some basic marksmanship practice, shooting 10 rounds from 7 yards at a B8 target at our own pace. Being in my 0% phase, I struggled with this initially, scoring 71% on the first string. After some coaching on grip by Tim Kelly and trigger press by assistant instructor Joel, I improved greatly to 96%.

From there, we began to work on the component skills necessary to draw and fire multiple shots accurately from concealment. For each of the component skills, we did both dry and live fire practice on three different-sized targets which required different balances of speed and precision. We shot “quick” on an 8-inch circle, “careful” on a 2-inch square, and “precise” on a 1-inch square.

For each of the three component skills — recoil management, pistol presentation, and draw to first shot — we were timed individually and recorded our times on the metric sheet provided (image below).

The course built up to the “Proof of Concept” test of drawing and firing two shots on a B8 size target (8-inch circle). Shooting mostly from close range (7 yards or fewer) the whole day made hitting the target from the 15 and 25-yard lines seem like a long shot (so to speak).

Before shooting the Proof of Concept under the timer, we practiced shooting two rounds from each of the three distances under a par time. As you can see in the target below, I didn’t do terribly.

Under the pressure of the timer, I did much worse, scoring a disqualification at each of the three distances by missing the scoring part of the target with at least one shot. My times for drawing and firing two shots on target were acceptable (1.97 seconds from 5 yards, 2.64 seconds from 15 yards, and 3.32 seconds from 25 yards) but my accuracy at that speed was not.

So I came away from Apache Pistol Metrics One with a very good sense of where I am at in my shooting skill set, ideas for what I need to practice, and a baseline set of metrics I can use to assess progress in the future.

It was 4 hours, 150 rounds, and $100 well-spent.

A final note: Of 7 students in the course, I was the only one shooting a more compact gun with iron sights (Glock 48). I did feel, to quote John Correia, like I was “Gun Amish.”