Dry Practice Essentials – Part 1

‘Dryfire is boring AF’ is a common complaint in the firearms community. Paradoxically, Abraham Lincoln addressed that issue with his comment. Preparation is the way to make dry practice more interesting and productive. Doing some preparation for your dry practice session is the essential first step. As the late William Aprill was fond of saying:

Spontaneity is overrated.

To keep it from being boring, make your sessions into a creative endeavor. Have a plan for the session, include something other than pure dry practice, e.g., make a target, and use some outside stimuli to add to the experience. Having a specific target that you use only for dry practice and then conceal or take down also contributes to improving the safety aspect of your sessions. Dry practicing on light switches, TVs, the dog, etc. is dangerous and can lead to a Negative Outcome.

Your plan might consist of nothing more than practicing your State’s (or any State’s) Carry License qualification course. As an example, here’s what the Louisiana Qualification Course looks like.

The session itself, without the explanations in the video, takes about five minutes. Although this session looks simplistic, there are 10 different skills practiced. They’re explained in the post What does effective Dry Practice actually look like?

It also helps to keep in mind Tom Givens‘ comment about the recency of your practice; whether dry or live: