WEAPONS TRAINING: 1-4-2 RIFLE/PISTOL DRILL

This blog is going to my first one about drills. The drill I’m going to tell you about today is a drill that I have not seen before, however If I’m wrong and this drill has been invented please correct me so I can cite that person and change the name of this drill. The reason I call this the 1-4-2 drill is because you take 1 shot, 4 times, with 2 magazine changes in the middle of the drill. It’s pretty simple but has helped me a lot with both my primary and secondary weapon magazine changes. As well as target reacquisition after a magazine change with my primary weapon system, and target acquisition from a holster draw after transitioning to my secondary weapon system. Now I’ve been doing this drill up close at around 20-25 yards and I realize that at that distance if your primary goes empty or experiences a problem you would immediately transition to your secondary. However, that completely defeats the point of the drill. I wanted to find a way to practice mag changes, with both guns, as well as drawing from a holster. So I came up with this:

Load 1 round in 2 spare magazines, 1 primary, 1 secondary and put them in whatever type of kit you have. I use simple plastic “Fobus” pistol mag carriers and at the moment until I find a good AR mag carrier I use a cheap one that is going to do fine for this drill. At the same time you should have 1 round loaded in the chambers of both systems. Place your secondary in your holster ready to go when needed. Start in a high ready position with your primary. Start whenever you want, I have a “shot timer” app on my phone, yes, there IS an app for EVERYTHING! The timer isn’t all that great but the buzzer is loud which is all I need. The drill itself is VERY simple. Shoot 1 round, at that point your gun will run dry, check your chamber even though you know it's not a malfunction, perform a speed reload, put 1 more
round on the target, when that gun runs dry transition to secondary, and repeat everything you just did. Do not forget to do your “search and assess” or “scan and assess” at the end of this drill.

You can add any sort of variants to this you'd like. I've added a variant where I'll shoot from a standing high ready on my first shot then prone on my second.


Hope this one helps! Now go shoot!


My weapons that I used for this are a Noveske AR15 and my Glock 19.


"Don't tread on me"

-Rush