[Aguila Blanca]

Originally Posted by Frank Ettin

And how do you know that your plan has any utility?

Was it General Patton who said "No battle plan survives first contact with the enemy"?

Personally, I don't think anyone can have a self defense "plan," other than doing one's best to avoid places where the probability of attack is high. Beyond that, all anyone can do is drill in fundamentals, and learn the fundamentals well enough that adapting to an unfolding "situation" becomes an automatic response.

Say you practice drawing, presenting and firing for 100 cycles per day, every day for five years. Let's say you always stand in the same place in your man cave and you always present and "fire" at the same spot on the far wall. You'll get to be very proficient at drawing and getting off a shot at an assailant who happens to be standing in that position relative to yours. What if your "spot" is basically straight ahead, and when the attack actually happens the threat is 45 degrees to your left? ("Off the port bow," for anyone who might be a Navy vet.) If your practice doesn't include making allowance for the threat being in an unpredictable position/location, your training may fail. If you train to shoot one-handed, and don't anchor the off hand to the chest, taking a waist-high snap shot at someone standing 45 degrees to your left may indeed have you shooting through your own left hand.

People didn't come up with these concepts out of a clear blue sky, and if there weren't a good reason for doing things I doubt many serious instructors would be teaching them. Being a Jeeper, I keep thinking that some of this is parallel to the guys who remove the anti-sway bars from their suspensions. Yes, that allows more "articulation" off-road, but off-road you're going maybe 5 MPH. Those bars do serve a purpose. I know more than one person who has decided the anti-sway bars aren't necessary on the street, and who has subsequently ended up with his tires pointing skyward. Seriously: those bars cost money. No manufacturer would install them if they didn't think they were necessary.

So it is with "wasted" movements like firmly anchoring your off hand to your chest. There are reasons for doing that, and doing that does NOT have to slow you down. Once the movement has been learned and practiced, it becomes automatic.