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Retaining the weapon is important, and more difficult than people would like to think. Most people think they're going to draw and point the weapon and the badguy at the other end is going to wither in fear. But what if he doesn't?! I've got a friend about an hour from where I live who's a former USN/SEAL who trains HRT/SRT shooters and he showed us how to effectively keep somebody from taking a weapon from you. A lot of it is simply in keeping the weapon CLOSE. But he had us practice trying to take the weapon from each other. One of the things he had us do was this...

Designate an aggressor and a defender. The defender should have his/her preferred PDW carried as usual but UNLOADED.

The aggressor positions himself 20 feet behind the defender and both defender and aggressor start walking in the same direction. But at some point, the aggressor is going to move quickly toward the defender.

If the aggressor overtakes the defender before he/she can retrieve the weapon and simulate shooting him twice, then the defender loses and the aggressor wins! If 20 feet is too close (and it usually IS for starters!), then increase it to 30 feet or more. In my case, I thought I was going to be a hotshot and ended up having the aggressor at 45 feet before I was successful! I SUCKED! :-)

The first day we practiced this, I ended up in the dirt most of the time with the aggressor and me both trying to gain control of the weapon. But after some practice I was able to retrieve the weapon and show that I could have used it before the aggressor actually "touched" me.... even though he was practically in my lap when I pulled the trigger!

We had a couple of guys one day who went with us and thought it was going to be easy. My 14 year old disarmed each one of them three times in a row!...starting at 20 feet. Finally, when one of them did manage to retrieve the weapon and point it before my son had him on the ground, my son reached out with his left hand and grabbed the top of the slide of the semi-auto pistol (a Glock) and just leaned into him....pushing the slide back enough to take the pistol out of battery. The guy wasn't thinking and didn't have the presence of mind to just fall back and shoot on the way down. He panicked and simply continued trying to pull the trigger!...but it simply was not going "snap"!...because the pistol was held out of battery by my son's hand! As he panicked, my son reached down to the side of his pocket and opened a Kershaw assisted-opening knife just to "illustrate" what could happen. ...and that was the end of that drill! Of course nobody was hurt, and we all had fun!...but it's a good reminder of our own imagined skills, in contrast with REALITY. :-)

When the defender thinks he's doing pretty good, you add TWO aggressors! :-) I have a tactic that works really well in that instance....RUN!!!...stop/turn and SHOOT....the closest one first. Or stop and drop quickly and cause the aggressor to just trip over you...then "shoot" them as they're getting back up! We practice this on grass. I would imagine that you'd get fairly skinned up if you practiced on concrete or asphalt!

These are good ways to practice things that most people don't give a lot of thought to. Too many people think that they're invincible just because they're armed, and it's just not true. :-)

BTW - that "trick" with pushing a pistol out of battery can be effective against a 1911 type pistol because you don't have to grab the slide at all to move the action out of battery, but merely push on the end of the barrel. It's a good reason to have a spring set over the 17-18lb stock recoil spring. Then again, if somebody is that close and you haven't fired yet, I guess you're kind of screwed anyway. :-)

That’s almost a full course right there. Exactly why it’s good to practice over and over again to gain speed when drawing from a holster and bringing up on target.

When faced with an aggressor body position is important too. Keeping the side you have your weapon on away from the aggressor. Even something as simple as resting your forearm on your weapon in your holster while backing up to create distance. A level 3 holster can buy some time to strike a nerve point if he attempts a grab at your holster, keeping it close is excellent advice when it’s out, etc.

Gun control is key, hitting what you shoot at because you may only get one chance.