My first article for PrimerPeak (formerly The Firearm Rack) was the The Test. It’s a shooting drill that I’ve been shooting for nearly a decade, and I think it’s time to revisit it on the website. What is the The Test, and what makes it such a good drill?
The The Test is a classic drill, and was created by Larry Vickers. You may see this drill online by other names, such as The Vickers Test, or the 10-10-10. Vickers made the drill during his time in Delta Force, as a sort of benchmark for shooting skill. If you could pass The Test, you were considered by Larry to be a reasonably good pistol shooter.
The original Vickers test was a simple drill. Begin at low ready position, at 10 yards, with 10 rounds loaded in your gun. On shot timer beep, raise your pistol, and fire 10 rounds into the black of a B-8 target in 10 seconds or less. If you handgun holds less than 10 rounds, par time and required rounds fired is equal to the capacity of the gun. 9 rounds would be 9 second par time, and 9 rounds fired, for example. To pass, you needed all hits in the black, and to be under par. Pretty simple, and it certainly works well as a baseline for skill.
Well, the great Ken Hackathorn (buddy to Vickers), has a modified version of The Test. His version is the same parameters, except scoring is on a 90% point scoring basis. Essentially, you’d need 90/100 points to pass with a 10 round gun, 81/90 for a 9 round one, and so on. I generally prefer Ken’s method, as using point scoring allows for tracking your progress better, and also makes for an easy way to shoot The Test in a competitive form.
I’ve made a video on The Test, which acts as an abbreviated video version of this article.
What’s the TL;DR for shooting The Test?
Here’s an example run of The Test:
For some extra challenge, try out the Advanced Test.
The Test is a simple drill, but we can change up a few aspects to run different variants of it.
I like the aforementioned “Advanced” Test, where the drill is the same, but we begin with our pistol holstered. On beep, we draw the pistol, and engage the target as normal. Let’s you work in an extra skill as part of a great drill!
There’s also the “Half Test”, which is the same as The Test, but with 5 rounds and a 5 second par time. Drills with less rounds fired can be quite handy, especially when ammo is expensive and hard to come by.
One of my favorite modifications to The Test comes from Bill Blowers. The Blowers Test is a harder version, but keeps the same framework. Shoot it at 10 yards, and 10 rounds in the gun. Shooter to begin holstered, and draw on shot timer beep. Minimum passing score is bumped up to 95 points, and the drill must be shot under 7.5 seconds. If The Test is too easy for you, shoot the Blowers variant!
The last variant that I’ll mention is the Super Test, which we’ve covered here on Primer Peak. Basically, it’s The Test, but at 15, 10, and 5 yards. Par time is equal to the distance, and passing score is still 90% of maximum points and under par. This version is great, but 30 rounds can be a lot to dedicate to a single drill.
While not a variant, we can also change the target to make the drill harder. Try swapping the B8 for a 4×6″ or 3×5″ index card!
The Test is a simple drill, but it does stress some important shooting skills.
The Test really gets you to lock in to the fundamentals of shooting, along with a focus on recoil control and maintaining the accuracy standard.
Working the fundamentals (grip, sight alignment, trigger press) is something that The Test will do. With this drill being 10 rounds, our grip needs to be on-point for consistent accuracy and good recoil control. The sight alignment really matters too, as we’ve got a rigid accuracy standard to achieve, and can’t let our sights wander over the B8. Trigger press is important, especially with the accuracy standard and cadence of fire required for a passing run. When it comes to shooting drills, The Test really does distill down to the fundamentals quite well.
Recoil control is really important with The Test. We’ve got to fire quite a few rounds, and recoil control is very important for doing that under par time. On drills with a single round or two rounds for a string of fire, you can get away with mediocre recoil control. Not on The Test.
The need for good accuracy is paramount here. Much like in the real world, we need to be precise, and The Test askes that of the shooter. The B8 is a good target for anatomical shooting (the black is about the same size as the high thoracic cavity), and I always like to see a drill that uses it.
With variations of The Test, we can also stress more skills, like drawing and longer distance shooting. There’s a lot to like with The Test.
The Test is among my favorite shooting drills. There’s a lot of skills that it stresses, but there’s more to it than that.
I really like how easy The Test is to set up at most shooting ranges. It can be shot at indoor or outdoor ranges, and with being shot from low ready is very accessible. There are a vast amount of great drills out there, but a lot of them cannot be shot at restrictive shooting ranges. The Test generally can, and there is a lot of merit to that.
I also dig how easy it is to modify The Test to make it easier or harder for the shooter. If you’re fairly green (or familiar with shooting and not very skilled yet), we can scale The Test down to give you more leeway as you learn. Drop the distance a few yards, or increase the par time a second or two until you’re able to pass the normal version. On the flipside, making the drill harder is pretty simple too. All of the variants listed above can make the drill harder, either to work the same skills to a higher level, or to work in additional skills.
Bring up the back, I like how much of a benchmark The Test is. It’s a great “progress” drill, as you can shoot it now, and then come back in 3-4 range sessions to see your progress. As a person who tests and reviews guns, it’s also handy for comparing my performance with different guns. How does the SIG M17 compare to the Glock 45 in my hands? Well, let’s shoot two Tests and see the difference! It can also lead to some fun “apples to oranges” comparison, like seeing how well I can shoot the drill with a WW1 Frommer Stop, or a 1970s Walther PP.
As a benchmark, The Test also makes for a great online competition drill. We’ve used it for many Drill of the Months (DOTMs) over the years, and it’s a really fun one for that friendly competition environment.
The Test is a drill that I’ve shot a lot. That time with it lead to my first article here on the site, and 7 years of writing to follow. The Test isn’t my favorite drill, but it’s an extremely important one to me. I’d really recommend that you shoot it, and add it to your drill playbook!
For some of our recent shooting drill articles, look below:
If you’d like to support me on Patreon, I’ve got the link for that here. Nearly everything that I do on Primer Peak is paid for out of my own pocket, and my content is not shilled or driven by manufacturers or companies. If you decide to donate, I’d really appreciate it, as it would allow for me to continue to bring you quality work.
Several years ago I owned an original Beretta PX4 Compact. I wanted something slightly smaller…
Over the past few weeks I've had quite a few people come to me asking…
rSavage typically isn't a name that comes to mind when looking for a modern defensive…
Summertime is here and our range days just got a little sweatier. Living in the…
In the era of the red dot sight (RDS), iron sights still have a place.…
In our previous entry we spoke with veteran, mother, competitive shooter and author Julie Golob.…