One-Reload-One Drill – Simple Shooting Drills [2023]

Over the years, we’ve covered a ton of shooting drills at Primer Peak. Some have been fairly simple, while others have gotten a little complex. In this article, I’m going to cover an extremely basic drill, the One-Reload-One.

What Is the One-Reload-One Drill?

The One-Reload-One (or 1R1 for simplicity), is a shooting drill that can be done with any gun. The course of fire is simple, and can be easily modified for more advanced version of the drill.

The 1R1 is a two round drill, and if your firearm uses a detachable magazine, we want to have a loaded spare on our person. We begin with our firearm at low ready, with one round chambered. If the firearm uses a detachable magazine, we insert an empty magazine. On command, shooter is to raise tjheir firearm and fire. The firearm should go to slide/bolt lock if applicable, and then the shooter performs an emergency reload. Once the reload is completed, shooter engages that target again with one round. It’s a simple gun up and fire, reload, and fire again.

For distance and target, it is shooter’s choice. I mostly shoot B8s, so I like to use the black scoring ring as my point of aim. I’d recommend that you use a target with a smaller scoring area if you are shooting close, to add a little bit of difficulty to the drill. Par time is also shooter’s choice, as it is very much dependent on the firearm you are using, and how/where you are reloading from. For an advanced version, we can perform this drill from the holster, if using a handgun.

As a tip to make the drill easier to repeat, I like to keep a loaded mag, and an empty mag on my person. We setup the drill by loading our gun with the full mag, then swapping it out for the empty. As such, we can set up the drill pretty easy like this. A 17 round magazine would give us 8 runs of the 1R1, making this a fairly efficient drill.

What’s the TL;DR on this already simple drill?

The Quick Rundown

The One-Reload-One (1R1) Drill 

• Necessary Gear: Ability to carry spare ammunition on one’s person.
• Target: Shooter’s choice.
• Distance: Shooter’s choice.
• Par Time & Scoring: Shooter’s choice for par time, and scoring is a simple pass/fail for the two hits on the target. Rounds should land in the intended scoring area.
• Round Count: Two rounds.
• Start Position: Shooter begins with firearm loaded with one round, at low ready. If shooting the advanced version with a handgun, begin with handgun loaded with one round, in a holster.
• Course of Fire: On command, shooter raises their firearm, and engages the target with one round. From here, shooter performs and emergency reload, and engages the target with one more round after the reload. If shooting the advanced version with a handgun, shooter begins with their pistol in a holster, but otherwise shoots the same course of fire.

Here’s a recent example of a series of recent 1R1 Drills that I shot:

What Skills Does the One-Reload-One Drill Stress?

The One-Reload-One stresses the following skills:

• A presentation onto target, with a required good hit
• Performing a slide lock/bolt lock/empty gun reload
• Reengaging the target with another accurate hit

The 1R1 is all about the act of getting on target fast, doing a fast reload, and reengaging the target. This is what I would call an “isolation drill”. We’ve covered drills that aim to cover a wide range of skills, like the Wilson Combat Comprehensive Handgun Proficiency Drill, but this one is working two skills.

We’re working on bringing the gun up, and firing an accurate first shot. This is going to require combining the 3 big fundamentals of shooting to get an accurate hit. From there, we need to perform a fast, and correct reload. I say correct, as reloads are easy to fumble under speed. However, this drill exists to get more repetitions done, so that we can get better at reloading well. Once we do that reload, we are essentially doing the first part again.

With this drill isolating the two skills in it (three if you shoot from a holster with a handgun), this is a basic drill to setup and perform.

What I Like About the One-Reload-One Drill

The 1R1 is very, very basic. I really like how basic this drill is. It’s a low round count drill that can be performed with any gun, and is easy to set up. It can be modified to be more advanced or more difficult, which is something that a lot of drills struggle with. While not a comprehensive drill, the 1R1 allows us to isolate a specific set of tasks, and work on getting better with them.

This is a great drill for people that are past the beginner step, but ware working towards a more intermediate or advanced skillset. Should you integrate it into your training regimen? Well, possibly. If you want to get better at reloads, this is a drill that will give you the most bang for the buck.

Other Shooting Drills & Additional Info

Check out our other shooting drills  >>>HERE<<<.

For drills that stress a reload, the Vickers Devil Drill is a very advanced drill that works on fast, accurate shooting, and a slide lock reload.