Many people in the firearms training community have heard of the Teuller Principle. Some of them can give a general outline of it, even if said outline is light on depth. Of course, some others misunderstand the principle, but that is par for the course. 

The issue that I have found though is that few people think much of the implications of what Sgt. Dennis Tueller discovered. Their understanding tends to be very surface oriented. In other words, their thoughts about it end at the simplistic “21 foot rule” (which does not exist and has nothing to do with Tueller’s work). 

I am going to do two short articles looking at two aspects that are rarely thought about, but are crucially important for self-defense. 

Today, let’s talk about the basic concept that Tueller discovered : that the average person can cover seven yards in one and a half seconds. 

Not only did Sgt. Tueller prove this in his initial tests, but it has been subsequently proven in thousands of follow up tests by others, including Masaad Ayoob who duplicates the drill with all of his students in his MAG80 courses. From this, we get the surface fallacy of the “21 foot rule”, as if we can magically keep everyone away from us at 7 yards at all times, and that if they are inside of that, we can just shoot them down. None of that is true, or has any bearing on the real world. 

What does have bearing is that people can close distance really, really fast. What we need to realize is that the above statement is an AVERAGE person can cover seven yards in 1.5 seconds. There will be many who are slower, but there will also be many who are substantially faster. In other words, they may be able to cover those seven yards in 1.3, 1.1, or even under one second. 

But the real nightmare is that we have no idea which of those three categories the violent criminal actor who is threatening us falls into. If you think he is on the average, but he is not, how does that affect your reaction? 

The other part that gets overlooked is how far away seven yards is. While we often shoot targets on the range at that distance, it is somewhat a nebulous matter. In my Close Contact Handgun class (as well as the block I teach at the Pat Rogers Memorial Revolver Round Up), I actually have the students stand at that distance facing another person so they get a true sense of how far away too close actually is. I would advise every reader to stake out that distance and repeat this so you see and feel for yourself that the edge you have when someone is closing on you may not be what you think it is.