Hit-factor is the scoring system for many competition organizations like USPSA and IDPA. This is also the system we incorporated into our drills; doing this allows us to forgo the usual pass/fail standards and instead challenge the shooter to progress their hit factor over time. This leaves no “ceiling” to our drills and promotes constant growth instead of trying to reach a predetermined number. Put simply, your hit factor is Points divided by Time. These points are earned through marksmanship using standard USPSA Metric targets, which we sell a version of on our website.
These targets have four scoring zones, although we only refer to three. These zones are A, C, and D. There is a B zone, but this is counted as a C for our purposes. We commonly refer to these zones in their phonetic form, Alpha, Charlie, and Delta, for clarity while on the range. Alphas are generally worth 5 points, Charlies are worth 3 points, Deltas are worth 1 point, and misses (Mikes) subtract 10 points. So a course shot with 24 Alphas, 24 Charlies, 1 Delta, and 1 Mike would total 183 points. Some of our drills deviate from this standard, so checking each of our drills’ scoring systems is ideal before calculating your final score.
Once you have totaled all your points, you can add up your times for the entire course of fire or drill. For example, 183 points divided by a time of 46.65 would result in a hit factor of 3.92. It’s important to note that hit factor is a balance of speed and accuracy. You will hurt your score by going too fast and getting a few misses. The same is true for getting perfect accuracy but taking a long time to get those hits. Your score is going to suffer as a result. Included below are both picture and text examples of how this is calculated.
If you have any further questions, please email us at [email protected].
EXAMPLE
24 Alphas x 5 points each = 120 points
24 Charlies x 3 points each = 72 points
1 Delta x 1 point each = 1 point
1 Mike x -10 points each = -10 points
This leaves us with a total of 183 points on this course. Say we have a time of 46.65 seconds, we take the 183 points we earned earlier and divide them by the time of 46.65.
So, 183 points divided by 46.65 equals 3.92. Therefore we have a hit factor of 3.9 on this course.
