From the official web site: "The World Fast Draw Association is the largest sanctioning body in the sport of Fast Draw. Although there are a number of smaller regional associations, the WFDA is the only universally recognized organization. It is a nonprofit group dedicated to governing, preserving and promoting the sport of Fast Draw."

Drawing one's shootin' iron is easy. Doing it quickly is quite a bit harder. Drawing quickly and shooting a target is much more difficult. Fortunately, all it takes is some aptitude, some instruction, and a hell of a lot of practice. Live ammunition (lead bullets and gunpowder) is not used in Fast Draw: blanks and wax bullets are. Wax bullets are propelled by a shotgun cartridge primer that have been placed on a .45 caliber casing. This is enough to propell the wax bullet to the target at high velocity. Wax bullets are therefore still dangerous! The .45 casing must be drilled out so that the shotgun primer will fit; usually the hole is just large enough so that the primer can be inserted with one's fingers. The blanks are .45 cartidges fitted with a primer, filled with a little packed three-f black powder, and then a loosly filled to the top with one-f black powder. A patch is placed over the powder, and then nail polish is brushed lightly over the patch to seal the blank. Blanks are very dangerous: they can kill! In my opinion, anyone attempting the Fast Draw with live ammunition is a bloody fool, and that person should probably not own hand guns.

The first step in participating in the sport of Fast Draw is to acquire a sootin' iron. The pistol must be single action: that is, one must pull back the hammer before pulling the trigger. Nearly any single action pistol will do for the beginner, though there are several modifications that the shooter will probably wish to do: The barrel should be as short as the rules allow. Almost any gunsmith can put on a shorter barrel, if one has a pistol with a barrel that's too long. The barrel may be made of aluminum, to make the gun lighter. This can cost around US$70 or so. Once the aluminum barrel has been installed, one should probably never shoot real ammo in the gun. Aluminum barrels have rifling: wax bullets will not hurt the rifling, but lead bullets will. The front sight should be grinded off, and the barrel under it smoothed, so that the gun will slide freely from the holster. If one "fans" the gun, the hammer should be modified so that it sticks upward instead of backwards. If one "thumbs" one's shots, one will wish to keep the hammer the way it is. Often a Fast Draw artist will thumb the first shot and fan the second, if she or he is doing the "two balloon" match. If that is the case, one must try both types of hammers to see which one prefers. The hammer modification may run around US$70 or US$80. The gun itself may be trimmed of excess weight, usually by machining down various parts to make them lighter. There are rules one must follow to make sure the gun is still allowed. Also, too light a gun can be a handicap: a pistol requires weight so that the hand that draws it will be "steadied" by the weight. The gun should be "tuned" to be fast. The draw of the hammer should be shortened so that it need only be pulled back two inches or so. Also, the spring or spring steel that is used to send the hammer home after the trigger is tripped may be weakened, so that it requires less effort to thumb and / or fan the hammer. Note that if the hammer's spring is too weak, the hammer will not detonate the primer! It appears that the most popular gun is the 'old model' Ruger Blackhawk. Another popular gun for Fast Draw is the Ruger Vaquero, that has had some or all of these modifications. One can therefore spend about US$1,200 to buy the pistol and have the modifications performed.

The second step is to acquire a rig with a fast holster. Fast Draw holsters are different than the "normal" holsters, such as Cowboy Action Shooting holsters. A Fast Draw holster will stand away from one's body an inch or two or three, and it will probably be slanted backwards a bit. There are rules that regulate how many degrees the holster may slant backwards. The "normal" holster lays flat on one's leg, generally half way between the side of the leg and the thigh--- one does not want this kind of holster for Fast Draw. You will want the holster placed on your side, near the hip bone, or an inch or two forward of that: wherever your arm is fastest. You must practice using different locations of the holster. Keep in mind that there are regulations that limit where you may place the holster on your body.