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Shooting weakhand


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This has been a problem for me for a while now. I can decently shoot strong hand by getting my elbow in like I saw in a Saul Kirsch video, but to this with my strong hand really tenses up my body. I can do it or I can be more relaxed and use my nondominant eye to aim weak hand. If I don't try to get my elbow in and either go with vertical or a slight can't then I can hit somewhat accurately but throw shots to the right and am much slower than strong hand with tucked elbow.

Any advice?

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Have been doing a fair amount of weak hand dry fire. Shot live today and did decent at 10yds with mostly A hits. Slow, but improved. Splits are a second...but I figure that's better than mikes!

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Hate to hijack but,

I've found that I shoot more accurately weak hand than strong. Even though there is definitely more muzzle jump with the weak hand. My theory is that my weaker hand/trigger finger causes less torque when pulling the trigger. Does anybody else experience this?

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Hate to hijack but,

I've found that I shoot more accurately weak hand than strong. Even though there is definitely more muzzle jump with the weak hand. My theory is that my weaker hand/trigger finger causes less torque when pulling the trigger. Does anybody else experience this?

I sometimes think I do too but it is probably because I am aiming. My right hand thinks it can shoot just as fast all by itself. My left hand knows better.

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  • 4 weeks later...

For me its easier to let my weak hand bounce around and just pull the trigger when it crosses the target then to try and hold it steady. A drill I do to improve my weak hand is to just grab my gun and hold it straight out from my body and hold steady while I'm watching TV for as long as I can before it get tired.

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i just currently shifted from shooting RH to LH due to eye dominance, I dry fire everyday for at least 30min to familiarize my LH with the grip, draw, trigger control and sight alignment. I'm also doing live fire practice at least once every two weeks just to see if my LH is improving from dry fire.  After 2 ipsc matches my points improved and now ambidextrous.

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  • 1 month later...

I've found that keeping the pistol more vertical helps with recoil management when shooting support hand only. Some people like canting the pistol as its more comfortable but (at least during quals) they tend to throw rounds on thier 2nd 3rd shots. 

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I use my dominant (right) eye regardless of what hand I am shooting with. Accuracy slow fire is pretty much the same. I find most people practice non-dominant hand one-handed and neglect transitioning from a non-dominant hand two-handed grip, working to build the mastery and memory with the assistance of a support hand first. I have been working to improve my own non-dominant hand shooting and found this to be effective for me. I too am open to suggestion though, glad I found this discussion.

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That i something that i dont ever think about practicing until i get to a stage on a match that requires you to shoot weak hand, after that i always say that i am going to practice that this week but i never do.

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I lock my weak hand elbow, shrug my shoulder into my cheek, and cant the gun 45deg to get the sights in front of my dominant eye.

What really helped me to manage recoil and shoot faster was to reduce how much finger I was putting on the trigger.  Before, I would use way too much finger, which would rotate the gun outwards with respect to my forearm.  Using less trigger finger and aligning the gun to my forearm helped manage recoil and track the sights much better.

To start, I'd work on trigger control a ton in dry fire (set a timer on random start, and on the beep, press the trigger as fast as you can without disturbing the sight picture), then practice (from low ready) singles, pairs, Bill Drills, and Blake Drills from 3-7 yards in live fire.

Edited by FTDMFR
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2 hours ago, FTDMFR said:

I lock my weak hand elbow, shrug my shoulder into my cheek, and cant the gun 45deg to get the sights in front of my dominant eye.

Locking joints is really ineffective for absorbing energy. Straight is good, locked is not. Canting the gun is personal preference. It's entirely acceptable to just shift the position of the gun closer to the dominant eye without canting.

2 hours ago, FTDMFR said:

What really helped me to manage recoil and shoot faster was to reduce how much finger I was putting on the trigger.  Before, I would use way too much finger, which would rotate the gun outwards with respect to my forearm.  Using less trigger finger and aligning the gun to my forearm helped manage recoil and track the sights much better.

This isn't really a trigger finger issue, this is a grip issue. It's not that using less trigger finger makes you control recoil better, you are just positioning the gun a bit better in your hand and the nature of that position reduces how much finger you have on the trigger. Ultimately a lot of trigger finger or a little trigger finger by itself doesn't make any difference.

2 hours ago, FTDMFR said:

To start, I'd work on trigger control a ton in dry fire (set a timer on random start, and on the beep, press the trigger as fast as you can without disturbing the sight picture), then practice (from low ready) singles, pairs, Bill Drills, and Blake Drills from 3-7 yards in live fire.

Pressing the trigger as quickly as possible while keeping the gun still is good advice. I think you need to work far more difficult targets than just out to 7 yards though.

Edited by Jake Di Vita
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  • 4 months later...

This is a technique to shoot well with your weak hand only. It is not difficult, but you need lots of practice. Always remember slow is smooth, so as per my opinion, start your shooting slowly and give some time for learning.

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7 hours ago, jimmymuller said:

slow is smooth

 

Whenever I hear this saying it makes me want to jam ice picks into my ears. Slow is not smooth. Slow is slow and smooth is smooth. They have a miniscule causal relationship with each other.

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But haven't we always heard that "slow = smooth, smooth = fast"?  I guess, therefore "slow = fast" [QED]  So just shoot slow and you'll actually be fast.

 

I always look palsied when I shoot WHO, but some of that is dot problems that could be addressed in dry fire.  I can only shoot WHO well when I accept the wobble and break the shot as the dot passes through the acceptable zone.  I am definitely slower, unfortunately.  Not that smooth, either.

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17 minutes ago, CHLChris said:

But haven't we always heard that "slow = smooth, smooth = fast"?  I guess, therefore "slow = fast" [QED]  So just shoot slow and you'll actually be fast.

 

Yeah, if only it actually worked like that...but it doesn't. If you shoot slow, you'll be slow.

 

18 minutes ago, CHLChris said:

I always look palsied when I shoot WHO, but some of that is dot problems that could be addressed in dry fire.  I can only shoot WHO well when I accept the wobble and break the shot as the dot passes through the acceptable zone.  I am definitely slower, unfortunately.  Not that smooth, either.

 

That's totally fine. The way to improve that is to train on the edge of what you're capable of. Most weak hand problems can be corrected over time with just an hour or so of focused dryfire per week. People just avoid doing that like they avoid going to the dentist.

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I use Steve Anderson's weak hand sight confirmation (draw strong, transfer to weak, acceptable sight picture on target) and "6 reload weak" (draw, freehand 2 per each of 3 targets, reload, transfer to weak, 2 per 3 targets), among all of the other drills.  Besides those 2, I don't spend much time on weak hand.  At my matches, WHO is exceptionally rare.

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The anderson 6 reload weak is a good drill.  Just make sure you do it at the range sometimes because the recoil with WHO will slow you down vs dry fire.  The sight picture and trigger press would be the same.  I have only ever seen it in classifiers so far.  Occasionally SHO while holding something dumb in the weak hand.  

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1 hour ago, CHLChris said:

Besides those 2, I don't spend much time on weak hand.  At my matches, WHO is exceptionally rare.

 

Couple of things.

 

It's really not about how much you see that at your matches. It's about becoming as good of a shooter as you can possibly be. In general, the type of person that thinks they don't need to practice it much because they don't see it much are the same people who will get bent over by a weakhand stage when they do throw one in or you run into it at a higher level match. Eliminate your weaknesses, regardless of whether or not you get bitten by them often.

 

Getting better with your weak hand will also improve your general gun handling ability. If you become a savage with weakhand only, some of that ability will transfer over to strong hand only and freestyle. Shooting with your offhand will teach you things that you'll usually gloss over and not notice when shooting freestyle.

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