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Refining Grip - increasing consistency


ArrDave

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I've been shooting the dots, i've gotten pretty consistent at 15' so to stretch myself i've moved it out to 21'.  I'm shooting 3 per dot at present and I'm kind of stalling.    I've been  and I can call my misses and generally attribute it to 1 of 3 things and it's usually very obvious (other than sight alignent/sight picture, that's obvious when that happens and that's visual patience.)

 

- My thumb is not engaging consistently on the left side of the pistol, this nets hits left and sometimes low on a rushed trigger press. 

- bad trigger press, usually goes left. 

- Breaking wrists up if I over extend

 

The bottom 2 happen rarely and are obvious when they do, the first seems to be my #1 reason for missing a shot.  I'm trying to train through it.  i suspect dryfire is the ticket, but my question of other than from the holster to a white wall - are there any drills you've had good success with training this away to make your grip more consistent.  

 

When my grip is correct the gun cycles quicker and returns dead nuts to where it went off - to the point at 21 I can stack them in the same hole - or very near to it (provided I have 2 good trigger presses in a row). 

 

Any tips for taking your grip to the next level is appreciated it.  If I get this sorted I'm certain it will pay speed dividends on medium to long range shots.  

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Excellent question...this is biggest thing I have been working at in the off-season.  So far, I still haven't developed the consistency I would like.  Looking forward to the responses you get.

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There is a technique in quit a few practical shooting books that say with the help of a second person, get your grip on the gun that you consistently want, the second person will then make two marks on both hands. By doing this you can verify that you are continually getting the same grip and have visual evidence.

Work on it slowly and feeling where your hands are hitting the gun as you start your draw. It will take time and practice but be consistent in practice, eventually you won't put much thought into it and only notice when you really screwed your grip up.

Also grip the gun as hard as you can.

Sent from my SM-G928V using Tapatalk

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So a couple practice sessions under my belt and I noticed something - I will put a good bit of strength in on the bottom of the grip but after the first shot I ease off then the gun starts flopping around.  When I consciously gripped the gun correctly throughout the string - things went better (surprise surprise)

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On 3/1/2017 at 0:18 PM, ArrDave said:

I've been shooting the dots, i've gotten pretty consistent at 15' so to stretch myself i've moved it out to 21'.  I'm shooting 3 per dot at present and I'm kind of stalling.    I've been  and I can call my misses and generally attribute it to 1 of 3 things and it's usually very obvious (other than sight alignent/sight picture, that's obvious when that happens and that's visual patience.)

 

- My thumb is not engaging consistently on the left side of the pistol, this nets hits left and sometimes low on a rushed trigger press. 

...

 

How about not using the thumbs at all? Of course, I know there are two schools of thought on this (I noticed an old thread on it as well).

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So a couple practice sessions under my belt and I noticed something - I will put a good bit of strength in on the bottom of the grip but after the first shot I ease off then the gun starts flopping around.  When I consciously gripped the gun correctly throughout the string - things went better (surprise surprise)

This is something I recently noticed in my shooting too. I'm not shooting at your level by any means, but I still see major improvements when I make sure my grip is solid and steady through the entire magazine.

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my grip strength is getting more consistent,  having the captains of crush in my car (office), mental practice

my opinion is if you have excess strength your 50% effort is much stronger than the weaker

my job is not manual strength intensive so i have to make up for it

 

getting precise grip placement , more so trigger hand , so gun and sights index correctly is my issue, guessing i'd drop .4  or more on my  draw to first shot average........

other than more dry fire  is there anything else to try ?

 

Edited by biglou13
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13 hours ago, biglou13 said:

my grip strength is getting more consistent,  having the captains of crush in my car (office), mental practice

my opinion is if you have excess strength your 50% effort is much stronger than the weaker

my job is not manual strength intensive so i have to make up for it

 

getting precise grip placement , more so trigger hand , so gun and sights index correctly is my issue, guessing i'd drop .4  or more on my  draw to first shot average........

other than more dry fire  is there anything else to try ?

 

get the support hand on the gun sooner.  As soon as you can.  thi shas helped me draw to a point more consistently - still working on it.  

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On 3/7/2017 at 5:04 PM, tanks said:

 

How about not using the thumbs at all? Of course, I know there are two schools of thought on this (I noticed an old thread on it as well).

Quote

 

My strong hand thumb presses into the frame behind the knuckle, but the tip does nothing, would rest on the safety if I didn't have thin safeties.  

 

My support hand thumb basically lightly rests on the slide stop where it enters the frame.  if I roll my support hand forward any more I get into the safeties on my match gun (which has shadow safeties) 

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On 3/7/2017 at 4:04 PM, tanks said:

 

How about not using the thumbs at all? Of course, I know there are two schools of thought on this (I noticed an old thread on it as well).

Exactly.  Thumbs are bad about steering the gun in recoil away from the track you want it on.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Good post!  It was recommended that I try to relax strong hand thumb.  I didn't even notice it was so tense it was driving the gun.  Correcting that, and working on a firmer grip has really helped.

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Dryfiring at (surprise) the dots was helpful for me on this.

 

The problem is that it takes weeks or months to make that your automatic way to grip the pistol, and until you do, you won't do it consistently unless you're actively focusing on it.

 

So that's where you start. No reloads or other activities to distract you, like moving into positions. Just draw, grip, shoot.

Edited by MemphisMechanic
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