Elbows up!?!

[Sheepdog6]

I was talking to another shooter who uses a slightly different shooting technique than I do. Both would be classified as a "modified isosceles" but he puts his elbows out and up. As a military and LE trained shooter I've always been taught not to let my elbows go out from the body any more than necessary, so I extend completely without locking them. Long story short, I tried his technique and noticed it helped with recoil management, sight tracking, and faster follow up shots, but my accuracy decreased noticeably. 

 

Does anyone else shoot this way or have you tried it? Should I keep practicing with it or stick with my current technique and just work on recoil management and sight tracking? Thanks for your thoughts. 

[jimbullet]

I have my elbows bent slightly but not necessarily have the elbows sticking out to the side extremely. For me in theory it does help in recoil management rather than recoil pushing my shoulders, its sort of like shock absorber on the elbow area.

 

Accuracy deteriorating? This is for me a work of visual patience when breaking the shot. Making sure that I have a solid grip, strong enough but not too light.

[SlvrDragon50]

Biomechanically speaking, the wider your elbows then the better you should be able to manage recoil, but it also brings the sights closer to your eyes which could potentially decrease accuracy if it's drastically closer.

[Eureka1911]

This is how I try to hold my elbows. Seems to work for this guy  and I'm liking it too. So effective for both ends of the talent spectrum!!

 

[Jake Di Vita]

On 4/30/2017 at 1:16 PM, Sheepdog6 said:

As a military and LE trained shooter I've always been taught not to let my elbows go out from the body any more than necessary, so I extend completely without locking them

 

I think this is on the right track. The reason you were taught to keep your elbows in most likely stems from not bumping them into things. The reason I keep my elbows in is because it sets my shoulders into an externally rotated position which is the most stable position for the shoulder in all ranges of flexion.

 

I have no issues with recoil management, accuracy, sight tracking etc while using an elbows in position. I'd suggest you look at your grip as being the primary culprit of your problems. There are lots of threads on here that go into detail about it. I'd suggest you do some searching.

 

2 hours ago, SlvrDragon50 said:

Biomechanically speaking, the wider your elbows then the better you should be able to manage recoil,

 

I disagree with this. Can you explain to me why you think wider elbows are mechanically more efficient?

[Jay870]

I can keep the gun the flattest by crush gripping with both hands then driving my elbows up and out to drive as much pressure into the top of the grip as possible. This technique also turns many other aspects of my shooting to shit and is a great way to end up with extremely sore shoulders.

 

Recoil management is very important but don't chase shooting flat to the detriment of other aspects of your shooting. I've personally wasted a lot of time and effort on this and trying to unlearn it sucks. 

[SlvrDragon50]

 
I disagree with this. Can you explain to me why you think wider elbows are mechanically more efficient?

You are able to use more of your chest muscles the wider your elbows are and apply greater grip force. Obviously there's diminishing returns as you reach the extremes.

[Jake Di Vita]

5 hours ago, SlvrDragon50 said:

You are able to use more of your chest muscles the wider your elbows are and apply greater grip force.

 

My chest muscles are not going to have much of any impact on the amount of force I'm applying to my grip. The only way the chest muscles would be able to have an impact on force applied to the gun is if you're compressing the gun from the sides using what mimics a fly motion. I don't think that's an effective way to apply force to the gun. I want my arms to be mostly straight and tight which makes the transfer of energy through the arms more efficient. Under load it is much easier to manage that load with the arms mostly straight than more bent. If you want wider elbows your choices are either bend your arms more or internally rotate the shoulder (a very poor position in flexion) to lift the elbows. Neither of those options are mechanically efficient.

[SlvrDragon50]

9 minutes ago, Jake Di Vita said:

 

My chest muscles are not going to have much of any impact on the amount of force I'm applying to my grip. The only way the chest muscles would be able to have an impact on force applied to the gun is if you're compressing the gun from the sides using what mimics a fly motion. I don't think that's an effective way to apply force to the gun. I want my arms to be mostly straight and tight which makes the transfer of energy through the arms more efficient. Under load it is much easier to manage that load with the arms mostly straight than more bent. If you want wider elbows your choices are either bend your arms more or internally rotate the shoulder (a very poor position in flexion) to lift the elbows. Neither of those options are mechanically efficient.

Your chest is a huge muscle group that can apply a lot of force for a much longer duration without fatigue compared to your forearm muscles. I'm not saying your chest muscle is going to contribute the majority of force, but it can certainly contribute a lot of force without much more effort. A lot of people teach torquing the gun inwards with each hand, and your chest muscles compressing the gun is accomplishing a similar effect. I've noticed a huge improvement in recoil control by incorporating Svend Presses into my workout routine.

[Jake Di Vita]

7 minutes ago, SlvrDragon50 said:

Your chest is a huge muscle group that can apply a lot of force for a much longer duration without fatigue compared to your forearm muscles.

 

Yeah. So are my legs. That doesn't mean I can effectively use them to apply force to the gun. Duration without fatigue is hardly a consideration for USPSA shooting. If you can't squeeze the gun tight for the duration of a USPSA stage, "use your chest" would not be my go to solution for that problem.

 

8 minutes ago, SlvrDragon50 said:

I'm not saying your chest muscle is going to contribute the majority of force, but it can certainly contribute a lot of force without much more effort.

 

The ends do not justify the means in my opinion, especially since as you said it's not going to be even close to the majority of force applied. Using your chest to control a pistol sounds like a lot of unnecessary complication for what would amount to be at best a tiny benefit. I'm no where near convinced there is any benefit at all over what I recommend.

 

10 minutes ago, SlvrDragon50 said:

A lot of people teach torquing the gun inwards with each hand, and your chest muscles compressing the gun is accomplishing a similar effect.

 

I advocate that. To be more specific, I advocate torquing pressure inwards towards the barrel axis. The way I do this is by using my shoulders to anchor my elbows to a stable position then I create the inward torque from my wrists. Just inward pressure isn't nearly as effective as inward pressure specifically towards the barrel axis. In order to effectively apply inward force with from your chest you're going to want your elbows to be on the same plane as your hands. This creates that crappy internally rotated shoulder position we talked about earlier. In my eyes that's one step forward followed by two steps backward.

 

14 minutes ago, SlvrDragon50 said:

I've noticed a huge improvement in recoil control by incorporating Svend Presses into my workout routine.

 

Got video? I'd like to see what that looks like. Even better if you also have video of before you started using this methodology so I can see the before and after of what this huge improvement looks like. Anthropometry could have an effect here. It's hard for me to go by you noticing a huge improvement when I don't know what it was like before. It's possible it could be a lot better than what you were doing before while at the same time still not being optimal.

[lgh]

If you have small hands, raising your elbows can lower the pressure the lower part of your hand puts on the grip. i.e. less contact of hand on stock. Then you have to fight that with a firmer grip. For me, I have had to lower my elbows a bit to get more hand on the gun.  Then the firmer grip has more effect. I think this is an area where people have to experiment a bit to find out what is best.