spook

I wish! Thanks guys, looks like I would just have to forget about shooting for a month....could be a good thing...at least for my wife Get some quality time with your wife... the gun will be there when you get back. +1 But bring one of those grip training thinigies!

Ouch! You make them seem that old... Hehe, well, those guys can still hang with or even better, still are the best I just wonder what kind of influence grip tape (or lack thereof) had on them during the 80's and early 90's. How they compare shooting with or without.

That's exactly what happens to me. The void between the support hand and the grip panel increases. Still, the advice about rolling the support elbow out or up works for a lot of shooters.I use a light grip on the gun. About what a person would use to grip a hammer. The grip works for me with any handgun that has a grip panel that is a bit rounded at the back so I can get the fleshy part of my hand behind the gun. All it takes is a little bit of contact and I am good to go. The problem I have always had with a Glock is the panels are absolutely flat and they swim around in my support hand, tape or not. I solved the problem with a Hogue grip sleeve. Maybe not the ideal solution, but it works. Ron, I was about to put a "paging Ron Ankeny" post in this thread. You're the first shooter that came to mind when I was cranking away yesterday, just watching the sights and effortlessly holding the gun (the Bill Drill clip comes to mind). I have similar experiences with gettin the "meaty part" of my hand behind the back strap. I am still in doubt if that also involves the part down by the magwell, or just the higher part from half way up to the tang.

They should have made the slide out of polymer... Now that would be cool!

Ramas, thanks for the tip. One of the first things that came to mind were the Burkett timing drills. I know Flex is pretty fond of them. My plan was to try them next time I'm at the range. I'll bring 500 rounds and see what happens. Thanks Jake I have seen you give this advice before in other threads. When I roll my elbow up, I have more (read: stronger) contact of the weak hand high up on the grip (where the thumbs meet). But I have almost no weak hand contact with the grip at the magwell area. Is this correct?

LOL! Man, I'm so hyped about shooting right now I wish I could go to the range with 10000 bullets and just experiment away with this. I grabbed Brian's book to see read up on some Old School (read: pre-grip-tape-era) philosophies on how to grip the gun. I have read the Grip paragraphs again and checked the "equipment" section. What got my attention is that Brian says he uses dulled 20lpi checkering instead of 30lpi because it is "easier on the hands" and "more comfortable" (less abbrasive?). Compared to grip tape, checkered wood is as slick as wet glass. It's like his whole philosophy on gripping the gun is in line with what I experienced at the range. And if Brian can shoot accurate .11 splits with a gun without tape, well... let me just say that I'm going to wait and shoot some more before I put it back on the gun I have always felt that the grip maybe the most important "skill" of pure shooting. I think there could be an entire sub-forum on the subject. But it is very hard to transfer through words how to grip the gun. I hope this thread will result in some interesting input and I'd love to hear what Mr. Enos himself has to say about gripping the gun (that isnot already in Beyond Fundamentals).

Looking good Luca! I didn't know you liked watching disney movies while reloading

I finally went to the range yesterday evening. I had taken the grip tape off my Glock a couple of nights before. During dryfire, everything seemed fine. We started out with a stage with 10-12y targets. Things started out well. It was cold on the range. No sweaty hands and I could hold on to the Glock well enough to get good hits. Then came the second stage. 4 targets at 25yds. First run and I could paste 4 hits instead of 8. Every target had a nice center hit and a miss. On the second run, I paid more attention to the sights and saw what happened. The gun would recoil up and because I tried to keep it down by putting pressure on the left side panel of the gun with my weak hand I somehow managed to pull the gun to the left as it was coming down. It was not a trigger issue, I could see the gun go up and come down to the left even before I started putting pressure on the trigger. Time for the third stage. 4 targets, all of which have A-zones with penalties on either side. Distances about 10-12y. It's getting old. First shot good, second shot to the left into the edge of the penalty. I'm starting to get pissed and blame the slick grip. There's just no way to hold on to this bar of soap thing. So I put some ProGrip on my hands, but the problem stays. I ask my shooting buddy: "How hard do you squeeze your grip with you support hand?" "I dunno, not very hard" "Grab my hand and hold it like you hold your gun" He grabs my hand and just holds it. Not harder that you would shake a person's hand. "Holy shit, that's all?!" "Yup" OK, time for an experiment. Same targets, 10yds. Penalties on both sides of the A-zone. I hold the gun like I normally would and see the second shot go into the penalties (well, I see the sights return to the left). I try to hold onto it, and the harder I try to hold on the harder the gun will go to the left and work its way out of my hands. I keep trying to control it, but it just doesn't work without the grip tape. Then I decided to just let it go. I place the gun in my hands like a wuss and pull the trigger. The gun would move more, but somehow came back down a lot faster. It felt like I had absolutely no control of the gun. But what I saw was the opposite. I noticed all I could do was just watch the sights and I witnessed how my body just figured out the rest. I was hardly holding the gun at all. I could actually be comfortable, just hold the gun, instead of squeezing, gripping, or whatever other uncomfortable terms, and adjust the way the gun went up and down just by looking at it! It was a shame I only had about 40 rounds left. I would have gladly shot 1000 more. It seriously felt like I could just flush my 10 years of previous shooting/training down the toilet. I hope to get some range time before my snowboarding trip at the end of this week. I just had to write this down to make sure I won't forget it. Shooting without grip tape is not better, but it turned out to be a blessing in disguise. It has shown me so much already about the flaws in my grip. I am going to figure this out and see what happens if I put the tape back on the gun after that. Now for a question to all those shooters who have aquired a neutral grip and use no effort to hold the gun during shooting: The only thing I couldn't solve in the 40 rounds I had left was getting the gun to stop at the right height. I would see the sight perfectly on the first shot, but when it would come straight down it stopped when the top of the slide was still very visible. The bottom of the front sight was at the position where the top should be. Edited to add a link to Rob Leatham's Q&A which I found interesting Damn, it feels like everything has changed. The way I tracked my sights. It was like I could put all my attention into looking at the gun.

Is the Para legal in Production? I know the magwell renders it useless (illegal) in IPSC Production. You might want to check for USPSA Production. Any specific reason the adjustables are a must for you?

looks like I'd could use some of the advice from Scott myself. Thanks for the correction guys. I edited the title and the post

A big +1

By Scott Springer. Gotta love it. The whole Interview

I have noticed the same. Especially the muscles close to my weak arm elbow will be sore. What I like about shooting without tape and grip goo (if I will stick to it) is that I take that extra step to being independent of artificial help, meaning I can basically pick up any Glock around the world and shoot it well. I wonder if the Big Dawgs from the Golden age (Brian, TGO etc.) used tape, or would use it now. I'd love to hear their opinion on the matter (Brian?) My initial decision of not using anything also came from realizing that the sick runs at the steel challenge by Brian and the awesome shooting of TGO were all done without tape of grip goo.

What happens when you yaw your strong hand to get it more "behind the gun"? I recently took my grip tape off the gun and will shoot without "lotions" for some time. Reason for this is that it will emphasize the flaws in my grip. Adding tape and grip lotions really does help, but it also camouflages your flaws.

That explains why he always has his hand on his gun between stages, but I wonder how he does his reloads....!!!

I have to try the stock grip out oin the range tonight, but I wonder how Dave Sevigny does so well with the stock grip. Does anyone know if he uses ProGrip or something similar?

I think the most important thing is to find out how you can call your shots I can call my shots. But I don't see what I thought Brian saw when I read his book.

I took the TruGrip off yesterday. I have one quite some training and the left upper part (next to the slide stop) began to slide. I like how the gun feels without it for now. I'll have to try it out on the range though. Strange though, I began using grip tape on my revolver and when I got my Glock, I immediately added tape, without even trying it stock.

It still won't fit the IPSC box if you shoot USPSA with it A friend of mine had a G35 with a T.H.E. Magwell. His solution was to file/grind off some material of the back of the magwell. The part where the bolt goes in the frame through the lanyard hole. If you can find someone who can do it, it might help to make the barrel flush with the slide up front Good luck!

That's exactly why I was asking if anyone tried blue yet. It would seem trackable enough, but since it's closest to a black FS, it might give better accuracy. Maybe I'll try one myself once I get the FS drilled for a FO.

Anybody ever try blue?

I was in the same boat two weeks ago. Get well soon!

+1

Randy is the man and I think the guy either meant 300 or he got 3 Randy Lee guns

That is pure tautology. That's even more abstract than saying: "Max had more match points than Eric when the match was over" It doesn't explain anything. Come on, the guy hasn't lost in almost 10 years and last time he shot the Florida Open he won by a 10% margin. Last time Eric and Max met there was a gap of almost 6%. I can imagine someone being curious what the cicumstances were. I had a little "WTF happened" moment myself, and I don't even track his results. Just like I had when I heard Rob got beat by Sevigny, with a Glock. Let me point out again that I have no reason to be biased towards Grauffel. But somehow I can understand comments like that. I mean, how is that different than calling Leatham TGO? I'm sorry, but I am sensing some bias. I have never seen any "shooter-bashing" on these forums (and I thank the Lord for that), but to me it's just awkward that the one time the greatest IPSC Open shooter of this era gets defeated (by an American shooter) the posts become a little.... Team America. BTW, my theory of why Eric lost is that this match (from what I have seen) was a pretty straight forward match. Meaning, there are not many solutions for the stages. Eric is a master in stage strategy and my belief is that he wins in that department more than in any other. I even think he is "just" top ten in pure shooting skills, when there are no extremely tough shots involved. But his strategy and mental game and match management are just really a notch above the rest. If you take the stage strategy and match management out of the equation, there is not much left but just the shooting and judging by the stages, pretty straight forward shooting. See if you can get a copy of Saul Kirsch's 2003 US Nationals. He has a mini interview with Eric and asks him about the differences between matches in the US and Europe are. The answer lies there I think.