How do you get a grip on your draw?

[Esther]

How do you grab the gun from the holster during your hands-at-sides draw? Right now my strong hand comes up over the back of the gun, then back down in a perfect (or near perfect) grip before bringing it up. My friend who has a much faster draw suggested that I try scooping the gun with three fingers (thus eliminating the up-down-up motion) and adjusting my grip on the way up.

And when do you acquire a perfect grip - when the gun is still in the holster or after it has come out?

Thanks!

Edited May 4, 2013 by Esther

[38supPat]

Acquire the full grip in the holster before it starts to move. The scoop draw never worked for me, Andy time gained getting the gun moving quickly was lost adjusting the grip to get a sight picture. I come over the top of the gun and use the beaver tail as my guide, I want it to contact the same part of the web of my hand every time, once it does I am pretty much in the perfect spot for contesting the entire blackstrap of the pistol, ten ill wrap my hands around until the fingers, or more importantly the middle finger contacts the point where the front strap and trigger guard meet and the rest of the fingers grip the front strap. At this point my grip is complete ad the gun moves out of the holster.

[amish_rabbi]

What Pat said, the scoop draw never worked for me either.

[DonovanM]

You can get some pretty ridiculous speed out of the scoop draw. Here's a demo I did a while back in dry fire.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwNDFSvBBvc

I can do it at this pace without worrying too much about throwing the gun downrange - which is definitely a concern if you screw up the scoop. But I haven't bothered incorporating it, due to my opinion of the priorities of a good draw. They are:

1) Consistently getting a good grip

2) Speed

It was an easy choice not to incorporate the scoop because it reversed these priorities for me in a fairly cut and dry manner. Acquiring a good grip was just not consistent enough - because frankly, I don't care enough about my draw to dedicate more of my time completely re-learning it to get it consistent enough. And I refuse to even consider "fixing my grip on the way up". That always seems to happen after I'm "up", and costs too much time.

Just coming in from above or the side or whatever I do works for me. I get a good grip every single time and how to do it is buried so deep in my subconscious I don't have to worry about it one bit anymore. I wish I could say the same about the rest of my gunhandling skills.

FWIW, one of my favorite guys to shoot with does it out of his Limited rig, and he has his holster set up in the perfect position for the scoop. He uses it to great effect as you can see a couple times here.

[BritinUSA]

Scooping did not work for me either. I think it was Matt Burkett who suggested that it may be quicker to lift just the thumb out of the way and grab the gun from the side rather than the top. I'm probably not describing it very well.

At the draw with hands at sides point your strong hand thumb toward the target and slap your hand against the grip panel then pivot the thumb down to complete the grip. If you can read that and make sense of then let me know.... :-)

[lumpygravy]

Maybe practice the scoop draw in dry fire from several start positions, i.e. hands at sides, surrender, touching a wall, etc... and then bring it to the range and practice it live on the timer and compare to your "regular" draw.

If you can do the scoop consistently, great. If not, you might just need to work at it or maybe you'll be able to develop both and use them based on the stage/situation and the targets presented. Personally, I favor acquiring a solid grip in the holster vs. the scoop. Beyond the stand-n-shoot classifier type stages, most stages are setup such that one is moving while drawing. IMHO, this increases the disaster factor for the scoop and negates any time cost/differential for acquiring a good grip.

Now if you're going to shoot any Steel Challenge type stuff which is truly stand-n-shoot, it would certainly be worth exploring further.

[38supPat]

Well Max has won the Steel Challenge, more than once, and here's his description of the draw.

[Esther]

Thanks for all the tips, guys! I'm experimenting with the scoop and side draw from different start positions in dry-fire.

Donovan - I like how you name the priorities as 1) getting a good grip and 2) speed. What are you using to make the light show where you hit the target?

BritinUSA - Thanks! Your description makes sense, and I actually like the side draw surprisingly much (from one dry-fire session). It's faster than the up-down draw I had been doing, not as fast as the scoop, but I can get a consistent grip each time.

[DonovanM]

Just my SIRT pistol.

[cpa5oh]

I'm not a great shooter, but I want to give my opinion on something - experiment with the scoop and non-scoop draw in LIVE fire, and shoot two accurate shots every time you draw. If you can pull the scoop off and get two accurate shots off in less time than a non-scoop draw (and feel like you are in control of the gun,) maybe it's for you. Pulling a draw off in dry fire, where there is no recoil to have to deal with, is significantly different than being able to do it in live fire.

I dry fired all winter using the scoop draw...and then I found out that for me, in live fire, it's far less effective - not because it is slower (the scoop is much faster for me) but because I don't end up with a perfect grip every drill/course of fire using the scoop draw. If I don't get a great grip at the beginning of a drill/course of fire, my trigger pulls disrupt the gun and I feel like I'm riding a mechanical bull with recoil taking the sights all over the place. I believe I wasted most of the time spent this winter running drills with a start (the scoop draw) that couldn't work for me in live fire.

[DonovanM]

^ Absolutely right and echoed my experience perfectly, luckily I only spent a couple weeks with it though. Of course you can (should) use live fire to be sure, but you should be able to tell in dry fire if you have a good grip or not.

[38supPat]

Yeah that's one problem with the dry fire par timed drills. It's pretty easy to just go all out to drop the hammer on the par time and start forgetting about getting a proper sight picture, grip etc. it just becomes an exercise in raw speed-to-click. It can be beneficial to learning to go faster but you have to be able to see whether or not it is causing you to give up something to get those times.

[Esther]

pa5oh - Great point about the live fire and shooting two accurate shots, thanks!

Donovan and Pat - Thanks for concurring!

[GM2B]

I used to scoop draw in live fire practice and at matches. After throwing a hot pistol during practice I stopped! I draw in the mid .80's without any issues.

[Bealzybub]

Wow, great stuff to a newb that hasnt yet started into what I hope will be a good first step towards three gun.

Edited May 7, 2013 by Bealzybub

[benos]

I would not recommend even experimenting with the scoop draw, until after one had perfected the "get a perfect grip on the pistol before it leaves the holster" draw - which may take about 5 years ... give or take.

be

[GuildSF4]

I would agree the scoop draw has a high disaster factor. (The only time I dropped a loaded gun was doing a scoop draw, good thing the gun was on safe, and that it was in practice and not a match, it was also the last time I tried that type of draw. Scared the grap out of me.)

To get good speed on the draw (which includes getting hits) you need a consistent draw, to do this you need a consistent grip every time, and consistent presentation, which leads to a consistent sight picture (as the gun will appear in the same place every time). Consistent is smooth and smooth is fast.

[Fitzghan]

Yeah that's one problem with the dry fire par timed drills. It's pretty easy to just go all out to drop the hammer on the par time and start forgetting about getting a proper sight picture, grip etc. it just becomes an exercise in raw speed-to-click. It can be beneficial to learning to go faster but you have to be able to see whether or not it is causing you to give up something to get those times.

I agree with this 100 percent. I used to dry practice with a par time ALL the time and found it hurt me a little. Now I focus on executing the technique perfectly and really seeing what I need to see to get two perfect A zone hits. I use the Par timer still as a check and to occasionally push the speed. Using it all the time though I found the focus became beating the buzzer and not what it actually should be.

Edited May 13, 2013 by Fitzghan

[TJ1911]

E-

Have you experimented with the technique I described to you? Bottom line here is you don't want any violent or superfluous motions in your draw, which could affect your first shot. I've watched some really good shooters over the years who "looked" like they had a slow draw, but when you looked at the timer they were off and running faster than you might think. I was an RO at the International Revolver Championship a long time ago and remember running Mike Plaxco.

I remember Mike's draw as being smooth and quick, but not super fast. You'd see the gun clear the holster, lock onto the target, and after a (very brief) pause, let off six rounds in what sounded like one burst.

I never learned the 3-finger technique myself; that seems like something suitable only for people with large hands or exceptionally long fingers. Looks like a high risk for bobbling the gun otherwise. I actually move my hand down to the gun more slowly than others-as soon as I feel the web of my hand hit the grip safety, I lock my fingers around the grip and "pop" the gun straight up out of the holster. With a revolver my "cue" to lock onto the gun is when my second finger meets the underside of the grip behind the trigger guard. My hand actually goes down and comes in "underneath" the grip a little bit.

It's not the fastest first shot that counts-it's the fastest first hit.

Good luck!!!

[Blackstone45]

I don't have much time to practice this, so my method is pretty inefficient. I place my hand on the grip and slide upwards until I reach the beavertail, where I establish my full grip. But that's only because I haven't practiced the draw enough to have a consistent hand placement.

[MikeHarrell202]

I'm trying to decide if its worth dedicating the time to effectively try it. I don't typically shoot SC so I'm on the fence about it, but I can't seem to get my draw to first shot under 1.1 average.

[cpa5oh]

I would not recommend even experimenting with the scoop draw, until after one had perfected the "get a perfect grip on the pistol before it leaves the holster" draw - which may take about 5 years ... give or take.

be

Wow, 5 years? Seriously? I know after 1 year I'm still not satisfied that I'm getting a great grip every time...but I keep hoping it'll come in the next few days/weeks :-)

[benos]

I would not recommend even experimenting with the scoop draw, until after one had perfected the "get a perfect grip on the pistol before it leaves the holster" draw - which may take about 5 years ... give or take.

be

Wow, 5 years? Seriously? I know after 1 year I'm still not satisfied that I'm getting a great grip every time...but I keep hoping it'll come in the next few days/weeks :-)

The more you work on it, the more quickly it will sort itself out.

I never stopped practicing the draw for 20 years.

[JKSNIPER]

A young man traveled to a sword master to learn the sword so he could avenge the slight to his family's honor.

When he found the master he was raking the sand in his zen garden.

When introduced to the master the master interrupted the young mans speech to suggest that they have tea together.

While waiting for the tea to arrive the young man couldn't contain himself and spoke about the stain on his family's honor and how he needed to learn the sword quickly so he could have his revenge.

The young man concluded with a question asking "If I work really hard at learning the sword how long will it take before I am ready to face my opponent?"

Tea arrived and the master drank while he pondered the young man's question.....finally he answered "Five years."

The young man said "Five years.....thats a long time....What if I worked twice as hard as any other student how long would it take then?"

The master drank some more tea and then said "Ten years."

The young man was puzzled."Master....I don't think you understood me clearly. I said I would work twice as hard as any other student. I will perform any task no matter how menial. I will chop all the fire wood, collect the water, do the laundry, anything to learn the sword. How long will it take me now?"

The master said "Fifteen years...and when the young man started to speak again about how he would work harder than anyone else to learn the sword the Master continued:

"One who is in such a hurry always learns slowly."

[jcarpenter82]

" He who denied it supplied it"-grandpa

Ive never been brave enough to try the scoop draw.