Jump to content
Brian Enos's Forums... Maku mozo!

TARGET PANIC / YANKING THE TRIGGER


whitetail1

Recommended Posts

My 13 year old son is going thru a stage right now that has me perplexed. He is yanking the trigger during slow fire and shooting low left. He seems to have it under control when shooting quickly or at least the bad hits are not as severe.

We shoot IDPA together. He will go weeks without an issue and then all of a sudden just goes to crap.

I have a suspicious feeling that he is not being true to himself during dry fire practice and gets sloppy.

I'm not certain.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

He's most likely waiting for the "perfect" sight picture to occur within his arc of movement, and then snatching the trigger too quickly when he sees it. When shooting faster, he's not waiting for a perfect sight picture, and so he presses the trigger more correctly and doesn't throw the shot.

What you should ask him to do is to line up his shot, and rather than waiting for the perfect sight picture, to intentionally shoot when his front sight isn't exactly on target, or when it isn't exactly centered in the rear. Doing this will teach him what the difference between an adequate sight picture and a "perfect" sight picture is. Under most circumstances the difference in shot placement between an adequate sight picture and a perfect sight picture isn't worth bothering over. Basically, let him learn visually what an adequate sight picture looks like. Once this clicks with him, the urge to snatch the trigger when he everything looks perfect will fall off. Basically he needs to learn to ignore his arc of movement and to comfortably take the shot when his sights are wobbling around in the "good enough" zone.

Hope this helps!

Edited by Jshuberg
Link to comment
Share on other sites

When I can get the little guy in my head that is rapidly running in circles with his hands in the air and screaming "shoot, shoot you idiot, the sights are on target" to just shut up I do best. LOL

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well

I did a little test with him with random dummy rounds and slow fire. He flinches like mad on slow fire but does well on quick shots. When i ask him to take a 2-3 second sight picture while squeezing the trigger he fails.

He quickly takes up the slack in the trigger each time but struggles to squeeze the last bit out in slow fire.

Any more drills or advice???

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ear plugs and muffs too helps everything quiet down so you can pay attention to the sights. Also if you have access to a 22 pistol with a red dot you can switch over to it after shooting your regular pistol during live fire practice and it will show him what he is doing to his sight picture when pulling the trigger.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hello: Get him to do some group shooting at 10-25 yards. Go slow and fast so he gets used to the sight picture at different speeds. I use those 4" circle sticky targets on the IDPA target. I do groups of 10 at a time no more than 50 rounds. I start with groups and end with groups when I practice. Thanks, Eric

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 5 weeks later...

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...