mattx Posted November 1, 2014 Share Posted November 1, 2014 (edited) This is what I've been drilling lately. I've noticed a correlation between hit factor and harder focus on front sight for most 7+ yard distances. For the closer targets I can get away with a "soft" sight picture with about half front sight/half target focus but when the distances start to increase, I need to focus harder on the front sight to hit the A-zone consistently. This is a newer revelation to me and I'd appreciate any insight from more experienced shooters on the topic. Edited November 1, 2014 by mattx Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hondakilla98 Posted November 1, 2014 Share Posted November 1, 2014 The more you focus on the front sight, the better your sight alignment. Sight alignment becomes more important the further away you are. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hi-Power Jack Posted November 1, 2014 Share Posted November 1, 2014 I've noticed a correlation between hit factor and harder focus on front sight for 7+ yard distances. I can't imagine anyone will disagree with your revelation. Most shooting instructors have been extremely sympathetic with your recent finding, for at least 25 years now. The basic credo seems to be " watch your front sight", or "watch your sights rise and fall", or some similar recommendation. A long time ago, people used to "double tap" - see the sights once, and pull the trigger twice - that has now been replaced with "watch the sights for EACH shot". Your recent discovery seems to agree with current thinking on the subject. Glad it seems to work for YOU, too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mattx Posted November 1, 2014 Author Share Posted November 1, 2014 Drawing to hard front sight focus is slower for me. What I'm trying to get at is there any rule of thumb i.e. a distance where where can get away with a "mixed focus" for better transition times? Should I work on drawing to 100% hard sight focus to get it set in for now, then worry about getting more complicated later? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeorgeD Posted November 4, 2014 Share Posted November 4, 2014 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ejEi_OcTVA8 I think this will help. I tend to have more target focus at closer distances inside of 10 yards. The farther the targets the more I focus on the fro t sight. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bkeeler Posted November 4, 2014 Share Posted November 4, 2014 Drawing to hard front sight focus is slower for me. What I'm trying to get at is there any rule of thumb i.e. a distance where where can get away with a "mixed focus" for better transition times? Should I work on drawing to 100% hard sight focus to get it set in for now, then worry about getting more complicated later? This is different for everyone. Wide open targets I focus on the target out to 15, 20yds. More difficult shots you need more sight/trigger control. 15yd head shot I focus more on the sight and Trigger pull. You need to find out what gives you the best HF for each target type...... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarkCO Posted November 4, 2014 Share Posted November 4, 2014 Drawing to hard front sight focus is slower for me. What I'm trying to get at is there any rule of thumb i.e. a distance where where can get away with a "mixed focus" for better transition times? Should I work on drawing to 100% hard sight focus to get it set in for now, then worry about getting more complicated later? I focus ON the target to about 8 yards, a slightly fuzzy front sight from 8-12 yards and ON the front sight from about 13 yards out. It is variable and the target style may dicatate changes. Slanted hardcover, head shots, swingers, etc, I cut those distances down. In USPSA pistol, seems that most of the targets are from about 5 to 18 yards, so you might need to use both styles. On Classifiers, or stages with similar target presentations and fairly high HFs, I have found picking ONE focus type works the best for me. Discovery of what you need to see, regardless of what others have done or said, is good, so don't sweat the sarcasm. Practical shooting is like an infinite onion...you will keep finding new layers and discoveries as long as you keep looking. I am sure that even guys like Miculek, Leatham and Grauffel have new discoveries in their practice and technique from time to time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mattx Posted November 5, 2014 Author Share Posted November 5, 2014 I've been playing with it in dry fire. Draw to point shoot is around 1.4 sec. Moving distance back to fuzzy focus with a sight correction is close to 1.7. Then draw to point then adjusting and finding hard focus on the front sight is around to 2 sec at as far back as I can go on quarter scale targets. That's after warmup and about as fast as I can currently go. I think more importantly, I'm learning what type of sight picture is necessary before breaking the trigger, while still trying to move faster. Thanks for the replies. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nimitz Posted November 5, 2014 Share Posted November 5, 2014 (edited) What MarkCO said .... The only thing that matters is what type of focus YOU need to shoot alphas on a specific type of target. As your shooting skills progress you should discover that you need less front sight focus with increasing distance as a general rule but everyone is different. For me, 10 yds and in is always a target focus for open targets. Greater than 15 yds is always a hard front sight focus and 10-15 yds is a mix. However, when I first started out, everything was hard font sight focus. BTW, forget that point shooting crap you mentioned ... Every shot you ever take should be aimed and have some kind of sight picture before pulling the trigger if you expect to be successful .... Edited November 5, 2014 by Nimitz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scooterdog Posted November 6, 2014 Share Posted November 6, 2014 the only time I've seen the point shooting work is with Tarans shoot from the hip on the plate rack on Youtube. Impressive... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scooterdog Posted November 6, 2014 Share Posted November 6, 2014 the only time I've seen the point shooting work is with Tarans shoot from the hip on the plate rack on Youtube. Impressive... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blinck27 Posted November 9, 2014 Share Posted November 9, 2014 Does any one sight help with this as in the giant dots vs a FO. I find that the red FO is a quick find for me and the green seems to allow more sight of the target but this seems to makes me shoot with a sense of confidence that tends to make misses more apparent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarkCO Posted November 9, 2014 Share Posted November 9, 2014 Try the different colors of fiber optic. Green works well for me in most cases, but I have switched colors during a match a few times based on light conditions. Orange, violet, yellow and your shooting glasses lens color change the ease of focus. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zjmccauley Posted November 10, 2014 Share Posted November 10, 2014 The more you focus on the front sight, the better your sight alignment. Sight alignment becomes more important the further away you are. This Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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