Trigger Control

[Doublehelix]

So I have been reading a lot lately, and one of the things that I see Ben Stoeger preaches a lot about is trigger control. I am a fairly accurate shooter, but no bullseye marksman.

 

One of the drills he talks about is to point your sights at a blank white wall, do not aim at ANYTHING, and pull the trigger over and over and notice whether the front sight moves.

 

I would have put money that my sight does not move, and I would have LOST! It is very subtle, but it is moving slightly to the left (classic newbie trigger issue). I have been trying different finger placement with slightly more finger and different "styles" of pulls to get the sight to freeze, but this seems like an impossible task to get the sight to not move at all.

 

Try it before you respond. Get about 10 feet away from a white wall, and focus on the front sight and rapid fire (make sure the gun is unloaded and safe! Double check! Triple check!).

 

Does anyone else have this slight movement or twitch?

 

So... how to get rid of it?

[George Post]

If I only knew.

Sometimes I can hold them still, but then sometimes they move when I release the trigger.

[DKorn]

One thing that helps, although I definitely still have some movement, is to grip the gun harder with my weak hand. 

[BoyGlock]

Maybe it means you dont shoot as fast as you can pull the trigger on hard/distant/high risk targets?

[jimbullet]

I noticed that when my weak hand grips a little bit harder, the slight left side movement will stop from happening.

[Doublehelix]

That is what I have been trying as well (gripping harder with my weak hand). Seems to help a bit for sure. Ugh... this sport just seems to get harder and harder the better you get!!!

[BoyGlock]

While a strong grip somewhat masks or mitigates effects of bad trigger technique I prefer to learn and employ the correct pull. At speed under match pressure correct technique would be most desirable and advantageous. 

[B_RAD]

39 minutes ago, BoyGlock said:

While a strong grip somewhat masks or mitigates effects of bad trigger technique I prefer to learn and employ the correct pull. At speed under match pressure correct technique would be most desirable and advantageous. 

Some would say the correct technique includes a strong grip. Not just a "correct pull". At least for USPSA. When I was younger and my dad and I would shoot for one hole groups, we'd hold the gun with a light grip. Now, I try to grip it as hard as I can without causing the gun to shake. 

 

To the OP, you'll never quit working on trigger control. Even Ben works on it. I'd bet every day!  

 

I have it too from time to time. 

 

Grip hard

Only move my trigger finger 

No side force on the trigger/gun

 

 

Something new I'm trying is to not pull the trigger too hard. My 2011 has a sub 2lb trigger. It's fairly easy to pull the trigger softer. A DA/SA gun not so much.  

Edited April 2, 2018 by B_RAD

[jimbullet]

I agree that proper trigger control technique is required but in saying that, it goes in hand with proper grip control, which also affects the way you pull the trigger in a consistent yet fat manner.

 

Grip hard enough so that the gun does not move. pull the trigger without upsetting the gun consistently.

[Limitless13]

Put a penny or other coin on top of your slide. Pull the trigger. The coin should stay where it is. This helped me a lot with good trigger technique, movement shooting, etc. 

[xtian999]

Penny Can!

[Hi-Power Jack]

7 hours ago, xtian999 said:

Penny Can!

 

[Doublehelix]

Thanks for the input folks.

 

Back before I started shooting steel and USPSA, I was a much more accurate shooter than I am now. Not that I am bad mind you, I can still hit those long-distance mini poppers pretty well, but when I shoot at a paper bullseye, I notice that my groups are not what they used to be.

 

I was at an indoor range yesterday (it was cold outside), and at indoor ranges, there is not much you can do except work on accuracy, and I was doing OK at 10 yds and at 25 yds, but nothing that I would take a picture of and post anywhere! Then I have the guy next to me say "Wow. Nice shooting." Well, I supposed compared to his Swiss cheese target it was nice shooting, but in most 20 round groups I would get 1-4 flyers, especially at 25 yds, and the groups were decent as I said, but not what I could call "wow". At 10 yds, the X-ring is pretty much shot out, but man there are way too many other rounds spread around as well!

 

I think I have had the tendency to work pretty hard on things *other* than absolute accuracy for the last couple of years. As long as I can hit an alpha or make a steel target go "ping", that has been "good enough". I spend an awful lot of time dry-firing, and working on draws and reloads and target transitions, etc., but I think I need to spend some more time working on absolute accuracy and trigger control again. I used to be able to shoot a target and say "wow", and then would take a picture so I could brag about how wonderful I was (j/k!!!).

 

Time to get back to some of the basics...

[Goodonpaper]

I find the deeper I get into this game the harder it is to slow down and shoot for my absolute accuracy. I tend to try to hold sight alignment as best I can and slap the trigger like a red headed stepchild. Somewhere ‘acceptable sight picture’ got stamped in my brain...

It would be cool to take the X ring out at 25 yards but the reality is I have so much more to improve on in this sport that is more important to me. The biggest accuracy challenge I’ve had at a match was a 5” square plate at around 25 - 30 yards, I think a PCC guy designed that one

 

 

[Doublehelix]

Since I started with USPSA, I find it hard to slow down and shoot "normally" sometimes.

 

I have a Labradar chronograph, and it takes a second or two between shots to reset. If you shoot too quickly, it will not pick up the next shot in time. I do it all the time!!! I have to really focus to slow down, and it is hard for me. When I am waiting for the chrony to reset, it seems like an eternity...

[jimbullet]

The reality is that we cannot be squeezing the trigger like ISSF style shooting, since our sport demands fast accurate shots. Its finding the balance I guess to have adequate sight picture, pulling the trigger without upsetting the gun - in other words, without the gun moving when you are breaking that shot and to achieve this consistently.

 

What is an acceptable sight picture at a minimum and how we keep the gun steady even pulling or jerking the trigger fast is what we need to understand individually I guess and being the holy grail of our sport - achieving this consistently and consistently fast. 

[SwedishMoose]

This is the whole concept of dryfire. Watch your sight and if it didn't move, congrats you hit exactly what you were aiming for. 

 

 

[DB_Cooper]

An optic will definitely tell you if you move on the trigger press, dry fire practice with my carry optics gun has significantly improved my trigger control.

[MixLord]

I have been dry firing constantly 250 times a day for a month now.. what a major major difference.. I was yanking the gun, had to work on grip, then it was strong hand was to stiff, then left wrist not locked.. just exposed all the areas I need to work on.. So now if im not dry firing, im sitting on the couch pulling the trigger.. what a change!!. My weak hand and strong hand game is very laughable, but I'm working on it.. And to think I come from a family of M card shooters

Edited May 5, 2018 by MixLord
Grammatical

[sigsauerfan]

On 4/8/2018 at 11:18 AM, Doublehelix said:

Thanks for the input folks.

 

Back before I started shooting steel and USPSA, I was a much more accurate shooter than I am now. Not that I am bad mind you, I can still hit those long-distance mini poppers pretty well, but when I shoot at a paper bullseye, I notice that my groups are not what they used to be.

 

I was at an indoor range yesterday (it was cold outside), and at indoor ranges, there is not much you can do except work on accuracy, and I was doing OK at 10 yds and at 25 yds, but nothing that I would take a picture of and post anywhere! Then I have the guy next to me say "Wow. Nice shooting." Well, I supposed compared to his Swiss cheese target it was nice shooting, but in most 20 round groups I would get 1-4 flyers, especially at 25 yds, and the groups were decent as I said, but not what I could call "wow". At 10 yds, the X-ring is pretty much shot out, but man there are way too many other rounds spread around as well!

 

I think I have had the tendency to work pretty hard on things *other* than absolute accuracy for the last couple of years. As long as I can hit an alpha or make a steel target go "ping", that has been "good enough". I spend an awful lot of time dry-firing, and working on draws and reloads and target transitions, etc., but I think I need to spend some more time working on absolute accuracy and trigger control again. I used to be able to shoot a target and say "wow", and then would take a picture so I could brag about how wonderful I was (j/k!!!).

 

Time to get back to some of the basics...

i  dedicate   half of  my  practice  session  to  bullseye  shooting style,so  i  keep  my  intrinseque  accuracy....well, of  course  that  partially goes  away at  the games, but  i  still  can  group inside  a   3  inch  bullseye  at  25. not that  its  of  a  tremendous  help  for the  games, but it  help some when i  transistion to  double  taps.  i  don't  feel  waiting too long  for  the  sights  to  come  back  in line, i  can see  and  pull.  thing is  i'm now  riding the  reset  all the  time  between shots,and  it  really  helped  my  accuracy  at  speed ;  the  gun doesn't  move  as much  as  when i  slap  the trigger.

Edited May 26, 2018 by sigsauerfan

[Ghorsley]

I read a lot of posts on trigger control because apparently I’m not too good at it. Specifically trigger control drills.

Would someone please clarify how it’s possible to rapid fire when you are dry firing. The gun won’t go into battery without a half rack of the slide, so how are you able to simulate rapid fire? What am I missing.

 

thanks a lot

[sdm702]

On 4/24/2018 at 11:04 AM, DB_Cooper said:

An optic will definitely tell you if you move on the trigger press, dry fire practice with my carry optics gun has significantly improved my trigger control.

i thought i was doing pretty good until i put a dot on my gun. turns out i wasn't, back to basics it is

[Eureka1911]

On 4/24/2018 at 7:10 AM, SwedishMoose said:

This is the whole concept of dryfire. Watch your sight and if it didn't move, congrats you hit exactly what you were aiming for. 

 

 

I dry fire a lot. But the real issue is transferring that to live fire. Things change when the brain knows there is no BOOM coming. I do a drill now where you get one in the chamber and then drop the magazine. Fire that round and when you reset fire on the empty chamber . Basically alternating live and dry fire. This way the brain is seeing the right things half the time even with lots of booms mixed in. Seems to help when I the low lefts.

[ATLDave]

In doing that drill, I can pull the trigger straight to the rear and hold the sights pretty steady for one shot.  When I start hammering the trigger repeatedly, I find that I get more up-and-down oscillation than left-right.  Often a hop up.  I have no suggestions, just sharing your pain, OP.

[BoyGlock]

Stoeger in his dry fire books said to df pull the trigger like you do in livefire, hard and fast to see the defects if any, then work to correct the problem with the same pull in df.