At what range do you practice point-aiming with a pistol?

[26 Inf]

Years ago, many law enforcement agencies taught a technique called 'point shoulder' - to save me the time of writing about it here you go -

POINT SHOULDER SHOOTING

Point shoulder shooting was developed because situations emerged where the officer had to shoot his weapon to neutralize a threat so fast that he did not even have time to bring the sights up to his eye level........

Point shoulder shooting is simple, intuitive, and easy to teach yourself. It uses instinct rather than dependence on your sights. It’s based on a curious human characteristic that manifests itself as hand-eye coordination. To try it, simply look at an object a few feet away. Now point your index finger at that object. Do you notice how your index finger always points at what your eye is focusing on? Without any training or practice, your index finger naturally finds the spot where your eye focuses on, and that’s what point shoulder shooting uses to aim. When you draw your weapon with your master grip, note that your index finger is usually pointing forward—it is not on the trigger, it is indexed along the trigger guard, and guess what?

It’s already pointing at what you’re looking at in most cases.

Point shoulder shooting is named that because you don’t bring the handgun up to your eyes, you only bring it up to shoulder height, and “point” using your finger at the target. Try it sometime at the range. You’ll find it’s very intuitive and, while you will not achieve the kind of accuracy you would get by using the sights, you will be able to hit the center mass of a target ten yards or so away reliably and without using the sights. It’s really a handy skill to learn as a backup, because there may be a time when you can’t raise that pistol fast enough.

I happened to be pretty good at it because I practiced the qual course and paid attention to my body mechanics. I was also one who would take regularly 'code-7' at our range and shoot. Unlike the square range qual course, when shooting by myself I could move. I quickly learned that point shoulder did not work on the move. I didn't know it then, but I was teaching myself to get a 'flash-sight picture' in order to get hits.

Fast forward 30 years, our state adopted a LEOSA qual course which was so rudimentary we called it 'no shooter left behind.' I can neither confirm nor deny that a couple of the range staff could shoot through the first several stages of the course, which involved movement away from the target at a constant angle and draws from the holster, with eye's closed. If you know where the target is and can orient yourself to the target at some point it becomes nothing more than stance-directed fire based on muscle memory.

These little parlor tricks -point shoulder and natural point - quickly lose effectiveness when you are in an unconventional position, your target is not directly in front of you, where you anticipated it to be, or when either you or the target are moving.

Bring the gun to your eyes, look through the sights, use them as needed, shit works.

[echo5whiskey]

Fast forward 30 years, our state adopted a LEOSA qual course which was so rudimentary we called it 'no shooter left behind.' I can neither confirm nor deny that a couple of the range staff could shoot through the first several stages of the course, which involved movement away from the target at a constant angle and draws from the holster, with eye's closed. If you know where the target is and can orient yourself to the target at some point it becomes nothing more than stance-directed fire based on muscle memory.

These little parlor tricks -point shoulder and natural point - quickly lose effectiveness when you are in an unconventional position, your target is not directly in front of you, where you anticipated it to be, or when either you or the target are moving.

Bring the gun to your eyes, look through the sights, use them as needed, shit works.

One of my favorite videos I used to teach about NPA was of Jerry Miculek on the History channel shooting blindfolded.

[MegademiC]

There are a variety of ways to "point shoot/aim", and no common definition. Depending on time, distance, and accuracy requirements you can index or superimpose the front sight, the nose of the slide, the rear outline of the slide, the cylinder, your fist, unfocused grossly misaligned sights, focused misaligned sights, focused aligned sights, on the target. In Pat Mac's video above, he uses the term "acceptable sight picture." A variety of methods accomplish that goal. Few people truly "point shoot", even those who profess to do so.

This sums it up well. What is your target? You have to know what sight picture produces what results.

A 5" target at 3 yards requires a much "looser" sight picture than a 4" target at 25yds.
It's situational as well. Clear target with solid backdrop- I'll dump rounds knowing most will hit the intended target.
No shoots obscuring target- I will obtain the sight picture required to ensure 100%hits on intended target.
USPSA march- I'll push the bouderies.

[CT45]

There was a pretty good article by Aaron Cowan, here is a small part from it:

The Eye Under Stress

So why didn’t K.P. see his sights? The human eye is a very complex piece of evolutionary engineering; it has the ability to alter point of focus from near to exceedingly far distances through Accommodation7 at speeds between 350 milliseconds and 1 second8 depending on age and general eye health (as well as environmental conditions). But this ability is highly dependent on the levels of stress in the body. In regards to stress, more specifically the stress we experience from the Sympathetic Nervous System (the body’s natural defense mechanism when threatened) when a threat is perceived, information is transmitted to either the amygdala and then the appropriate cortex or directly to the cortex depending on the stimulus (a spontaneous attack will cause a reflexive response, or a Somatic Reflex9 in which our natural programming generates a response before the “thinking brain,” the appropriate cortex can generate a conscious response whereas a perceived threat that does not initiate a Somatic Reflex will process to the appropriate cortex and allow OODA10 to take place). In layman’s terms, the body will produce adrenaline under stress, adrenaline is secreted into the blood stream near-instantaneously and pushed throughout the body by increased heart rate. Adrenaline has a number of effects on the body to prepare it for “fight or flight,” as far as the eye is concerned it effects the Ciliary muscles.

http://monderno.com/training/vision-under-stress/

[Ron3]

You should get a shot timer and post up some videos. I’ll do the same. What drills do you typically run so that we can accurately compare the two techniques?

Sounds like fun. One of these days I'll get a video camera and shot timer.
Drills? It varies. Sometimes a drill I read, others something I make up on the fly, and I have a few of my own I wrote down.

[Ron3]

I think I am using the sights more than I realize after reading some of the comments about how we train our eyes.

[mark5pt56]

I think there's a variance in definition amongst everyone. Unless we are looking at contact distance and various techniques to deal with that, you should have a sight reference. Some refer to it as sight management in other words "how good of a sight picture to I need?" That's dependent on target size and distance, you have to know that by training --and keep in mind trigger control. Beat that trigger like a cheap hoe and the wheels can fall off if on the border with sight management. SO I can get my money's worth if close but treat her nice if out further. I like to say the sights are the speedometer and the trigger is the gas pedal.