Pistol Vs. Rifle Shooting Tips? *Update 6/21*

[BushmasterFanBoy]

I think I may be one of those rare, rare types of people that feel perfectly fine with their pistol skills, but lacking in the rifle/carbine department.

I feel pretty much in my box when I'm shooting a pistol. All the way from the FAST drill to 50 yard slow-fire at life sized silhouettes, and steel shooting in between, I feel like I'm a pretty competent handgun shooter. To put some objective numbers behind this, my best FAST time so far is 6.53 from the surrender position with a M9/6004/FB mag pouches, with all hits, and most everything else being less than or around 7 secs.

Yet, with rifles, I feel completely outclassed. I can't reliably hit a 8x10 piece of steel at 200 yards, rested with 2 MOA AimPoint M4s, 14.5in stock BM barrel, and Privi m193, and my personal best rested group at 50 yards is barely covered with a quarter. At 100 yards, also rested, its about 5" :(. And close in, I fare no better, with a 2.5 sec avg. for the Viking Tactics 2x2x2 drill and a 4-6" spread between my hammers.

What are some drills that I can do to get better with my rifle? I feel like my distance shooting is pathetic, but I pay attention to trigger control, breathing, natural stance, and follow through. And in close, I feel like I'm gripping the gun to brace a mule, and keep my trigger in check, but my groups still widen if I attempt to get any speed advantage in. I plan to slow down and work my speed up with the rifle in close, after all, it took me about 5 years of shooting to get where I am with my pistol, most of that being 5 round mags and slowfire on a paper plate 50 feet away. But I'm at a loss for how to improve my distance shooting. :confused:

Any drills for those of us who shoot ok with a pistol, but come up short with a rifle? What are some of the aspects of handgun shooting that can help me get ahead with my rifle skills?:confused:

See PG. 2 for progress reports. :D

[ZDL]

Someone smarter than me will be along with specific drills but, breathing and trigger control. Lot's of dry fire. QUALITY training, not just pounding rounds off. Just some thoughts on my first pass.

[Shadow1198]

Don't worry, you're not alone. I'm horrible with rifles but decent enough with pistols (although I could still use plenty of improvement in that area as well). ;)

[ToddG]

I'm more accurate at 100yd with a pistol than a rifle. That is pathetic ...

[John_Wayne777]

I'm more accurate at 100yd with a pistol than a rifle. That is pathetic ...

Personally I don't see how that's possible...but if I had to pick one, I'd rather have your problem than the other way around. A pistol is, after all, the weapon most of us are going to be using if things go sideways on us in real life.

[YVK]

I think I may be one of those rare, rare types of people that feel perfectly fine with their pistol skills, but lacking in the rifle/carbine department.

I can't fully relate as I certainly don't feel perfectly fine with my pistol skills and with rifle I am generally decent at 100-150 yards (with Aimpoint), but at shorter distances I find that my rifle groups are worse than they should be. I have been attributing it to recoil/barrel flip management issues. If you look at the videos of pros shooting, barrel movement is barely perceptible. My dot moves off the target to what I feel is excessive extent. This is generally considered a stance/body weight balance issue, but I've not been able to figure it out so far.


I'm more accurate at 100yd with a pistol than a rifle. That is pathetic ...

Just curious: have you ever shot an AK74 (or clone) with iron sights, Todd?

[RogerinTPA]

I think more practice and patience, will improve your accuracy at 100 and 200 yards. I've been shooting that distance and farther (1000 Meters) back in the day, and way more comfortable with that, than those VTAC drills. I've been practicing the 1-5 and 2x2x2 drills just for shits and giggles for the upcoming VTAC 1.5 course this coming weekend. Every time I shoot, I concentrate on a tight shooting position (stock on right Pec to better control recoil), trigger and breathing control. It's helped me quite a bit. If I can get the majority of hits inside a 5 inch circle, I'm good with it. IMHO, your shots are more than acceptable, being this is a tactical shooting course and not a Camp Perry type "slow fire" rifle match. On the down side, you expend a hell of a lot of ammo.

[LittleRedToyota]

just to make you feel even less alone, i also am much better with a pistol than a rifle.

for me, it does definitely have something to do with pacticing with my pistols much more than with my rifles.

and there is the fact that i can barely even *see* an 8x10 target at 200 yards... :cool: (that's supposed to be a blind smilie. :( :D)

[ZDL]

I can't fully relate as I certainly don't feel perfectly fine with my pistol skills and with rifle I am generally decent at 100-150 yards (with Aimpoint), but at shorter distances I find that my rifle groups are worse than they should be. I have been attributing it to recoil/barrel flip management issues. If you look at the videos of pros shooting, barrel movement is barely perceptible. My dot moves off the target to what I feel is excessive extent. This is generally considered a stance/body weight balance issue, but I've not been able to figure it out so far.



Just curious: have you ever shot an AK74 (or clone) with iron sights, Todd?

A compensator can help but, first maybe check how you are shouldering the weapon. Are you giving it a firm surface or is there "play" in your stance/shoulders. Something I'm working on currently as well.

[ToddG]

Just curious: have you ever shot an AK74 (or clone) with iron sights, Todd?

Unless you count the SIG 551/552 as an AK clone (and some do :cool:), nope.

[YVK]

I don't know what sights SIGs have...

Reason I asked is that AKs utilize a pistol-type open sights. During slow fire I get better groups with AK 74 (which I find more accurate than 47) than with iron-sighted ARs. I believe that I can get consistent sight picture easier with pistol-type sights than AR- type.

[Failure2Stop]

Ah, the rifle! My favorite weapon system. Accurate, powerful, far reaching. . . hell, you can even stick a knife to the barrel and stab stuff with it.

When it comes to the rifle there are a few things that must be worked on fundamentally of you want to make real progress when it comes to working the gun efficiently at combat relevant distances. The biggest thing to remember is that consistency is the key.

Trigger control.
Absolutely essential. At the very core, trigger control is marksmanship. It is the skillful manipulation of the trigger straight to the rear without disturbing sight alignment or sight picture. Trigger control must be smooth. Regardless of the speed at which shot are fired, the trigger must work smoothly straight to the rear until the shot is fired. Finger placement on the trigger is not as sensitive as when using a pistol, but when I am shooting for precision, I use the same spot on my finger as when shooting a pistol- which is between the center of the first pad and the joint of the index finger. When shooting for most use I am more concerned that the shooter can manipulate the safety without moving the firing hand. From there the shooter simply drops the index finger to the trigger where it naturally falls. I find that if I use the precision trigger finger placement my split times will be longer than if I use a joint or the middle finger bone.

When shooting, only the trigger finger can be permitted to move. I like to explain it as a "press", not a "squeeze" or "pull", to instill what the movement should feel like. When shooting for precision, the trigger finger must exert pressure on the trigger with smooth gradually increasing pressure, allowing the shot to break without anticipation, maintaining rearward pressure on the trigger until the shot has fired. Once the shot has broken the trigger finger smoothly releases pressure until the sear reengages the hammer, and the cycle continues.

Trigger control must be practiced to seat it as a subconscious skill and maintain it.

Sights.
Sight alignment and sight picture.
With iron sights sights with a peep aperture, sight alignment is a three part relationship between the shooter's eye, the center of the rear sight, and the tip of the front sight. For precision shooting the shooter must be focused on the tip of the front sight. The front sight is held in the center of the rear sight aperture. The closer the eye is to the rear sight the larger the aperture will appear and the more difficult it will be to perfectly, consistently align the front sight in it's center. While nose to charging handle will give the shooter consistent eye relief, the shooter can make sight alignment easier by bringing the head and eye rearward, which makes the aperture appear smaller, and therefore easier to center the tip of the front sight- the disadvantage is that more of the target will be obscured by the rear sight.

Cheek weld and practicing quickly acquiring proper cheek-weld will assist the shooter in achieving acceptable eye-relief rapidly.

When shooting optics for precision it is crucial to have the eye looking through the optical center of the sight. With magnified optics this is achieved by placing the eye at the correct distance from the occular lens, which is the eye-relief of the scope. With non-magnified optics eye relief is not as sensitive, and as long as the shooter is acquiring consistent eye-relief he will be ok. With magnified optics when the eye is at proper eye-relief there will be no scope shadow visible, but if the head is shifted "scope shadow" will be seen. If the shooter is closer than proper eye relief the scope shadow will not be seen with head shift and can be a cause of errant shots. I prefer to back my eye just past proper eye relief so that the edges of scope shadow can be seen just inside the hard ring of the image- this allows me to ensure that I am perfectly centered in the optic as I will see any minor shift in scope shadow. There are a lot of people that group poorly with magnified optics simply because they are too close to the occular lens and therefore fail to place their eye in the same place consistently. At close range (0 to 25 yards) perfect eye relief is not critical, as the minor deviation will be irrelevant unless the need for high precision is present.

Sight Picture
Sight picture is simply applying sight alignment to the desired impact point or offest aiming point on the target. Perfect sight alignment is more important than perfect sight picture when it comes to precision work. A slight deviation from center of target with perfect sight alignment will result in the shots being only slightly off of the center, and the shooter should be aware of where the sights were when the shot broke, allowing the shooter to call the shot. However, any deviation of perfect sight alignment will result in much greater deviation in impact on the target. While this phenominon is greatly reduced with RDSs, for maximum precision the dot/reticle must be centered in the optic as when zeroed.

-Actually, sight alignment does not technically have to be with the front sight centered in the rear sight or with the dot in the center of the optic. What really must happen is to place the dot/front sight in the same place every time. It is simply much easier to consistently center the front sight/dot than to put it somewhere else.

-Vision correction is important. While you only really need to be able to focus on the tip of the front sight, you must be able to focus oni the fromt sight. If wearing glasses, ensure that you are looking through the exact same area on the lens for every shot.

Sight alignment and sight picture are conscious effort skills. To use an analogy- think of the sights as your steering wheel and the trigger as a gas pedal. You subconsciously press the gas in accordance with how fast you can control the car's acceleration. You don't think about how hard your foot presses the pedal, you are focused on keeping your car pointed in the right direction. Likewise, the foot does not immediately shove the pedal to the floor when acceleration is needed- it is a smooth increase in pressure, it is just a more rapid or slower press depending on the needed speed. The trigger is being pressed with subconscious trigger control as long as the sight picture is acceptable. If sight picture is not acceptable, the finger backs off pressure until it is good again and pressure resumes.

Breathing.
This is an important skill because the shooter is directly connected to the rifle at three points, one of which is the shoulder, and the upper body moves during the respiratory cycle (it is also affected by heart-beat, but we won't worry too much about that right now). The effects of breathing will be amplified in braced or supported positions, and will be most dramatic from the prone position since the chest will be in direct contact with the ground. As I said earlier, consistency is the key. In the respiratory cycle it is difficult to consistently return to the same fullness of the lungs, be that fully filled, or half, or 3/4, or whatever other random fractions you want to apply. However it is fairly easy to find the natural respiratory pause (NRP), which is at the bottom of a normal breath cycle and lasts for about 6 to 8 seconds without adverse affect to the shooter. The shooter takes in a deep breath, holds it for a second or two, slowly releases it until the lungs are comfortably empty (if you try to fully empty the lungs you will feel a slight back-pressure trying to get air back into the lungs- this is too far), takes in another slow deep breath, exhales to the natural respiratory pause, and holds there. This is the most consistent part of the respiratory cycle in which to deliver a precision shot.

-When it comes to speed/CQB distances breathing is not as important as long as you are not taking the shots while in the process of inhaling or exhaling, and even that can be overlooked if at room distance.

Natural point of aim (NPA).
When in any position there will be a point at which the sights will want to sit. This point requires minimal muscle tension to maintain. The goal is to have the NPA on the center of the target.

To determine the NPA first assume your position. Acquire sight alignment. Close your eyes and take two deep breaths, stopping at the NRP. Open your shooting eye. Your sights should be on the exact point that you want your sights to sit. If they do not, shift the position until it is. Once you think you are good, check your NPA again. If shooting for precision, NPA is critical. Muscle tension is to be avoided as much as possible since muscles fatigue and constantly move, remember that consistency is key.

NPA is not really combat relevant, but the more you work at it, the more instinctive it will be to acquire by knowing exactly how to position your body relative to a target to achieve NPA (or close to it) without having to go through the whole process.

Without getting into positional issues, these are the key facets to precision rifle work. Working on these until they are subconscious and habitual will greatly improve marksmanship, but they are perishable skills and need to be honed whenever possible.

Moving onto speed work, there are some things that become more important than before.

Grip.
In fundamental precision work the most important thing about grip is that it supports smooth interface with the trigger and the support hand provide a place for the handguards to rest. When it comes to shooting fast the mount is very important, as it seals the stock to the shoulder (with help from stock weld) during multiple shot delivery. The firing hand exerts sufficient force rearward to seat the stock in the shoulder in a firing position without help from the support hand. The support hand assists in the mount by applying rearward pressure along the bore-line. A high grip on the HG using a vertical fore-grip does this much better than a low, full hand grip on the VFG. The firing hand should have a grip that supports rapidly sweeping the safety and accessing the magazine release button (righty) as well as placement of the index finger on the trigger.

Platform.
Commonly called stance, but I like to refer to the platform.
I consider the platform to be from the hips to the shoulders. In all reality when it comes to fighting with a rifle, the legs really don't matter so long as they provide the needed support or mobility to the shooter- at least as far as the standing position is concerned. I prefer to have shooters initially start in a very squared-off position and allow them to naturally, gradually alter their shoulder angle instead of having them begin bladed. This is important to the bulk of my student body due to body-armor/plates. I personally have a slight blade, pretty much like Chris Costa. While I am not overly concerned about the amount of shoulder blade, there are advantages to a more squared-off position, such as transisitioning between widely spaced targets, plate protection, 360 degree mobility and seamless movement between mobility and low-profile positions. If I am running slick I will have a little bit more blade to the position since more of the ball of the shoulder will be available for use as a pocket for the stock.

The platform needs to be aggressive behind the gun, with the top of the stock firmly backed by body mass. Any air gap between the shoulder and the buttstock will permit movement of the gun to fill the void during recoil. While this will have zero affect on accuracy (you should be achieving at least flash sight picture at sight relevant distances) it will make the gun slower- remember, you can only shoot accurately as fast as you can track the sights. Many people that have problems with running the gun fast and hard are not backing the stock with sufficient shoulder.

The shoulders need to be rolled forward aggressively. This will do a few things for the shooter. It will give a consistent placement of the buttstock and provide pressure into the gun from the outside. It also helps with forward weight balance onto the balls of the feet. Just as with isoscoles pistol the weight balance forward on the balls of the feet will allow the shooter to fluidly bounce his heels alternately without discomfort or weight shift. Keep the elbows rolled down- this reduces target profile, reduces the possibility of smashing your elbow during movement, and slightly applies pressure to the gun, giving a little more stabilization during firing.

The abdomen should be slightly tightened, squeezing the upper body down. It usually doesn't require explaination, but some shooters are not terribly athletic and the little hint can trip the little lightbulb.

When practicing, there are a few things you can do to work the position for maximum efficiency.

Learn to rapidly present. I use a shot timer set on random initiation. Begin at a low alert, weapon on safe. On buzz, simultaneously sweep the safety and present the gun, driving the sights to your line of sight and fire a single shot to an 8" paper plate. Your goal is to be able to break the shot with a guaranteed hit from 5 yards in .75 seconds or under consistently. Once you can do that, switch to a 3x5 index card at the same distance.

Learn to control the gun. 25 yards- begin with the gun up on target, safety off, finger on trigger. Work shooting 1 second intervals for 5 shots, as in, "One thousand BANG, one thousand BANG. . ." Then work on speeding that up by changing the tempo to about .5 second intervals "1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 5". Work on this until you can keep 2 strings of 5 in the paper plate. Move forward to the 10. Once again we will speed up to about .25 second intervals- "1.2.3.4.5." Keep working it until you can track the sight bounce for each shot and keep them contained on the plate. Now speed up again, "12345". The trigger finger is moving as fast as it can- and the eye is tracking all shots, able to call each shot. Once all shots can be contained, move up to the 5 and work the same cadence to the 3x5 card.

There are a lot of ways to work rifle training, this is simply a way that has worked well for me.

[Robb Jensen]

Good stuff F2S.

When I was a kid the main reason why my dad had me shoot pistols a lot more than rifle was because it's much easier to shoot a rifle if you can shoot a handgun really well.

[Redhat]

F2S,

A questions on stock placement:

- How do you work around the IBA?

Thanks

[Failure2Stop]

When I was a kid the main reason why my dad had me shoot pistols a lot more than rifle was because it's much easier to shoot a rifle if you can shoot a handgun really well.

Agreed. I wish I had been proficient with a handgun at a younger age. Learning the pistol was not pleasant for me- I really sucked until I learned what I needed to do for effective training and practice.



- How do you work around the IBA?


This is one of the reasons I have the shooters start out very square to the target, it makes stock seating easier without chicken-winging. Most shooters will modify the position with a bit of cant as they gain proficiency.

[Charles]

Would anyone be interested in video's posted of some of the things F2S posted, starting from this is a rifle to the 2+2+2 drill in 1.3sec clean?

[Redhat]

Certainly!

A picture's worth a thousand words right.

Seriously, I think in the absence of actual instruction, well done photos or videos make things easier to understand.

[Charles]

Alright, it will be early next week before I can start filming, but it will be pretty thorough.

[Charles]

I'll try to start filming tommorrow...

[BushmasterFanBoy]

I'll try to start filming tommorrow...

Thanks a bunch, I have a feeling this will be a big help to a lot of shooters here. :D

[Charles]

Here is the link to the first post- https://www.m4carbine.net/showthread.php?p=369577#post369577

[BushmasterFanBoy]

I'm going to go ahead and give this thread a bump, especially after being plagued by some of the same problems today at the range.

Something startling happened to me at the 50 yard line, when confirming zero and firing slow in the prone supported position, I only grouped around 3" with irons, and 2.5" with my M4s. However, when I simply let out a five round group as fast as I could drive my dot back on target (about 3 seconds, braced against the support), my group size shrank to around 1". :confused: This to me means, that I am losing consistency in taking long pauses between shots, as I often break my cheekweld to rest my eyes, or shift my stock to ease muscle tension. And/or my ammo is largely producing some sporadic groups, some great, some terrible.

As for close in, I practiced my FAST drill, and I'm proud to say, I've actually improved, despite having to completely change my drawstroke in the last week. :D My FASTest time today was 6.13 seconds, no misses. (BTW, a shot timer is a godsend if you are serious about shooting, it beats a stop watch and gives you concrete numbers to break when you practice)

However, my improvement in pistol skill has actually eclipsed my rifle skill even more, which I've put a significant amount of time into. When shooting my rifle, I can usually only have my gun from high ready to first shot in .8-1.0 seconds, and then drilling 5 rounds into an 8" circle at 10 yards, I can only get my splits to .36-.40 before I begin to miss the paper. In comparison, shooting my M9 nets me routinely .40-.46 splits on the same 8" circle. I feel like I should be able to be shooting my rifle much faster than my pistol before worrying about missing the circle.

I am holding my rifle with my thumb on top of the rail, pointing forward. My index finger is alongside the 9 o'clock rail. My grip is covering the 26-30 position of my rail. However, and I unfortunately only noticed this once I had left the range :o , I had my support-hand elbow tucked the entire time. While this may not seem like a big deal, in practice I felt like I could much better grip and drive the gun if my arm were parallel with the bore as it was extended outward. Does anyone have experience shooting with the support elbow tucked vs. extended alongside the gun? :confused: Or perhaps I just need to hit the weights again? :D (We do have a fitness forum now, after all...)

[Failure2Stop]

BMFB-

It sounds to me like you have a fault in your grip/mount/platform with regard to your rifle shooting. Make sure you are in a tight, sound position with linear, directly to the rear pressure with both hands, weight dedicated behind the gun.

Work on 5 shot strings starting with the gun on target, on fire, finger on trigger, starting with 1 second counted between shots-
"*BANG*(1) one thousand *BANG*(2) one thousand *BANG*(3) one thousand *BANG*(4) one thousand *BANG*(5)"
Pay attention to your dot! What is the dot doing? How much is it bouncing? Where is it bouncing?
The dot should not be leaving the 8" circle (this is easier practiced with a white paper plate so you can see exactly where your dot is in relation to your acceptable aiming area). It should be a neat little "pop" up and back on target. If the dot is bouncing up and then down past your original sight picture you *may* be anticipating recoil or pulling down and away with the support hand. I find that this is and be caused by several things or a combination of these issues-
-Having the stock too high in the shoulder, allowing the gun to pivot upward
-Lack of aggressive lean forward, with no contact between the top of the stock and the shoulder, which allows the gun to recoil upward
-Weak mount, which allows the gun to bounce off the shoulder
-Weak cheek-weld, which allows the gun to bounce
-Excessive blade, which makes it difficult to dedicate weight straight into the gun

Keep working a 1 second cadence, until the dot is uniformly tracking. Play around with front-hand's rearward pressure, driving the stock lower, increasing cheek-weld pressure, adjusting stock position (sometimes simply reducing the LOP by a position or two can make a world of difference), altering shoulder blade angle, and altering foot position (toes toward threat, becoming more on-line or less on-line).

Now decrease to a 1/2 second cadence. Control the cadence by saying "and" between shots.
"*BANG*, and *BANG*, and *BANG*, and *BANG*, and *BANG*"
If you did your job with the 1 second cadence the 1/2 second cadence shouldn't be too much different. Once again, pay attention to what the dot is doing and work on making it as consistent as possible.

Once that is going well (it might not happen immediately) decrease to 1/4 second intervals. Time between shots should be about the same amount of pause given to a "," between spoken words.
"BANG","BANG","BANG","BANG","BANG"
About all you will be seeing here is a split-second stationary dot as the shot breaks. Continue to work on dot-movement appreciation.

Once those are contained we will drop down to your trigger-finger's "cyclic rate" ;). You will apply what you have perfected in the decreasing cadence to cycle the trigger as fast as you can. All you will be seeing of the dot will be an enlongated blur contained within the paper plate. Keep working this, bit only after you have gone through the rest of the steps.

The increasing (decreasing?) cadence is a good drill to go through every time you work the gun to firmly seat grip and platform. I use it often and with pretty much every new skill (SOM, alt pos, lat movement, etc) at relevant distances to get the shooter in the best possible position from which to perfect the technique while balancing the ability to shoot as accurately as needed, as fast as they can.

Just my .02, good luck.

[RogerinTPA]

Does anyone have experience shooting with the support elbow tucked vs. extended alongside the gun?

You may want to vary your support elbow position to see what works for you. I tried the tucked support elbow for a while. Although it did work, I found having my support elbow out, almost pointing 90 degrees left (maybe 70), felt more comfortable, gained more leverage in driving the gun when engaging multiple targets (VTAC 2x2x2 and 1-5 drills and variations of them), and applying more rearward pressure to form a tighter shooting position. I start out with several five round drills, as FTS mentioned, to test accuracy, speed, aggressive stance and recoil management. I discovered I was pulling aft with my shooting hand way too much. I now just have a firm grip and make an effort to not apply rearward pressure with my shooting hand, and concentrate on smooth/fluid trigger control. My groups shrank quite a bit.

[BushmasterFanBoy]

Thanks guys, the more I examine what I'm doing as far as my shot placement on target from today, I seem to be pulling my follow up shots low and left. While this would be a tell-tale trigger issue, I think its far more likely that I'm using my support hand and pulling the shots in an attempt to control recoil. (Oddly enough, very few of my shots are high, so I think I may be over compensating the recoil by a bit)

Next time I go to the range (which may not be too soon :( ), I'm going to practice the cadence of fire, and generally get more comfortable with my gun's recoil impulse, as well as my support hand's role in pulling the gun back to the shoulder, not torquing it down and leftward. I think I've built the recoil up in my mind to the point where in trying to mitigate it, I'm actually agitating my groups. Thanks for the tips! :D

[epf]

BMFB-


Work on 5 shot strings starting with the gun on target, on fire, finger on trigger, starting with 1 second counted between shots-
"*BANG*(1) one thousand *BANG*(2) one thousand *BANG*(3) one thousand *BANG*(4) one thousand *BANG*(5)"
Pay attention to your dot! What is the dot doing? How much is it bouncing? Where is it bouncing?
The dot should not be leaving the 8" circle .


F2S-

Do you recommend any distance to begin this drill?

Thanks,

Eric

[RogerinTPA]

Thanks guys, the more I examine what I'm doing as far as my shot placement on target from today, I seem to be pulling my follow up shots low and left. While this would be a tell-tale trigger issue, I think its far more likely that I'm using my support hand and pulling the shots in an attempt to control recoil. (Oddly enough, very few of my shots are high, so I think I may be over compensating the recoil by a bit)

Next time I go to the range (which may not be too soon :( ), I'm going to practice the cadence of fire, and generally get more comfortable with my gun's recoil impulse, as well as my support hand's role in pulling the gun back to the shoulder, not torquing it down and leftward. I think I've built the recoil up in my mind to the point where in trying to mitigate it, I'm actually agitating my groups. Thanks for the tips! :D

I also have my VFG as far forward as possible. It allows me more leverage in keeping the weapon tight in the shoulder, keeping the dot more stable and driving the gun from target to target.

[Failure2Stop]

It depends on what you need to work.
If you are just getting into it I work 25 yards at 1 second and 1/2 second, then move forward to 15 for 1/2 and 1/4 second, then up to 10 for 1/2, 1/4, and 1/5, finish up on the 5 for 1/5 to the 8" and 1/4 to the head (3" circle).

You can also go backward from 5 to 10 to 15 to 25, working on keeping the split times as low as possible.



Do you recommend any distance to begin this drill?

[BushmasterFanBoy]

Went shooting today, I tried the cadence of fire drill with my carbine, and its just what the doctor ordered. I also moved my VFG slightly back, and gripped the rail/VFG just as I would with a pistol in an isosceles stance. I also locked my support arm out with my elbow parallel to the bore. My thumb was kept along the 11 oclock portion instead of pulling on the top of the rail. In addition, my weapon arm elbow was tucked and kept locked tight, with the stock shouldered just inside the bell of my shoulder on my pex. My footwork widened up, a bit more than shoulder width.

Boy did it pay off, at 25 yards, I was keeping up a sub 1 sec split, putting a round into the 8" circle reliably at under a second.

At 15 yards, I was putting a round into the 8" circle under every half second. This was the same cadence of fire that I had been able to achieve last week at 10 yards.

At 10 yards, I was able to keep all of my shots at or under .25 seconds and reliably hit the 8" chest circle.

I think this was a pretty big improvement, experimenting with grip, and having a timer is a GREAT skill enhancer.

As for pistol, I got my FAST time under 6 seconds on my first try of that day (I attempted it 3 times total). All this time timing my draw-stroke has really payed off. I got one run of 5.45, with no misses. I think that's pretty good. :D (I have vid if anyone wants to see)

[ToddG]

BFB -- I'd like to see the vid of your 5.45 FAST, definitely!

[BushmasterFanBoy]

BFB -- I'd like to see the vid of your 5.45 FAST, definitely!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hoiqZr1AIdk

There it is, I should have gotten the target in the shot, but there's always next week. And yes, I'm a pretty young shooter compared to the guys here. :D

[ToddG]

That's with an SLS starting with the hood up (locked), yes?

[BushmasterFanBoy]

That's with an SLS starting with the hood up (locked), yes?

Correct.

[Robb Jensen]

Very impressive time.

[ToddG]

Is the pause in your reload when the magazine comes to the gun on purpose, a habit, or just something that happened this time? Eliminate that and you could have had a 5-second run.

[Vinh]

Nice. I wish I could shoot that well with a TDA gun!

[BushmasterFanBoy]

Is the pause in your reload when the magazine comes to the gun on purpose, a habit, or just something that happened this time? Eliminate that and you could have had a 5-second run.

Admittedly, I've been giving a lot of attention to that first double action shot from the draw, so I've been neglecting my reload time. I think the pause comes from being careful about inserting the mag into the well, although if I practiced my reload and eliminated waste movement, I could get it done faster and more confidently.

The drill really is about the fundamentals, and if you are great at doing each of the steps (drawing, firing the first shot, maintaining precision, reloading, and firing for more speed) then you have all the tools you need. Doing the whole drill is really just connecting the dots, IMHO.

Thanks for the kind words gents, and I hope to get some better times with my carbine as well.

[Failure2Stop]

BMFB-
I am glad to hear that you are making marked improvement.
Keep it up!

I recommend moving onto some of the drills in the Fav Drills thread now with a consistent return to the cadence drill if things loosen up.

[iakdrago]

Here is the link to the first post- https://www.m4carbine.net/showthread.php?p=369577#post369577

The forum won't let me access the link for some reason

[sboza]

The forum won't let me access the link for some reason

Dude, you just brought back a two and a half year old thread.