How many people are practicing shooting offhand beyond "close range"?

[Moltke]

I define anything close enough that I'm faster getting multiple hits offhand than assuming a supported position as "close range". For me that's about 75 yards. For others it may be different. My practice off hand past 75 yards probably accounts for less than 5% of my practice. If I'm that far away, I can afford the time to take a supported position.

Primary rifle is a 14.5" BCM LW Middy with an Aimpoint H1.
Whatever 5.56 I have on hand for practice.
Accuracy expectations are center torso hits, so say a 6" circle?
Speed is dependent on range and the aforementioned 6" accuracy standard. Say .15 second splits up to .75 second splits from 0-75 yards.
I'd venture a guess that my round count is split 80-20 between speed and accuracy (accuracy being 2MOA or better hits).
I practice going into and out of positions frequently, regardless of range. Like I stated, past 75 yards I'll practice standing barricade support, kneeling or sitting. Past 200 yards I usually go prone. With my Noveske 18" precision rig, I add precision head shots at 300 (Non-Threat torso plate with swinging threat head plate).

Having been a Marine Expert rifleman and lifelong hunter, I'm accustomed to accurate shooting. Most of my practice these days is centered around speed, maneuver and weapon manipulation.

Please clarify a few things for me.

“Close range” for you with a rifle is 0-75 yards, got it. Nice.

So then 5% of your time spent shooting is offhand from 0-75 yards, or is it that 5% is offhand beyond 75 yards?

Once at 75 yards do you always practice supported or do you continue offhand shooting knowing that you will always take a supported position in a real life non-training scenario?

Your standard incorporates time and accuracy and so the 80 percent of the time when you're going for speed, what what is your standard for accuracy? When you're going for accuracy, holding 2 MOA is pretty damn good for offhand (I think) but at 75 yards a 6” circle is 8 MOA, not 2 MOA – so am I not understanding something correctly?

[Moltke]

Offhand standing is the vast majority of my rifle shooting. Usually 100 yd, but occasionally in at 75 or 50. Iron sights only.

I shoot that because it is the most demanding method for me. It requires the most control of all the marksmanship disciplines. I figure that if I can control my aim, breathing, muscle memory, etc, while standing offhand, then shooting supported with any aid will be significantly easier. It's also just fun to do.

My measure of success is hitting an 8" steel gong -- enough to take down a man or game at that range.

Shooting a 14.5" carbine under an A2 handle.

Interesting. Whereas the majority of most people’s shooting is done from the a bench or supported position, the majority of your shooting is done at 100 yards offhand. Do you set a time limit for yourself per shot or this accuracy based without time? What do you consider to be “close range” for you with a rifle, and do you shoot offhand differently at the closer distances? How many rounds do you put downrange per year while shooting this way? Has shooting offhand at 100 yards actually helped your shooting, or do you do it because it’s more fun/difficult? Also, do you use supported positions when shooting beyond 100 yards?

[Moltke]

I also hunt with my AR. I like to be able to take quick shots at wolves and coyotes and have the confidence to do so. In a practical application vs. humans I doubt I will ever need to shoot beyond 50 yds.

Less than 50 yards. I live in a rural area. Threats to me and my family can easily be out to 50 yards in some scenarios.


DDM4V7, Vortex Sparc (waiting for my Trijicon TR24), UMC 55gr.

I shoot standing unsupported at all distances out to 200 yards. I try to keep my shots on a 8" gong out to 100 yards and a 12x18 plate at 200 yards. I also shoot a bunch of prone at 100 yards and 200 yards. I increase my shooting pace based on distance. I can easily keep hits on the plate at 200 yards from prone 1 shot per second.
A minimum of 500 rounds a month, but I've been averaging about three range sessions a month @250 rounds for the last three months. I practice at close and long range in each session.

Like my pistol shooting I push myself to go as fast as I can at all distances to score a 8" kill shot. In the case of a carbine I want that 8" shot out to 100 yards as fast as I can make 90% of my hits. Anything beyond that I am pleased with any upper torso hit. I only shoot group sizes from the bench to make sure there is no "weirdness" with the carbine. Anything under 10 round 2" groups is good enough for me and my DDM4 will do that with any ammo I have fed it. For "general feelings of goodness" I mix in a minimum of 1/2 hour of nothing but weapon manipulations, immediate actions (both clearing malfunctions and transition to pistol) and reloads.

So “close range” to you is 0-50 yards and that’s all you ever expect to shoot anyway, but you practice standing shooting out to 200 yards? Okay cool. Has shooting offhand at a 200 yard target helped you with your shooting at a 50 yard target? When you're trying for accuracy what are your offhand groups like at 50 yards, 100 yards, 200 yards? Has this changed since you started shooting like this?

[Moltke]

Why are you practicing offhand beyond close range?
Improve USMC rifle qual, and accuracy. Quick target acquisition and engagement

Okay.

What gun, optic, ammo are you using, and what's your firing pace?
20" M16a4 clone service rifle (BCM), TA31 A4 acog/ iron sights, m193

Okay.

What distances do you practice different positions at?
100 yard target, 200-400yd steel targets at local range

So what do you consider to be "close range"? When you say "100 yard target" do you mean a paper target? How are you judging your performance at this distance? What size steel at 200y-400y?

How often do you actually practice offhand? At close range or otherwise?
Everytime I go to the range

How often do you go to the range? How many rounds do you shoot and has shooting offhand actually helped you improve your accuracy, recoil management, target acquisition, etc. from when you started?

What has your measure of success been with practicing offhand? Group size? Hits on steel? General feelings of goodness?
For me, practice is essential to improving accuracy and effectiveness.

I agree that practice is essential to improving accuracy and effectiveness… but have you tracked your progress and what are your standards? Are you a better shooter now than before, and is it attributable to shooting offhand? As in, do you actually have better groups at specific distances? Are your hits on steel are common or noticeably easier?

[AKDoug]

So “close range” to you is 0-50 yards and that’s all you ever expect to shoot anyway, but you practice standing shooting out to 200 yards? Okay cool. Has shooting offhand at a 200 yard target helped you with your shooting at a 50 yard target? When you're trying for accuracy what are your offhand groups like at 50 yards, 100 yards, 200 yards? Has this changed since you started shooting like this?

I used to be a competitive archer. I spent a bunch of time shooting at distances much farther than I would see in competition. That made the closer shots a "chip" shot. Sounds like you are experiencing the same thing.

Like I said in my first line. I don't expect a human encounter at beyond 50 yards, but I do shoot my rifle at animals at distances beyond that. I don't shoot groups very often other than to test a rifle at 100 yards off the bench. My interest with a carbine is speed and accuracy good enough to do the job. Prone (or supported off a rest standing) at 200 yards I can hit 8" plates with 90% reliability. That's a kill zone hit on a coyote or wolf..and definitely a human. I can make those hits at a 1 per second rate on most days. I don't care if I have a 2" group or a 7" group. My entire purpose is to pick an acceptable kill zone for my target and try to hit it as fast as I can.

Looks like I basically repeated myself...

[HackerF15E]

I don't care if I have a 2" group or a 7" group. My entire purpose is to pick an acceptable kill zone for my target and try to hit it as fast as I can.

Somewhat the same story for me, although I'm not so concerned about the speed.

[glocktogo]

Please clarify a few things for me.

“Close range” for you with a rifle is 0-75 yards, got it. Nice.

So then 5% of your time spent shooting is offhand from 0-75 yards, or is it that 5% is offhand beyond 75 yards?

Once at 75 yards do you always practice supported or do you continue offhand shooting knowing that you will always take a supported position in a real life non-training scenario?

Your standard incorporates time and accuracy and so the 80 percent of the time when you're going for speed, what is your standard for accuracy? When you're going for accuracy, holding 2 MOA is pretty damn good for offhand (I think) but at 75 yards a 6” circle is 8 MOA, not 2 MOA – so am I not understanding something correctly?

To clarify, probably less than 5% of my practice rounds are fired offhand, unsupported beyond 75 yards.

Skipping to the last question, it's relative. 2MOA is pretty much the mechanical limit of the carbine/RDS or irons platform. In most cases I'm shooting for acceptable. That may range from 2 MOA at 300 yards (6" group), all the way to 120 MOA at 5 yards (still, a 6" group). It's a sliding value scale. The times are adjusted according to how much it takes to get the acceptable accuracy.

I'm a little unclear as to your second question. Once I hit 75 yards and beyond, I'll practice most all of those shots from standing with barricade support, kneeling or sitting. Past 200 yards I usually go prone for maximum stability. For instance, I wouldn't take a shot on a game animal past 150 yards using an offhand, unsupported position (and only if conditions are optimal at that distance, i.e., broadside, light to no wind, animal not moving, etc.).

As I stated, I'm no stranger to accurate shooting. I qualified Expert on the 500 meter KD course in the Corps 4 years straight. I've had coaching on precision shooting and I've shot competitively. Most of my speed shooting has been with handguns, so approximately 80% of my practice with a rifle these days focuses on speed. My not always realized goal is to land all shots fired into the "A" or "-0" zone on IPSC/IDPA targets while on the clock. I try to match my speed loosely to that goal. When I'm getting repeated "A's" or "down zero's", I'll bump the speed up and then focus on keeping the points dropped to a minimum at the faster speed. The point being that you can never be too fast, so long as you're getting solid hits.

With the exception of critical shot placement under narrowly defined conditions, I work off the premise that "perfect is the enemy of good enough". If you wait till you can place the perfect shot, you may already be dead. Train to take the shot you can make, quickly! Along those lines, I recognize that the time it takes me to make an acceptable shot offhand, unsupported past 75 yards may take longer than taking the time to drop to a knee or move a short distance to gain barricade support. Once I've gained a more stable shooting position, I'll break the shot more quickly and with a greater likelihood of scoring an acceptable hit. It's a balance of speed and accuracy.

Back to "close range". I practice mostly offhand, unsupported inside 75 yards, often incorporating movement inside 25 yards. Why? Because it's a challenge. A conventional kneeling or barricade supported torso shot at 25 yards is ridiculously easy, so I amp it up. I do practice position shooting inside 75 yards though, because it reflects my potential reality. I'm not a police sniper, but I am a reserve LEO qualified with my patrol rifle. I might have to post up on an armed & barricaded, so shooting from behind cover or very unconventional positions is a possibility. You should know what it takes to make an acceptable shot from as many different and odd positions as possible. You may not always get a solid cheek or stock weld, or even a perfect sight picture. I've seen shooters take forever to even find their sight picture from odd, yet realistic cover positions they've never experienced before.

Back to the easy shots. That's where I make it hard through accuracy. Instead of taking an easy shot at close range and accepting the 6" accuracy standard, I'll call for a T-box hit (center face shot). Or perhaps I'll use hard cover or a non-threat and only leave a sliver of the the threat target visible. If someone is shooting at you and using cover VERY effectively, you need to be able to place that "critical" shot to hit whatever part of themselves they have uncovered. This is complicated inside 75 yards by the mechanical offset of your sights, so knowing where your rifle hits at all ranges is important.

Even shooting from prone at 300+ yards is a mix of speed and accuracy. I might start with a called, cold bore head shot (again, 18" SPR rig) on a swinging threat plate behind a non-threat torso. But at some point I'll practice how fast I can move from standing to "round sent" from prone at distance. I might even practice multiple hits at speed from prone. My best recorded run from bagged prone on a 300 yard steel torso is 27 hits out of 28 rounds fired in 15.14 seconds. Is that useful drill? Hypothetically speaking, not very. However, the information gleaned about recoil and trigger control in relation to a distant man sized target is.

Those are my standards for myself. While benchmark drill performance is good information to know about your own performance in relation to others, it's not the most crucial piece of the puzzle. You have to know what you're capable of on a given day, under as many different circumstances as you can. When SHTF and you're on the trigger, knowing how well you can do in relation to others doesn't mean squat. Knowing what you can or cannot pull off at a crucial moment is. The only way to build that database is to fire as many rounds as possible, in as many different ways as you can come up with.

So to that goal, always train, always strive and never, ever give up.

[TriumphRat675]

At close range you want 6-8 inch groups with rapid fire, and at distance which is 50-100 yards you want anything on the upper torso with shots about 1 second apart? Sounds adequate. Is this something you came up with on your own or is this a standard somewhere?

I would qualify those statements a bit. When practicing pistol shooting up to 25 yds, I have two modes: "bullseye" type slow fire shooting where the goal is pure accuracy using good technique, and "practical" shooting where the goal is to use that technique while achieving a reasonable degree of accuracy with a few to many shots fired in a short period of time. I like using negative targets where a "hit" is anything inside a 6 - 8 inch circle on the upper torso, very roughly corresponding to the really important areas on a bad guy. I prefer my groups to be tighter than that, but see merit in Todd G's idea that if you want to practice speed you need to be pushing yourself a bit - which might mean throwing one or two rounds out of every ten outside that circle. This applies to any distance. So at 3 yds you can fire really, really quickly and still make good hits, but at 25 need to slow down a bit to still make them. It makes sense to me to apply this to short-range rifle shooting as well. This is my own standard using concepts borrowed from a number of trainers.

At longer distances, I still prefer to make upper torso hits in the magic circle, but give myself a little more leeway as to what is "acceptable" when shooting reasonably quickly. I know that with practice, once I'm dialed in with a carbine I can make some very good, consistent off-hand shots at 100 yds, but I don't practice enough to maintain that level of proficiency. Since I don't fight, compete, or hunt with a rifle, and have lots of other demands on my time, I have no incentive to practice with it and try not beat myself up for not making the shots I did on that one glorious day, long ago.

[evosil98]

So what do you consider to be "close range"?
I'm limited by my local range. It has target holders at 50 and 100 yds. I'm being very general and consider close range to be under 100 yds.

When you say "100 yard target" do you mean a paper target?
Yes

How are you judging your performance at this distance?
Nothing fancy. I print out 1-3" targets and try to group them as best as possible. This is at both 50 and 100 yrd.

What size steel at 200y-400y?
Not to sure about the exact size. We can't go pass the 100yrd line but they are steel pigs, deers and several square plates.

How often do you go to the range?
Not as much as I would like. It really depends, sometimes once a week or once a month.

How many rounds do you shoot and has shooting offhand actually helped you improve your accuracy, recoil management, target acquisition, etc. from when you started?

I would shoot about 300rds in a 3 hour session. Sometimes more or less, it really depends. Yes, it has improved my offhand shooting. I would say that offhand shooting was my weak point. That's why I wanted to practice more.

I agree that practice is essential to improving accuracy and effectiveness… but have you tracked your progress and what are your standards? Are you a better shooter now than before, and is it attributable to shooting offhand? As in, do you actually have better groups at specific distances? Are your hits on steel are common or noticeably easier?

Offhand practice has helped me improve breathing, muscle memory and muscle fatigue.

[Moltke]

Thanks again.