Where on the training spectrum do you put the lateral transition?

[rob_s]

So that we define our terms, what I mean by "lateral transition" is moving the carbine from one shoulder to the other, as demonstrated here and here (2:00 minute mark).

I am also not asking *if* they should be learned or utilitized but instead, provided that you agree they should, *when* should they be learned? In other words, at what level of proficiency should the shooter be prior to beginning to learn how to perform a lateral transition?

If you'd like to put it in terms of the Four Stages of Competence that is fine, perhaps further broken down by skill, or perhaps a skills test or drill that one should be able to complete prior to moving on, etc.

[Zhurdan]

I'd say that this particular skill is useless unless the person already has a good grasp on firing from the support shoulder without a sling and has a solid grasp of re-safing the weapon after a string of fire. Why? I've watched people try to move to the support shoulder WITHOUT the safety on, and this is definitely not a time you want to be fumbling with the safety off.

Getting at the support shoulder firing part, I'd say that learning to get to your support shoulder doesn't do any good if they can't already shoot accurately from said shoulder. Get those basics down, then move on to the sling.

Assuming that someone has that down, I'd say it falls under the Conscious Incompetence section as they have to start somewhere. If they've never done something, but recognize it's importance, then go to it, but go slow. There will be fumbling and bumbling so an empty weapon is a good place to start.

During a recent outing with some LEO friends of mine, we had a newer officer out there and he wanted to do the "cool stuff" we were doing. It was a good half hour conversation (that took away from actual trigger time) to convince him that he probably wasn't ready to do lateral transitions. We asked him to unload and unsling his rifle and go thru the motions.

Primary shoulder, unsafe, bang bang, resafe, transition, unsafe, bang bang, resafe.

As soon as he got to the first resafe(which he didn't) he began to transition and put his support hand on the fire controls and on the trigger. He couldn't get past the fact that he wasn't ready to try it with live ammo. Not sure if it was personal pride or flat out arrogance on his part, but we as a group wouldn't let him. He got pissed and left. Definitely didn't have a high level of strength of stimulus to learn.

It did make me wonder if there are many people who are at a higher level and a lower lever shooter that it may damage newer shooters to a point. Almost like you need to slow down a bit until they are up to speed so they don't try to run before they crawl.

[Failure2Stop]

I would prefer to build everyone to be ambidextrous from the start.
Ever heard of a boxer that can only throw hits with one hand?

[rob_s]

I would prefer to build everyone to be ambidextrous from the start.
Ever heard of a boxer that can only throw hits with one hand?

Two followup questions:

1. From a military standpoint or a non-LE civilian standpoint?
2. How?

[HuttoAg96]

I took a 1 day defensive long gun class this past weekend that focused on home/homestead defense (which seems like a pretty realistic scenario for Joe Blow Private Citizen to be actually shooting someone with a long gun). The shooting drills were pretty much split half and half between strong side and support side shooting, with the idea being that depending on what kind of cover/concealment you are shooting from/around, you can expose yourself a lot less on support-side corners by shooting support side.

There were some relatively inexperienced shooters there that did just fine... I'd say I'm an advocate of putting that early in the curriculum based on that experience.

[militarymoron]

In other words, at what level of proficiency should the shooter be prior to beginning to learn how to perform a lateral transition?

i'd say whenever the shooter can demonstrate safe handling during the transition and weapons manipulation from the support side. this is just from observing myself as a student and being honest with myself in determining when i felt 'ready' to learn to perform transitions.

[jenrick]

I'd say worry about your support side when you can conduct all your rifle skills and manipulations on the move. This includes single target engagements, multiple target engagements, reloads, transitioning to a secondary weapon, and doing all of the above while moving in any direction. At that point you can effectively fight your rifle from 85%-95% of the situations you might encounter, and you've got enough training and practice you can probably do support side work without too many problems without much formal practice or training.

-Jenrick

[Failure2Stop]

Two followup questions:

1. From a military standpoint or a non-LE civilian standpoint?
2. How?

I wish I had done it with myself, so I am still playing catch-up trying to get my left side as good as my right. Since I am right side dominant (with that dominance reinforced by years of magnified optics with over 80% of my shooting from strong side) I don't delude myself into thinking that I will ever be 1:1, but 90%+ is reasonable. You don't have to completely retrain the support side, since you already know what you have to do and can compare it to the strong side, but it does need to be trained and practiced.

I see a need for it in the .mil, but even more so for the private citizen that won't have a bunch of buddies to protect him when his strong hand/eye is unable to do it's job and the choice is win or die.

I propose achieving the goal by training each skillset on the strong side first, and once proficiency was gained, work the other side. Taking this model forward through all individual skills will result in a shooter capable of effectively employing the weapon regardless of personal preference, and instead base employment on a realistic assessment of situation and ability.

[arizonaranchman]

I would begin is as soon as possible once the shooter has reached a level of weapons handling safety/familiarization. Ideally it will avoid the shooter from becoming a one trick pony as to right/left preferences. Slicing corners safely shooting from the wrong side is almost impossible due to exposing so much of the shooter's head/shoulder/arm

[Nobody_Special]

If one has safe practices I think, as a civilian, it should learned from the start. Especially if your carbine is for HD. Not being proficient with strong and weak side could be detrimental. My question, again as a civi, is there a need to shoot weak side at distance? I ask because whenever I work on transitions, its at the 25 yard indoor range and it's never even crossed my mind to shoot weak side at the 100 yard range.


Sent from my brain using Tapatalk