odd shooting style.

What is this? IDPA?

Doesn't sound very practical to me. More like a 1 in 1,000,000 situation.
But I'm no expert and opinions vary.

Meplat 308 said:

More like a 1 in 1,000,000 situation.

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Which, coincidentally, is (hopefully) about the same odds as (a non professional) getting forced into a gun fight. And also the probability that if they are, it's going to be exactly like what they trained for.
RO's can get too creative in designing stages. OTOH if it's too standardized, it tends to get awfully gamey. IMO, it's good to get a plethora of scenarios in anything called "practical".

For CQ retention, I prefer holding at reverse half yo , against my strong side pect.
ymmv
Holding inline with the sternum might give you quicker shots to your weak side.
You got your shooting and you gots your thinking. Stuff that makes you think and shoot is good.

ohihunter2014 said:

I get the unexpected thing but what does holding the gun with two hands and having it inline with your sternum accomplish. Im not bashing them i was a little ticked i got points nocked off and no one had an answer for me why we shot this way. your elbows basically have to be at your side when firing. It just didn't make sense to me or very practical. shooting from the hip in close range is normal and accuracy is there but backing away firing from the sternum doesn't make sense. According to them the reason we fired 6 rounds was incase its still coming after me. I thought i just drew at 3ft away and sent 2 rounds into this guys groin. he isn't chasing me after that.

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The situation is probably based on the thing I see on TV a lot, where operational operators walk through a building with their handgun in both hands, near their chest, pointed down and ahead a bit. I have no idea if actual high-level special-forces-type people are trained that way, but television seems to think so. The actors don't usually pretend to fire from that position, though.

AKA "low ready"
some say better than the "high ready", AKA "Sabrina"
again YMMV
What operational operators do is double seekwrit, if you knew they'd kill ya.

stoky said:

AKA "low ready"
some say better than the "high ready", AKA "Sabrina"
again YMMV
What operational operators do is double seekwrit, if you knew they'd kill ya.

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C'mon, you can tell me. It's just between us. Does it have something to do with where my nose is pointed?

geographically or geometrically?

It just sounds like another wannabe Rambo to me....

Firing from a high compressed position (the pistol in both hands in front of the sternum) is a pretty common defensive training drill these days, as is firing from a high draw position (pistol in one hand, near the right pectoral muscle, with the left hand drawn up near the head for defensive protection as well as prevent coverage by the muzzle).

The backing up and firing from high compressed is a poor choice of stage design, and signifies to me the designer doesn't really understand how and when the position should be used. When backing up, the shooter is making space, which you can occupy with your arms and pistol - which is what it sounds like you did. Firing from high compressed, moving back, and extending the pistol forward is a common technique. Back pedaling and keeping the pistol at high compressed position is just silly, and frankly, sounds like a great way to ensure the shooter trips while moving back, since they would lack the counter balance out front of their arms.

What we see most often in tv/movies isn't high compressed position, but rather is "Sul." The pistol is almost laying on its side against the body, and both hands are together at the centerline, with the firing hand effectively resting on the support hand, which is palm in against your body. It does always make me chuckle, since Sul isn't really meant to be a "ready" position, but is kind of an administrative position which is "almost ready." Guys seem to like it, which I attribute to being relatively similar in physical automaticity to low ready with a rifle. It's BARELY faster to a firing position from Sul than it is from a holster, as opposed to true ready positions.

I forgot to mention - I did shoot a match stage once where we moved through a "hallway" of barricades, shooting into doorways at targets on either side, all at high compressed, and all of the shots were taken from there. All point shooting, effectively, aiming with your breastbone. It was probably a decade ago now, and I'll admit, it was VERY fast, but I also remember thinking at the time, the design was remarkably silly, as each time we passed a doorway to fire from high compressed, we were completely exposed to each assailant/target in each room, and we didn't actually secure any of the rooms. Just shot one target and moved on... Some of the guys joked afterwards - they felt like the training was more like "learn how to go on a killing spree in a dorm" instead of what the stage designer had intended.

But I will say, a guy has to give stage designers a little bit of slack. Shooters expect new stages at every match, and expect different stages to test different skills/techniques. Nobody is perfect, so sometimes stages slip through which even the design sits back and thinks - "well, that was dumb..." after it's actually fired live.

I will, when a CoF specifies "retention position", get both hands on the gun unless specifically told to one-hand it. I would say it is more in line with my solar plexus than my sternum, but that is anatomy. Perhaps it is "compressed high ready" with the trigger pulled, I am not sure of the trainer jargon.

Why do I do this? Because invariably, backing off the initial target(s) shooting from "retention", will be followed by aimed shots at more distant targets. So all I have to do is raise the gun with freestyle grip already in place and start aiming.

I also thought the OP CoF included Sul and point shoulder.

When a COF starts dictating to me that I am not allowed to use the sights and how to hold the gun in relation to my body during firing... I know it's time to find a different game/match.

IMHO
Ask an RO about the rational behind the rules.
Think about it and give it an earnest try. If it doesn't make sense and or work for you, abandon it and put in in the back your tool box.
Get what you can out of it. Don't get too fixated on the scoring.
"You have to figure out what works for you. I don't want the responsibility,"
--Louis Awerbuck

ATLDave said:

When a COF starts dictating to me that I am not allowed to use the sights and how to hold the gun in relation to my body during firing... I know it's time to find a different game/match.

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Good policy if you live somewhere that has a lot of choice in matches.
I shoot IDPA and a couple of knockoffs which will occasionally specify "retention position."
USPSA doesn't.

I shot a local clubs defensive pistol match the other day and i thought it was kind of odd the tactics

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It's a game, don't think of goofy stuff as tactics, rather rules to play by.

I shoot IDPA and a couple of knockoffs which will occasionally specify "retention position."
USPSA doesn't.

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If you have ever fired an open pistol from "retention" you would understand why. It will blow your hat off and my ears are still ringing.

Well, yes, but my main point was that if he can't handle the IDPA choreography, he could do Something Else.

I hesitate to say it but this hold position has become "trendy". I hold a handgun (or rifle) in a variety of ways depending on where I am, proximity to objects, blind spots, distances in fields of view etc. I might hold a handgun in the strong hand low right side muzzle horizontal, high 3 o'clock chest height muzzle up, two handed muzzle low, muzzle high. It varies. Being glued to some universal "ready" position is a mistake in my opinion

RPZ said:

I hesitate to say it but this hold position has become "trendy". I hold a handgun (or rifle) in a variety of ways depending on where I am, proximity to objects, blind spots, distances in fields of view etc. I might hold a handgun in the strong hand low right side muzzle horizontal, high 3 o'clock chest height muzzle up, two handed muzzle low, muzzle high. It varies. Being glued to some universal "ready" position is a mistake in my opinion

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Nobody of any training quality is teaching students to "glue themselves" to one universal ready position. But that doesn't have anything to do with SPORT SHOOTING STAGE DESIGN.

A SPORT SHOOTING stage designer doesn't have access to many of the effective ready or shooting positions, so that's a reality you have to live with if you're going to participate in SPORT SHOOTING.

High compressed, like low ready, simply happens to be a ready position which can be safely incorporated into stage design without violating range safety rules or general safety considerations. High-temple (aka temple-index) position and high-ready positions violate firing line planar safety rules. Firing from a retracted draw position runs too great of risk of the shooter covering their muzzle with their opposite arm, or taking a chunk out of the side of their belly. Sul while moving covers your own legs... There simply are too many safety issues for SPORT SHOOTING to incorporate many of these other "ready positions." Any cover position which puts the shooters BACK against the cover is a non-starter, since it inherently points the pistol backwards across the firing line... Supine positions are fantastic skills to practice, but the target array planning has to be incredibly careful to avoid the shooter EITHER crossing the muzzle over their own legs or feet, OR sweeping their muzzle over the berm... Muzzles always have to be forward, never too far down, never too far up, and never with a possibility for the shooters own body to be in front of it.

So then, as SPORT SHOOTING stage designers, there really aren't many positions from which we can draw to challenge the shooters' abilities without putting them or others at risk during the CoF. High compressed and low ready are safe.

How many indoor shooting ranges allow dynamic shooting from the draw? How many will let a patron, in anything but a training class or competition, fire from anything but a standard "square range" firing position? Shooting on the move, or even moving with a loaded and "active" firearm was a long argued battle among many of these sports - how many SHOOTING SPORTS prevent re-holstering a loaded firearm during the stage?

What a guy does at his own private range in private training sessions, or does during dryfire practice in his basement is one thing, but when a stage designer is responsible for - above all else - making sure everyone goes home with the same number of holes with which they came, things get tied down pretty tightly.

Of course, many sport shooting stages (at least in USPSA) start with the shooter facing uprange or some other position where step 1 has to be: move to a position from which you can safely draw. When you toss in the routine start positions of having guns on tables or in boxes, not much is gained by having shooters start with some contrived ready position.

Regardless, the OP's post was, IIRC, about a (likely unsanctioned) match where certain numbers of shots had to be fired from one of these retention/ready positions. As I observed in a post about bullseye shooting, some people really like these kinds of constraints (one-handed only in bullseye, for instance); others want a good deal of latitude to come up with the best way to perform a task (defined at a fairly high level). Some people might enjoy a match where the use or non-use of sights is dictated (and enforced, I assume, in the judgment of the RO?). I am not among them, but they probably exist.

I get the sport application, however no range safety rule is, or should be, broken as long as the muzzle is always pointed down range, and not elevated above target level.