Cooper, Cirello, or Applegate?

[dovedescending]

I honestly don't know what to think... my practice routine is all over the place right now. I've been practicing drawing from concealment, reloading drills, even tried my hand at FAST drills (that 3x5 area is kinda tiny...)

Should I concentrate on aiming with my sights? Should I work on point shooting? Or should I be using the silhouette of my slide? My groups ain't getting any tighter people!

 

[Sam1911]

It takes time and ammo. Lots of ammo. But the more (high quality) help you get along the way the faster you're likely to progress.

Its hard to know exactly what you most need to work on, not knowing where you are now. And we need to understand what your present goals are. Do you want tight groups? Or are you going for ultimate "combat accurate" speed at contact or "bad-breath" distance as might be most useful in a real shooting?

I would always say to start by learning the fundamentals of marksmanship -- good sight picture, mastery of trigger control -- and for that you need to be using your sights. Best point shooting technique comes after many MANY thousands of rounds getting the feel of the gun into your hands. P.S. is (at its best) a series of shortcuts that work because your body is already trained to do the right thing, so that when you shoot with great haste at short distance you can rush over the last details of the sight picture (or not even see the sights at all) and not blow the shot.

My "perfect world" solution would be for you to find the closest IDPA club to you and go shoot with them on their practice nights. IDPA may not be a lot of things that high-speed-low-drag operators care about, but it is a great way to learn practical accuracy and real-world gunhandling skills. And the folks who do this are generally very generous with their advice and guidance, if you ask for it with the manners of a student, and you show them that you are safe above all else.

On a more specific note to your question: At the very least I'd pick something like the FAST drill and practice it over and over again. Concentrate on what you do that gets you the hits you want. Bad practice is worse than useless. Only good practice makes you better, so practice drawing, aiming, and firing taking the time you need to get your hits. It may seem like forever, but a miss doesn't count. I'd stick with one drill for now because that's the quickest way for you to see results -- and seeing improvements will be a boost to your efforts to continue practicing. If you do a little of this and a little of that you really won't be able to track progress at anything and it will feel like you're spinning your wheels.

Practice until you think you're getting sloppy, then pack it up and try again next time. Tossing rounds down range just to pull the trigger is wasting time and ammo.

There's SO much more to say, but without standing on the range watching you shoot it's hard to be more helpful.

Good luck!

 

[Leadbutt]

I am one of the biggest proponets of point shooting going, was trained that way as a youth,but it was all ways and still is today important to learn to use the sights.

Slow down don't woory about speed, worry about accuracy

 

[David E]

Use the sights. Cirillo did. He advocated the "gun outline" as a sight picture only when you could not SEE them.

Focus on the top edge of the front sight during the shot, not the face of the front sight.

Use some dummy rds loaded randomly in your mag and see if you reveal a flinch. (which is highly likely)

Then it becomes a matter of grip and technique.

 

[SharpsDressedMan]

Do exactly what you are doing. Having a diversity of training will slowly improve you in the overall; DVC. You may not SEE just how much you are improving, but practice will pay off, no matter how you get it. If you focus on one aspect, you will probably just lengthen your practice period until you engage the other perspectives. I guess the ultimate goal is to have all kinds of training and tactics burned into you brain somewhere, and then pull them by instinct in a real incident.

 

[Deaf Smith]

Should I concentrate on aiming with my sights? Should I work on point shooting? Or should I be using the silhouette of my slide? My groups ain't getting any tighter people!

Dove,

First concentrate on the sights. Particulary the front sight. Learn to use them well and fast, with such as 'flash sight picture'. Then, once you have that down pat you will find that at close range, if you cannot SEE the sights, still bring it up as if you COULD SEE the sights.

For by then you will have ingrained the index necessary for the gun to be on target, sights or not.

For you see Jeff Cooper, in a way, had his own form of point shooting. The 'presentation', that is draw, and the Weaver stance, brought about an index (not unlike point shooting) and the 'flash sight picture' meary confirmed the index as you did not adjust the sights before fireing. The 'surprise break' was the trigger control.

But the nice thing about his Modern Technique was you only learned one thing, a form of sighted fire, instead of learning several types of fire.

Deaf

 

[The Lone Haranguer]

Should I concentrate on aiming with my sights? Should I work on point shooting? Or should I be using the silhouette of my slide?

All of these have a place, depending on the situation. Jim Cirillo's book Guns, Bullets and Gunfights has a chapter on alternative sighting techniques, including what he called the "Silhouette Point" you mention, and also has some good marksmanship tips. Available from Amazon.com

 

[DT Guy]

First, practice hitting what you need to hit.

THEN practice hitting it faster. Diligentia-Vis, in that order for a reason.


Larry

 

[Ridgerunner665]

All of them (Cooper, Cirello, and Applegate)

I find the different techniques useful for different situations...

If its happening fast and close...point shoot.

If its happening fast but further away...quick aim.

If I have time...Aim.

No single technique will ever be the best in all scenarios...

 

[9mmepiphany]

if you ever hope to become better are shooting, you have to learn to use your sights and placing your shots with proper trigger control. without good trigger control all else is just wasted effort regardless if you are using open sights, laser, red dot or even point shooting.

if you think a 3x5" card is tiny, you should try shooting at small post-it notes (1.5x2.5")...granted it is slow fire and only at 5-7 yards, but that's what i start new shooter out on. we use 3x5" cards when shooting 2 shot strings from the holster

 

[SaxonPig]

It's not how quickly you can shoot, it's how willing you are to shoot.

From my limited experience and what I have read about gunfighting I suspect that very seldom does a lightning quick draw become necessary. Most times you see trouble developing in time to either remove yourself or get the gun in your hand in plenty of time. The biggest hurdle to overcome is our natural tendency as decent human beings to avoid violence. It's the hesitation that gets you killed, not the .5 second difference between a fast draw and a slow one. Mental preparation is the single most important factor.

Remember, the criminals you will be dealing with are not trained gunfighters. They don't practice fast draws or marksmenship. Often they can't figure out how to operate the guns they carry. After a fight you are amazed at what total numbnuts criminals really are.

 

[Sam1911]

Remember, the criminals you will be dealing with are not trained gunfighters. They don't practice fast draws or marksmenship. Often they can't figure out how to operate the guns they carry. After a fight you are amazed at what total numbnuts criminals really are.

Not to take away from what SP said, but there are generalizations here that can promote a false sense of complacency. There are skilled and competent criminals mixed in with the ignorant and unskilled. Nothing wrong with setting your training goals with a view to that "better" class of bad guy.

Some criminals and gang members DO practice. There is a study floating around here somewhere referenceing a survey of prison inmates that determined that a fairly significant number actually "practiced" firing their weapons MORE often than did a similar sampling of law enforcement officers. Not that they were piling up Bianchi cup trophies, of course, but that they did take some care to understand how their weapons worked and to do a little familiarization practice under practical (for their uses) conditions.

Gun fights don't happen like on Gunsmoke with everyone squaring off at 20 paces and trying to "out draw" the other guy, but there certainly are realistic circumstances where you may need to be able to successfully draw, align, and fire your sidearm in a very short amount of time.

You still need to start with the basics and learn to shoot WELL. FAST will come once you have shooting WELL down pat.

 

[Old Fuff]

I knew two of the three individuals (Cooper and Applegate) mentioned in the O.P., and both made a point of saying one should first learn to make a smooth draw and then hit where they intended to before speed came into consideration. In other words:

Learn the technique > practice it until you make consistent hits > and then develop speed.

 

[Mike OTDP]

Sam1911 has a lot of good advice.

I'd start with bullseye. Slow fire in particular. Slow precision fire has the same relationship to shooting that ballet has to dance...it hammers good. solid basics into every fiber of your being.

Stay in bullseye, work into timed and rapid fire. This teaches control.

THEN you can start working on the fast draw. But slowly. Concentrate on smoothness and accuracy, let speed develop on its own.

By this stage of the game, the whole point shoot/gun sillouette/sights argument becomes moot...you are working in a continum of shooting that merges everything seamlessly.

 

[Guillermo]

Dove,

In a concealed carry scenario you have a LOT of variables. The holster may ride differently on different pants (OWB) because of where the belt loops are. The different clothing can have a huge effect.

Practice, slowly, getting to your gun and smoothly drawing it. Make it as efficient as possible. The speed will come.

And concentrate on your front sight. Again, the more you practice using it the more accurate you will be and the more likely you will to be accurate in a high stress situation

 

[dovedescending]

See, this is why I love webforums.

 

[Guillermo]

this particular webforum is spectacular

many of the smartest, most famous and skilled gun people in the nation are members

you might not recognize them but just on this thread at least four of them are (this is no exaggeration) world class when it comes to shooting ability and firearm knowledge

This is truly a special forum

 

[Shawn Dodson]

Concentrate your efforts on accuracy, using the sights. Speed will come with experience. I suggest you find the distance in which you can reliably put 80% of your bullets into the 4-inch ring, and 100% into the 6-inch dotted ring of this target then move the target farther out 5 yards and stretch your challenge. Once you can achieve 80/100% performance at 25 yards then closer distances will be much easier and your cadence of fire will be much faster. I suggest substituting the NRA B-16 25yd slow fire pistol target, which has a 5" black bullseye, if you have problems seeing the other target at greater distances. You can get the B-16 target here: http://www.letargets.com/estylez_item.aspx?item=B-16

Learn to watch your front sight lift off the target and return. Don't move your eyes in attempt to track the front sight - just see it as a blur as it lifts and returns. When it returns to the aimpoint you press the trigger again.

Learn how far your sights can be out of alignment and still achieve good hits. Using a cardboard IPSC target at 5 yards, acquire a traditional sight alignment/sight picture on a fixed aimpoint then move the front sight until the edge of the blade touches the left/right of the rear sight notch. Press the trigger and see where your bullets hit. Repeat the same drill, but move the front sight until the bottom of the blade is even with the top of the rear sight notch. See where your bullets land. Repeat but move the top of your front sight so it's even with the bottom of the rear sight notch. This drill allows you to recognize that at close distances you don't need a high quality sight alignment to get good hits on the target. With time you'll learn to recognize when your sight alignment is "good enough" to get good hits at various distances, which increases your speed.

When you've developed your ability to watch the front sight dance, you can progress from a front sight focus to a target focus. At a distance of 3 yards acquire a traditional front sight focus and sight picture. Then shift your focus from the front sight to your aimpoint on the target. Take note of how you see your sights when your focus is downrange on the aimpoint. Then shift your focus back to the front sight. Shift your focus back and forth a few times until you become accustomed to focusing on the aimpoint and recognizing the sight alignment/sight picture when it is out of focus. Finally, focus on the aimpoint and press the trigger. Your bullet will hit the target right where you're looking. Once you've developed proficiency with target focus at 3 yards, systematically increase the distance 2 yards at a time until your target focus groups open up to about 6 inches.

Cheers!

 

[Ronsch]

Something I learned in CAS shooting...Smooth is fast. Get whatever style you are using down pat, ingrained in your muscle memory, and as you become more smooth, your speed will increase.

+1 on starting with the sights. Any shooting discipline begins with (other than the safety rules, of course) breathing, sights, trigger control. I had an instructor call them "The Holy Trinity." "Learn these (he would say) and you shall inherit the earth as surely as the meek..."

 

[David E]

Concentrate your efforts on accuracy, using the sights. move the target farther out 5 yards and stretch your challenge.

Learn to watch your front sight lift off the target and return.
Learn how far your sights can be out of alignment and still achieve good hits. Using a cardboard IPSC target at 5 yards, acquire a traditional sight alignment/sight picture

Where's the movement? Where's the FoF airsoft training? According to you, this is a mere parlor trick, as you said in the other thread about a shooting drill:

Shawn Dodson wrote: Good shooting but for practical purposes it amounts to parlor tricks at the shooting range.

Cardboard targets don't interact with you. They don't move or shoot back.

You MUST move to keep from being hit.

This armchair commando owns four airsoft pistols for training.

What is a "drill"? It's training. It's training that's setting you up to fail.

Even tho you think each drill is training, you had good drill suggestions in THIS thread............but you're sure inconsistent.
a
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[Sam1911]

Lets not derail Dove's basic skills training questions with bickering spilling over from other threads. If you have suggestions to him, make them and let them stand on their own merits.

 

[David E]

My point is, good shooting drills help the shooter identify, learn, improve and test that shooter's skill in certain areas.

It helps to have a good, solid shooting foundation before branching out into other areas.

Dove, describe your grip and stance. Also, what gun are you using ? Any pics would help, also.

 

[tekarra]

Jim Cirillo wrote that he did not use the sights, rather he brought the revolver up centre of his face and looked along the barrel with both eyes open. If the barrel appeared balanced, it was on target. I practiced this technique for a time and it is quite fast and accurate.

 

[David E]

In Cirillo's famous shootout on the stake out unit, he was asked if he used his sights. He said, "I could see the striations on the front sight."

He did have his "silhouette" technique, but that wasn't the only one he used. In the class I took with him, he had us tape up the sights and later he had us wear goggles that had been smeared with petroleum jelly to reinforce the silhouette technique, but the rest of the class time was spent using sights.

 

[ShowMe2]

dovedescending,

If you want to read a timely book that advocates point shooting and the techniques involved, pick up a copy of Mike Conti's "Police Pistolcraft" and his new one "Officer's Guide to Police Pistolcraft".

Conti designed his program for the Massachussetts State Police and I think the California Highway Patrol has adapted some of his training techiques. His experience as a police firearms instructor and some of his observations in terms of training LEO's were similiar to my years of training police officers. It's not a panacea, but IMO it's well worth a look.