Me too but if you are follower of Rob Leatham, you should note that he teaches what we do to produce accuracy at 7 yards should not change to produce accuracy at 10, 15 and 25 yards - So same trigger control should be used but perhaps with greater emphasis placed in maintaining sight alignment, which still involves trigger control but I found transferring grip work to steady the pistol/front sight to larger shoulder/back/chest muscles better steadies the pistol and specifically the front sight for longer distance targets as explained by Brian Zins in our in-depth "Trigger Control" discussion -
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/trigger-control.834737/page-3#post-11255509
"You can hold sight alignment and sight picture on your pistol all day long. When does it change? When you move the trigger. Sights move. They are going to move. They have to move ... No matter how big your hands ... strong you are ... death grip ... as soon as you apply force ... on this pistol, it's going to move"
And I wrote, "The stance/grip/pistol together is in a state of dynamic motion to counteract/compensate for trigger pull/press to keep sight alignment on Point of Aim (POA) so Point of Impact (POI) will occur at the same spot, regardless whether using two hands, one strong/weak hand, two fingers, sighted/unsighted (point shooting), slow-fire bullseye, or rapid-fire action pistol.
If the shooter does not apply consistent trigger control, regardless of the stance/grip used, muzzle/front sight of the pistol will move just before the bullet exits the barrel and POI will deviate from POA (
Which your friend apparently is doing either by "flinching" and/or by dipping/pushing to consciously or unconsciously compensate for recoil)
And minimizing muzzle/front sight movement on a consistent basis to produce smaller shot groups is accuracy."
To me, it's always "right time" to teach point shooting as I taught/shared defensive point shooting to hundreds of people and now introduce new shooters to point shooting with eyes closed (To establish natural shooting POA/POI synchronization) before transitioning to sighted shooting -
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/trigger-control.834737/page-2#post-11244660
This is a listing of threads I compiled for a new member in H&R and perhaps will help your friend as well which includes step-by-step for point shooting -
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/my-proposed-recipe-newbie-here.864640/#post-11414962
Thank you, sir, for the well thought out response.
of course, any trigger manipulation that doesn't "move the sights" at 5 yards won't "move the sights" at 20, or 50 yards. one could also make the argument that Mr. Leatham was saying that your trigger press should be good enough under his method that it will achieve the same results at distance. I am very glad that I brought that up. pointing out my missteps as a coach, or instructor will do nothing but make me better!
as far as neutral grip, push-pull, death grip etc... I think that there are a bunch of ways to skin a cat even at the highest levels. Rob Leatham grips differently than Brian Enos, who grips differently than Jerry Miculek, who grips differently than Bob Vogel, who grips differently than Pat Mcnamara, and so on and so forth. now the differences in grip may be nuanced, but they are there. whatever allows a shooter the ability to make consistent hits while controlling recoil is what that shooter should use.
I happen to squeeze down on the sides of the pistol, camming my elbows up to increase my torque, and pushing in with my chest. I do a bit of pulling with my support hand by nature of breaking my wrist down, possibly similar to the amount that Mr Leatham had indicated. most of what I do is intended to lock the pistol into my frame, which will by structure be locked in place. the "path of least resistance" of the energy to take is directly back into my body where I can absorb the recoil and keep the firearm on target. but I am more than willing to teach another technique based more on a "push/pull" or driving the thumb forward to gain leverage on the bottom of the front strap and manage recoil that way.
to point shooting:
after understanding the detail from the threads that you posted, it seems that you are talking about both a "hard target focus" and point shooting.
after our trip to the range, today Jordan (he's given me permission to use his name in our discussion) ran out of ammo before we ran out of time. I took the opportunity to really analyze what I do. when shooting quickly, or doing transitions etc.. I target focus with both eyes open. painting a good sight picture onto the target that looks like it's "ghosted". if you've ever shot a magnified optic with a lit reticle at close distances you may be familiar with the Bindon aiming concept. my sights seem to operate kind of similar to that. Point shooting is a skill that I believe is best developed through creating muscle memory by performing repetitions using the sight so long as you are presenting and not "looking for the sight". I also believe that in the formative stages of shooting it is important to teach around the front sight "don't shoot until you see the front sight", pressing the trigger as soon as the sights have settled after recoil instead of waiting to release the trigger etc..
range report
Jordan and I arrived at the range at 9:30 today. he bought 200 rounds today and 2 hours worth of range time. before we had arrived I explained the goal of the day; to stop the flinch. there was steel in his eyes as we walked onto the range and set up. M&P loaded. 3 Mags ready. we hung a large target facing downrange and I told him to watch the pistol as he shoots. impassively observe the cycle of operation. following that magazine he shifted focus downrange. observing the flash with his peripheral vision. next mag back to the slide. after 5 mags we pulled the target in and switched it out with a new one, sending it out 7M he fired 10 rounds slow fire. his first impact became his target and his goal was to create the smallest possible group. his flinch had noticeably reduced at this point. his group was good. not a raged hole, but close enough that we both felt good about it. several drills, and 100 rds later, he had a solid grouping. still, a touch low, impacting between the outside 10 ring, and the 9 but significantly better. we did one more magazine of taking the sights out of the equation, then the last 10 rounds went to him having fun. all in all a good session! we both agreed that we had a good thing going with the fix for the flinch and after I took the last 15 minutes to figure out how i do and see things, we got some steak and shake and called it a day.
so again! thank you all for the help with Jordan's flinch! and with the support of becoming an instructor. would anyone, by chance, want to open a coaching development thread? something where we can talk about the how's and why's of what we do? I would like a little bit of help with structuring classes. it felt.... very random.t he way that I had taught the basics. how do you all teach basics? is it something like: safety, terminology (or should that be reversed?), what to expect, grip, stance, trigger manipulation, safety again, dry fire, safety, live fire?