Gun range skill level for a beginner

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JansonRM

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Hello everyone. A little history: I grew up in the south and when I was age 12-14 I went hunting with my father. I never shot a deer and was more interested in driving his truck (on the back roads) than actually hunting. I had some experience with a shotgun. Back then I shot my first pistol a handful of times.

Fast forward to now.. I'm a 35yr old male and have been to the gun range twice during the past year and only shot a pistol once before that since I was a kid. During this last trip to the range I put a target 11 yards out and shot the target pictured below. The left target, center head and right target were three different turns. Unknowingly when I was shooting a lot of people at the range were stopping to look at me (my girlfriend informed me of this afterwards). I also had another guy introduce himself and asked if I came to the range often. He asked what my trick was.

My primary reason for posting this is that I want to find out if I'm truly naturally good or was everyone around me just beginners and I'm status quo. I enjoy going and will continue to do so but just want a realistic observation of my performance. I do not want this to come off as passive bragging or anything related. I truly don't know much about this hobby besides the fact that I enjoy it. I promise you won't hurt my feelings if you tell me I suck. I just want feedback from people who are experts and love this hobby like im sure most of you do.

I should probably mention I was shooting an HK and Sig 9mm.
 

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If I could do that to a target, offhand, consistently myself, I would be very pleased :thumbup:

But, there is ALWAYS room for improvement, so you should make plans to practice as often as possible... ;)
 
I have worked myself up to the point of being a smidgen better than that after about three years of frequent shooting. You may have an aptitude for pistol shooting. Keep working on it. Find the pistol you really like, the action type/trigger that works for you, the most comfortable grip, the sights you can really see well and aim well with. You should be able to tighten those targets up quite a bit with the right gun for you. Good work.

BTW while there are no hard and fast rules, the standard distances are usually taken to be 3, 7, and 15 yd. 5 and 10 yd are also common distances for handgun practice. If you adhere to the common distances, it will be easier to compare your performance to others’.
 
For a beginner at 11 yards those are better than average groups. Some people are naturals and the trigger control, sight alignment, not flinching come easier than to some. I would watch some fundamentals videos on youtube(grip, stance, trigger control, sight alignment) to further your abilities, but that is pretty good for your second time. It prob took me 10 range trips and some online reading to shoot groups like that at 10-15 yards when i first started shooting
 
Perfect practice makes perfect. Spend some time and maybe some $ with a good instructor, you will learn the finer points and continue to improve.
 
Glad you enjoy shooting. Looks like you are off to a good start. No point comparing your groups to anyone else unless of course it is competition related. Using your current abilities as a baseline, get some instruction and view some training videos. You can only improve with practice. Dry firing will help alot with trigger control and sight alignment. Happy shooting and welcome aboard.
 
If you aren't sandbagging, you definitely are a natural. I used to teach Shooting Sports for 4-H, so I saw a few naturals. Most have to work hard to get to where you're at. Find some good instruction and you can improve on your already considerable abilities.
 
Hey, I recognize that range! The ATL locations of Quickshot are nice little ranges with friendly staff, but the clientele there definitely includes a lot of people who are "casual" shooters, including a lot of foreign tourists, bachelorette parties, etc.

Those look like the groups of someone who is not struggling with a flinch/blink and who has adequate hand strength to operate the trigger without having to flex their entire hand. Most people struggle at some point during their shooting with a flinch/blink, and a smaller number struggle with being physically able to pull a trigger without dramatically disturbing the gun. Many people spend years trying to overcome those particular problems, and some folks never get there, just as some people who try to play golf never overcome a wicked slice or a terrible tendency to hit the ground first on every single shot. You don't seem to have those problems. Which is awesome!

Since you're going to get to skip the long, painful stage of development where you wrestle with those things, you can move directly into the more fun stuff. What does that mean? Well, it depends on what seems like fun to you. Maybe it's trying to hold those groups while shooting faster. Down that path lies defensive pistol craft and the practical/speed-based gun games, like USPSA/IPSC. Or maybe it's getting those groups ever tighter, doing it from longer distance, and doing it with one hand. That leads down the path to bullseye and other precision-focused disciplines. Or maybe it's learning to print groups like that with more and more challenging guns, like DA revolvers or big-bore magnums.

Lots of fun places to go from where you are!
 
That would be a pretty good target for someone with moderate experience. Most people I see at the range get about half their shots on a pie plate at 11 yards.

My girlfriend shoots about once per year and can get groups like that without much practice, however that's not the norm.

For new shooters there's a lot to learn - trigger control, sight alignment, a repeatable proper hold, the basics of operating the gun, etc.
 
I have a friend that was never a gun guy. We had a work related hunting trip I asked if he wanted to borrow a gun. He bought a xd40 and his dad gave him a Remington semi auto 30-06. He shows up the the shooting range to practice. The guys never fired a pistol or rifle. But has shot pheasants with a shotgun.

We kinda chuckled when he shows up the the shooting range and proceeds to struggle to load the 7400 or whatever it was. He fires 4 shots offhand at a target at 100 yards and does a 3” group. No one was laughing anymore! On his second mag through the XD he is smacking my 12” gong at 100 yards. Every shot.
On our hunting trip he shoot 4 pigs at 100 yards off hand standing. Puts down his rifle and fires 16 40s at a few more pigs. Of course they don’t fall and keep running another guy shoots one of them down the dry creek they were in and when we cut them up that one had tons of quarter size bruises when skinned and a couple rounds right under the skin.

So yea people are naturals.
 
It depends where in your life shooting is. After 60 years of shooting, I can hit the 8-10 ring every time, within 3 inches up or down, shooting at about 1 round per second. That's at 25 -50 feet. I don't really shoot further unless I have a new gun that is shooting very well and I just want to see what it will do. The whole thing is a process for me to see how fast I can get to my gun and shoot the center as many times as I can.
At 20-45 years old I shot much more and competed against anyone who wanted to compete. I belonged to a Club and shot at least once a week, Now maybe once a month. Now it's a matter of priority's,I buy more guns, but shoot less. Once something becomes harder to do exceptionally well, you tend to do if less. I do dry fire and practice my grip and hand strength, doing various exercises at home when the house is empty. Also a grip exerciser and some free weights don't hurt to keep the strength in your hands. I still go to the gym 3 times per week, even though it's more cardio now than weight lifting.
Also the accessibility to a range is paramount.
 
Hello everyone. A little history: I grew up in the south and when I was age 12-14 I went hunting with my father. I never shot a deer and was more interested in driving his truck (on the back roads) than actually hunting. I had some experience with a shotgun. Back then I shot my first pistol a handful of times.

Fast forward to now.. I'm a 35yr old male and have been to the gun range twice during the past year and only shot a pistol once before that since I was a kid. During this last trip to the range I put a target 11 yards out and shot the target pictured below. The left target, center head and right target were three different turns. Unknowingly when I was shooting a lot of people at the range were stopping to look at me (my girlfriend informed me of this afterwards). I also had another guy introduce himself and asked if I came to the range often. He asked what my trick was.

My primary reason for posting this is that I want to find out if I'm truly naturally good or was everyone around me just beginners and I'm status quo. I enjoy going and will continue to do so but just want a realistic observation of my performance. I do not want this to come off as passive bragging or anything related. I truly don't know much about this hobby besides the fact that I enjoy it. I promise you won't hurt my feelings if you tell me I suck. I just want feedback from people who are experts and love this hobby like im sure most of you do.

I should probably mention I was shooting an HK and Sig 9mm.

If you can do it everyday at anytime at 3 to 15 yards with similar results, then I’d say your marksmanship is good. If not then I’d say it’s a good day.
 
My primary reason for posting this is that I want to find out if I'm truly naturally good or was everyone around me just beginners and I'm status quo. I enjoy going and will continue to do so but just want a realistic observation of my performance. I do not want this to come off as passive bragging or anything related. I truly don't know much about this hobby besides the fact that I enjoy it. I promise you won't hurt my feelings if you tell me I suck. I just want feedback from people who are experts and love this hobby like im sure most of you do.
Sort of like the fish to water thing applies. My wife is a naturally good shooter and if she actually liked shooting more and applied herself there is no doubt in my mind she could be shooting competitive matches. However, it is not something she ever wished to pursue. I have to work to maintain a level of proficiency be it pistol or rifle which I enjoy. So for some it comes natural and for some you work harder for it. What is important is if you enjoy shooting?

Some prefer silhouette targets as you posted while others like myself prefer a traditional bulls-eye target as I am not the tactile type. You shoot what you are comfortable with as well as what you are preparing for. Obviously if you enjoy shooting then get out more and shoot.

Ron
 
it's good. when i bring some people to the range, with instruction(10yrds offhand) most of them put almost all in the black with 1 or 2 hitting the bulls in a shoot n cee target the black with red center(8 inches), this included my sister a few years ago, her son neither of which have ever touched a gun before and acouple of weeks ago a father and son . the son who's 13 and never held a gun before. put 90% in the black with my 9mm and the victory 22. started with the 22 of course. the father put all in the black with my 1911. 1st hit was a bulls. these guns are all zeroed property. ( les baer, cz85, victory with red dot) less accurate with double action gp100 wadcutters but their groups are better than the average shooter in the range.
 
When I started last year I had an ex cop letting me use his pistols. After letting me shoot a few mags with no instruction he starts to critique my stance/grip/form as the target is coming back (indoor automatic targets.) He glances at the target for the first time and goes "Oh, uh keep doing what you are doing if it feels comfortable I guess." Some of us are just natural.
With that being said I've gotten complacent in my shooting and have actually gotten worse so don't start going easy on yourself just because you started on a high note.
 
As an instructor I usually find a woman between 15 and 40 with no experience to be the easiest to send home with a good first time target. With many people bad habits don't show up until their third or fourth visit to the range. That is when the real instruction begins.
 
Looks good to me :thumbup: One day everyone was complimenting me on great groups ,next trip to range with same pistol 5906 and ammo shot terrible
 
Thank you all for your replys and advice. The amount of responses shows how great of a community this board has.

I'm going to focus on getting more time in at the range with various brands of guns to get a better feel for what I like. I'm also going to watch some YouTube videos as recommended to learn the proper way so that I don't build bad habits. In time I will most likely get an instructor as well.

I saw quite a few people mention getting over the flinching. The thing I have found that works for me has been to exhale slowly and squeeze the trigger so that the shot is somewhat of a surprise. However, it takes a few clips to get that right. On the target that is on the far right side (on the image in post 1) I struggled a little with it and you can tell by the larger spread.
 
Chances are if you have good eye hand coordination, like being able to play Call of duty, or some other video game, with a 16 year old, online and do well, you may be a good shooter in real life. My wife is very good at first person shooters, "a grandmother" so the first time I handed her my 1911, he shot 9's and 10's from 25 feet. It surprised me how well it translated, and the same with my one time son in law, never held a gun before, and shot like he had been doing it all his life. Funny thing is neither of them had any interest in shooting guns. On the other hand 2 guys I grew up with, who had shot plenty of times, hunted, really sucked even at 10 feet out, one was just a flincher who was severely recoil sensitive and flinched before every shot, both thought the were good shooters, neither would take any instruction. I think you either are or are not good at a given thing, if you are not, with training you can get to the point where you can get by, but some folks are clumsy, uncoordinated and nervous by nature, and no amount of training will make them into a great shot, like anything else.
Usually these are the guys who blame the gun for everything, and get a new one every month, thinking it's the guns fault.
 
. On the other hand 2 guys I grew up with, who had shot plenty of times, hunted, really sucked even at 10 feet out, one was just a flincher who was severely recoil sensitive and flinched before every shot, both thought the were good shooters, neither would take any instruction. I think you either are or are not good at a given thing, if you are not, with training you can get to the point where you can get by, but some folks are clumsy, uncoordinated and nervous by nature, and no amount of training will make them into a great shot, like anything else.

I completely disagree that someone who is a "flincher... by nature" can only get to a point of being able to "get by." That is an overcomeable obstacle, though many instructors (especially those who never had any flinch inclinations) are not able to deal with it effectively.
 
I find flinching best overcome by just shooting the gun downrange at nothing in particular. No aiming. No trying to hit anything. Just keep your eye open and shoot. Bye and bye it will be no big deal.
 
Yep. The key insight to fixing flinching is that flinching starts with the eyes. If someone can keep their eyes open during the shot, they can see the sights dip, and can self-correct very quickly. There are a variety of ways to get people who are having a hard time keeping their eyes open to actually do so, but taking away the target is one of the more reliable ones.

Of course, talking about flinches and how to cure them is a topic worthy of many, many threads (and there have been such threads in the past). Since the OP here appears to be blessed with not having a serious flinching problem, I don't want to derail this thread. I merely wanted to respond to the claim that people are either gifted or not, and natural flinchers are inherently limited in their potential. That's not true.
 
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Flinching is just one aspect I mentioned, Un coordinated nervous, people with poor eye hand coordination are others, not everyone can do everything well. You can teach people to shoot, but if they don't have some natural ability, they are going to be limited. Also until they engrain the proper techniques and practice them for years, and the achieve that place where they can pick up any gun and shoot it well.
 
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