Shooting tip: Accurate or Fast...or Both?

Source: The Blue Press magazine, Dillon Precision Products, Inc., March 2012

By Duane Thomas

[I don't have a link]

"What separates the very best 'combat' handgun shooters from their less-skilled counterparts is the ability to fire with a great combination of speed with accuracy. This is not something most people can do --- they have to choose one or the other. There are two basic approaches to becoming a person who doesn't have to make that choice, who can do both at the same time, and these two groups of people approach the problem with two different mindsets. Group A is terrified of missing, so their attitude is, 'I will learn to shoot accurately first. Then I'll worry about becoming faster once I'm accurate.'

This is by FAR the most common approach. Then we have Group B, a much smaller group, which says, 'I want to shoot fast. I'll put some effort into becoming accurate later... as long as I don't have to slow down to do it.'

I started out a Group A shooter, and tried that approach for, oh, 20-plus years. I could shoot accurately slow fire but when I turned up the speed the accuracy went out the window. At this point, if you are an accuracy-oriented shooter, the overwhelming compulsion is --- and I'm sure you've all heard this advice before --- to 'slow down and get the hits.' The problem with that approach is that it builds an either/or mentality toward speed and accuracy.

And thats unacceptable. Eventually I did figure out my problem: I was spending most of my time shooting accurately but [in the overall scheme of things] slowly. I wasn't pushing the speed as much as I could. How are you ever going to get really good at something you never, or very rarely practice? Even when I was firing fast, there was always that control freak part of my mind that just couldn't let go, couldn't just let it happen.

Finally I made the mental leap to 'Hey, let's just see what happens if I put the gun out there and shoot as fast as possible. Don't worry about the speed; the speed will be whatever I can achieve when I'm shooting 'balls to the wall.' Just sit back, watch the sights, and take care of everything else EXCEPT shooting fast. That part can happen on its own.' When I did that, I found that not only did my speed improve immensely, so did my accuracy. I found that I really do have all the time in the world to track the sights, to fire accurately, to transition the gun between targets between shots, even when firing it as fast as I can. Because THE TIME INTERVAL IT TAKES TO DO EVERYTHING ELSE IS LESS THAN THE TIME IT TAKES TO PULL THE TRIGGER AGAIN.

You literally feel like your waiting on the gun between shots. That to me is how I know I'm shooting really well: the sense that I am always waiting on the gun."


Part 1 of 2

reply to post by Erno86


All I know is, on MW3 if I shoot really fast I hit everything but the target and I die. If I aim exactly on them and do it in pulses, then usually I kill them before they kill me because they are also spraying bullets everywhere.

Personally I think shooting fast is the illusion of being better

But if you try and shoot accurately like you said and work your way up on speed. Then I believe that is the foundation of learning how to be better at the entire process itself

When I started "combat" shooting (IDPA/3-gun) I shot slow as hell. Didn't want to look like an idiot spraying bullets everywhere yet hitting nothing.

That first season I scored well. Really well. So well in fact I started playing games with myself like running scenarios head-shots only or point shooting rather than aiming. Not because I had to per the stage but because I was getting cocky.

The next season I shot fast. Too fast. I was in the bottom 5 every match. I sucked hard.

The ear after I went slow again but having lost so much confidence from my fast shooting debacle I couldn't rise to the level of my beginner year.

Now I shoot slow and with intent. Focusing much less on the scoring of it all and a lot more on the practical side of it all. Everything is better now.


Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

What's the point of being fast, if you're not accurate? That's my question.

Practice accuracy and your speed will increase naturally. That's how it worked for me at least.

very few places will you speed shoot, draw aim fire empty clip or cyl [slam] new one in, aim fire, how many hit the target say 15/18 or 30 shots on paper @ 35- 40 yards ? as fast as you can fire. ok if your in comp and it is not you vs them aim for the "one and one" take your time shot placement is all it is no need for Swiss cheese.

Originally posted by Pelvi
reply to post by Erno86

 

All I know is, on MW3 if I shoot really fast I hit everything but the target and I die. If I aim exactly on them and do it in pulses, then usually I kill them before they kill me because they are also spraying bullets everywhere.

As an ex-tournament player in COD and an AR-15 shooter IRL...
It's fair for me to say that game shooting is THAT much more different that shooting a real firearm.

Without proper form & trigger control, you'll miss your target 5 feet away if your not properly disciplined. No matter how much time you take 'aiming'.

Part 2

"The either/or attitude toward speed OR accuracy, for most people, is a very real choice they have to make. However in a perfect world we would like to have both --- and one of the first and most important steps toward achieving that is to dump the either/or attitude. To fire with the maximum rate of speed with accuracy, we need to be operating at a speed beyond which our conscious minds cannot keep up.

The conscious mind can only do one thing at a time, and it operates in a very linear, A-to-B-to-C-to-D fashion. There's no way it can execute the physical skills needed, and monitor all the visual and tactile imputs necessary, to fire a handgun with speed and accuracy. It simply doesn't work that fast, or multi-task well enough.

This is the basic problem with shooting slowly and accurately, then thinking that's going to transition over to shooting fast and accurately.

The subconscious mind, by contrast, can multi-task, it can do many different things at once. The subconscious mind needs to become accustomed to operating at the necessary speed, the conscious mind needs to understand it can indeed get out of the way and things will not fall apart, in fact they will work out much better. This trust between the conscious and the subconscious minds, the conscious understanding that the subconscious mind is capable of shooting accurately even when the gun is firing faster than the conscious mind can control the shooting, is not going to occur unless the conscious mind KNOWS through successful repetition after succesful repetition, that it works, at that speed.

Shoot accurately slowly, then try to transition that over to firing much faster and not only is the subconscious mind not able to function at that speed because it's never built the capability through repetition, but shooting fast always seems something 'other,' something very different than what we do normally, and therefore frightening. This is the very antithesis of the relaxed trust that leads to good performance at speed.


Group A shooters tend to get stuck in 'when I'm slow I'm accurate, when I shoot fast it all falls apart' mode. Group B shooters, by contrast, who start out fast [than, granted they do indeed work to bring their accuracy up to the level of their speed,] tend to progressinto 'accuracy with speed' mode much more easily ---because they're used to operating at that speed. If I could go back in a time machine, I would become a Group B shooter right off the bat. I wouldn't have wasted years years of my shooting career beating my head against the 'I'll become accurate than fast' wall, and would be much further along The Path."


I have a favorable opinion of the author's topic, but the beginning shooter should learn the basic fundamentals of rifle and pistol shooting before they progress to shooting at speed. I have a lot of fun at the gun range when I let my subconscious take over the trigger work; meanwhile, all I have too do is hold the gun and aim the sights.

Originally posted by bekod
very few places will you speed shoot, draw aim fire empty clip or cyl [slam] new one in, aim fire, how many hit the target say 15/18 or 30 shots on paper @ 35- 40 yards ? as fast as you can fire. ok if your in comp and it is not you vs them aim for the "one and one" take your time shot placement is all it is no need for Swiss cheese.

edit on 11-2-2012 by bekod because: editting

What is more efficient?.... putting 6 shots into a bad guy that deserves it, into one hole [for example: the heart area,] is effective, but putting 6 six shots into into 6 different body organs like the heart, lung, liver, spleen and spine areas, in about 1.5 seconds is much more efficient.

Originally posted by thisguyrighthere
When I started "combat" shooting (IDPA/3-gun) I shot slow as hell. Didn't want to look like an idiot spraying bullets everywhere yet hitting nothing.

That first season I scored well. Really well. So well in fact I started playing games with myself like running scenarios head-shots only or point shooting rather than aiming. Not because I had to per the stage but because I was getting cocky.

The next season I shot fast. Too fast. I was in the bottom 5 every match. I sucked hard.

The ear after I went slow again but having lost so much confidence from my fast shooting debacle I couldn't rise to the level of my beginner year.

Now I shoot slow and with intent. Focusing much less on the scoring of it all and a lot more on the practical side of it all. Everything is better now.

 

Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

 

May I suggest.... that when you practice, you push yourself beyond your "normal" speed limit, so when match time comes around you will seem to sense that you are shooting slow, but the people around you will sense that you are shooting very fast.

Originally posted by Erno86

What is more efficient?.... putting 6 shots into a bad guy that deserves it, into one hole [for example: the heart area,] is effective, but putting 6 six shots into into 6 different body organs like the heart, lung, liver, spleen and spine areas, in about 1.5 seconds is much more efficient.

If you get a shot through the heart, you really don't need to waste those other 5 bullets. One bullet efficiency is much better than overkill. If you just need to "make sure", two in the chest and one in the head is the general rule.

Originally posted by FugitiveSoul

Originally posted by Erno86

What is more efficient?.... putting 6 shots into a bad guy that deserves it, into one hole [for example: the heart area,] is effective, but putting 6 six shots into into 6 different body organs like the heart, lung, liver, spleen and spine areas, in about 1.5 seconds is much more efficient.

If you get a shot through the heart, you really don't need to waste those other 5 bullets. One bullet efficiency is much better than overkill. If you just need to "make sure", two in the chest and one in the head is the general rule.

I've heart shot deer, with bullets and arrows, and some of them will perform there "death-run," as in running top speed for at least 100 yards before they collapse. Some only go 30 or 40 yards before they lay down and die. Since I might know that I had good shot placement on the deer, I will typically not want to continue shooting for I would waste precious meat. For a bad guy that deserves it, I would aim and shoot for the main torso area until he goes down, [unless there are other bad guy's waiting in the wings.] Taking a head shot is risky business, though I still practice my two to the chest and one to head strings at the pistol range. Some indoor pistol ranges will not allow you to make head shots on human silhouette targets.

reply to post by Erno86


I wasn't aware of range rules. I've always practiced in my or someone else's yard. My favoritie layout is a 1x2 ft plywood torso with the "sweet spots" marked, and an old coffee tin for the head.

Dumb, I know, but it works for me. Two in the chest for a deer doesn't equal two in the chest for a human, but that's what that final headshot is for. WIth today's body armor, it's a tricky game, either way.

reply to post by FugitiveSoul


Your target shooting sounds like fun, though I've seemed to have forgotten about body armor.

Thanks for the heads-up.

Cheers,

Erno86

For the purpose of using my CCW weapon (Kahr CW9) I am happy keeping all of my shots within an 8 inch paper plate at 10 to 15 yards. Fast and accurate enough to kill. If I was competing, I would be using an entirely different pistol and would have to find a better balance of speed and accuracy.

Of course, add a massive dose of adrenaline a heavy breathing and the whole game changes. Maybe I need to get into IDPA. I've been wanting to do it for years.

reply to post by jibeho
not bad but move back some a man with a knife could kill you at that range, by the time you draw aim and fire your throat could be cut. remember 25 yard rule "in side that defend with no thought, out side of it take aim" 10 to 15 yards 2 leaps and one bounding jump your dead, your gun is still in its holster.

reply to post by Erno86


In case you watched too many western movies, at the 'Actual' Gunfight at the OK Corral, the two opposing sides were standing between 10 to 15 feet away from each other when the shooting began in a small alleyway between the corral and an adjacent building.

Those who were shot could not say for sure who shot whom.

What you need is to be able to move with gonads the size of steel ball bearing bowling balls.

The rest is prologue.

Originally posted by bekod
reply to post by jibeho

 

not bad but move back some a man with a knife could kill you at that range, by the time you draw aim and fire your throat could be cut. remember 25 yard rule "in side that defend with no thought, out side of it take aim" 10 to 15 yards 2 leaps and one bounding jump your dead, your gun is still in its holster.

edit on 11-2-2012 by bekod because: editting

25 yards is a luxury in most mugging scenarios when I would be forced to draw. I'm concerned with those who pop out of blind corners, from behind parked cars or those who pop open the doors of their "Silence of Lambs Vans" ha ha ha. I don't like vans. Especially those crazy rusted out unmarked vans without windows. Kind of like my fear of clowns.

Many threats may not present themselves until they are right on top of you.

INteresting video


not something I can necessarily practice at my local indoor range. However, I can practice in my basement with a cheapo airsoft pistol.

reply to post by jibeho


You can practice with blank rounds with was loads.

The noise level awakening your neighbors depends upon the caliber you use. The caliber you use also determines how large a welt you can leave on your leg. But you won't penetrate walls.

I have four acres on my survival property. I use .22 calbier subsonics. The neighbors can't hear a thing. The primer only rounds are about as loud as a pellet pistol. The 900 fps rounds are about half as loud as a standard .22 (animal control uses those rounds, they can draw considerable blood from a leg wound). IT's much more realistic than the pellet pistol.

Depending on your the extent of your urban/suburban environ, you can use the primer only rounds in your back yard, usually no problem. Provided you have a fence and no nosy neighbors.

Of course, here on my acreage I can turn on the boom box and quick draw with my Glock with live rounds and nobody knows the difference.

It's not that most of my neighbors aren't often practicing too. It's just that the Sheriff doesn't like to answer calls of gunshots from a passerby or some other. We're all part of the 'Neighborhood Crime Watch' program. The deputies are often our neighbors. They just have better things to do than coming around telling us to keep the noise level down.

We have a private gun range down the road. One time when then President Bush came to town, we had a Secret Service helicopter land on our gun range to ask us not to shoot while the Prez was in town.

Same happened when Sarah Palin and John McCain came to town.

Democrats never come here to campaign. Lots of photographs of visiting Republican Presidents on the town library wall. Not one of a Democrat. And this is going back to the eighteen hundreds.

Does anybody here play PC wargames? I don't mean arcade shoot-'em-ups, but real adult stuff like the Armed Assault 2 series?
I've never fired a gun in my life, but in AA2 i've fired dozens of pistols, rifles and machineguns, their ballistics are beautifully modelled.