Practice with off hand

:grin: @MikeBKY Yes. Yes we do. :smiling_face_with_three_hearts:
I think @Dawn has the tech team working on it.

2 Likes

Yes, not having a crystal clear view of ones front sight on top of a disabled dominant hand is a terrifying thought. Thanks to Big Dot sights and practice I feel Iā€™ll do well if I had to use my non dominant hand.

1 Like

Ohya, that! And: racking the slide one hand and top of pocket in blue jeans or off the belt otherwise! (Sheesh there are days I feel like Iā€™m gonna sit on the cold concrete floor and try to get my feet to do all the work! Thank gods Iā€™m too old fat for that! Iā€™ll just use that door over there, or! the counterā€™s edge!!)

2 Likes

Now that Iā€™m a member of an outdoor range, I can start working on that more often. (I can work on this at home on the farm, but I keep forgetting to do it there - need to make a list!)

I do failure drills left handed now, but I could do more. And reloading. And ā€¦ andā€¦ andā€¦ :thinking::face_with_monocle::woman_facepalming:

2 Likes

This thread is perfectly timed with the training I took this last weekend! In our Defensive Shooting Fundamentals, we do a lot of unsighted fire and intuitive sighted fire, because that is how our body will react in a self-defense incident given the balance of speed and precision needed. (I could go on and on about that balanceā€¦ but Iā€™ll save that for another post).

We did some - very little - one-handed, non-dominant hand shooting. Why did we do very little? Because while it is possible that we will have to defend ourselves one-handed with our non-dominant hand, it is not probable. We want to train more for the more probable situations and less for the less probable situations.

The other thing we talked about was defensive accuracy vs marksmanship accuracy.

Hereā€™s one of my targets from this weekend:

Doesnā€™t look very impressive, does it? Would your impression change if I said each of those groupings was a complete mag dump as fast as I could shoot? Out of all of the shots, only 5 were considered misses. Every other shot was in high center chest - and that was the goal of the drill.

Do I need to work on my shooting - heck yea! But this shows me that I can stop a threat when I use everything Iā€™ve learned. And it also shows me where I need to train more, given my available resources.

6 Likes

Agreed. Nomenclature is important.

1 Like

Well done.

2 Likes

Nice and very well presented.

1 Like

My practice routine is 50 rounds with each hand unsupported (100 rounds) and 50 rounds each with each hand in a two-hand grip (100 rounds). I became fully ambidextrous several years ago when I had surgery on my hands and needed the skill in order to keep carrying.

1 Like

Iā€™m cross dominant so I always sight with my right eye even though Iā€™m left handed. This is because I cannot close my right eye by itself very easily and when I started hunting with rifles I had to shoot right handed. But when it comes to pistols I cannot hold the gun as steady with my right hand, though I do practice shooting right handed regularly, my groups are never as tight as when shooting left handed.

2 Likes

This has to do with cover. Shooting with the non-dominate hand should be as easy as with the dominate hand. I realize itā€™s a natural part of me from years of training in the military. It takes practice but you should be as efficient firing with either hand. Your life will depend on it. There is cover you can use that forces you to shoot with the non-dominate hand and you should be an expert at it. As I got older my vision started to disappear and targets I could not identify any longer and signs on the road I could not read them until I was right up on them. So today, I am in glasses and have no problem with vision. But that cover you will hide behind will save you while you engage your target. Itā€™s instinctive, so train your dominate hand 3/4 of the time and the other 1/4 train non-dominate until you are very efficient with both hands. Itā€™s your life.

2 Likes

You can easily train your left eye by either putting a patch over the right eye or a patch with a small hole in it over the left that forces you to focus with the left.

2 Likes

@WildRose Iā€™m going to say you can train the other eye, but ā€œeasilyā€ā€¦ yeah, not necessarily.

So far, Iā€™ve been unable to train my weak eye to actually see betterā€¦ even if itā€™s the only one open. Just sayinā€™ :wink:

1 Like

It takes time but the methodology required is easy.

3 Likes

Thatā€™s not the issue. I donā€™t have enough muscular control to easily close my right eye by itself. I donā€™t have any issues sighting with my left eye once my right is blocked, it just requires a lot of effort to close my right.

2 Likes

I get that. It becomes much easier if you practice with those methods, just takes time to train the eyes.

2 Likes

Iā€™ve tried over the years. Never gotten any easier.

2 Likes

Always shoot with both eyes open. Itā€™s not just the site picture but you may pick up bad guy number 2 or 3 in your periphery. If youā€™re done to one eye focused on one guy, youā€™re not being effective.

I practice putting down 3 at once. In each round I put 2 to center of mass on all 3 then return to each for one more shot to center of mass. Thatā€™s 12 of my 15 shots. The rest are for threats still coming, or just get dropped out when I change mags.

2 Likes

Thatā€™s fine unless you are trying a precision shot.

3 Likes

Exactly this. I close my left eye for precision shots the same as shooting a rifle or shotgun.

3 Likes