Speaking strictly of combat shooting here, not target shooting. Are you supposed to wrap the index finger of your supporting hand around the front of the trigger guard or wrap all of the supporting fingers around your shooting hand?

I borrowed this picture that Mackay posted since it shows what I'm talking about.



The front of the trigger guard is flat but the shooter has all of his fingers under the guard. The Beretta website has this blurb in describing the features of the 92A1 version: "Rounded trigger guard: Updated styling to conform with current pistol gripping practices".

If the pic above is "current gripping practices" when did wrapping that finger around the front of the trigger guard become old fashioned and more importantly, why?

A LOOONG time ago. Shooters figured out that the more contact you have with that pistol the faster your recovery/recoil management will be. See that gap between the shooter's support-hand index finger. It needs to close. That index finger should be jambed up against the trigger guard, you can use that finger to "steer" the sights. Look at his firing hand, it could probably grip the gun a half inch higher. You want BOTH hands just as high on the gun as possible

What he said.

Okay, good enough.

Do you use a push-pull technique with shooting-supporting hand respectively or just squeeze with the hands while extending the arms?

For over 35 years I've wrapped my supporting hand completely around the shooting hand and held both as high on the handgun as possible as mentioned, it just seemed natural to do so, but I've shot SA and DA revolvers way more than autos so was wondering if the technique was any different. My arms were extended with neutral pressure but lately I've tried the push pull to try to reduce muzzle flip.

A good starting point would be some of the better known classes as a LOT has changed in the last 35 years. They will allow you to get a good start on proper new techniques to see if they work for you.

I don't push-pull. I lock out both arms and push-pull seems to twist rather than stabilize.

Both eyes open, high on the grip, both thumbs forward, elbows locked out, shoulders and back rolled forward, knees bent, slight lean forward, standing square to the target, follow through, deep breath and a scan after each string.

Whatever works.

They key either way is controlling recoil. A common misconception is that recoil control is controlling the rearward and upward torque of the pistol, but that's a minor portion of it. The ideal is controlling where the sights fall back on the target after the shot. Grip pressure, thumb and hand placement, shoulders, feet, and all the rest should be used to make the sights drop right back where they started out. A top shooter isn't fast because he can quickly realign the sights after the shot - he's fast because he doesn't have to.

As for me, my index finger wrapped around the trigger guard tends to push the pistol to the strong-side during recoil so I don't do it.

That's an interesting comment because I tried a magazineful one handed with the classic bullseye stance, even putting my right hand (I'm left handed) in my back pocket. I was shooting my Springfield XDm .45. At the shot the pistol would recoil up and right, the sights described an arc with my shoulder as the pivot point. My arm and hand would settle back down back along that same arc and the sights settled back almost perfectly aligned, it only took a minor correction to re-acquire the proper sight picture on the target.

Apparently I'm already doing things right and holding the way folks above have described (mostly). I don't follow the shooting games or read many handgun articles anymore so was just curious what the latest thoughts were on the matter.

Posted this in the thread bemoaning marksmanship skills but I figure this ain't too shabby. This is from yesterday morning with the XDm .45, 50 rounds in 5 round bursts. It's an NRA 25 yard slow fire target and I managed to keep most all shots in the 8 ring. Not sure of the dimensions of a rapid fire target but I'm guessing they would be in the 9 ring on that.

I have big hands and always put my index finger of the support hand on the trigger gaurd. I can hold the gun tighter and recover shot to shot faster with it there. I also think I have alot better chance of keeping my gun should someone get lucky enough to get ahold of it.

I have had some instructors b$tch and moan about it and say it leads to "pushing" the gun to one side but for me it does not.

Dink

I am a little old school but what has worked for me over the years continues to still work today.

I shoot a pretty standard Weaver stance & shooting position.

My weak hand index finger is over the front of the trigger guard but really not exerting any real force, it's just lightly placed there mostly for comfort....my weak hand middle & ring finger pull slightly against the forward push of my strong hand but the key is that it is all natural & not exaggerated in either direction; easier to do that than to explain it, it's just a "feel".

My thumbs are pointing forward in parallel.

I believe, as JOG says, too much weak hand index finger pressure on the trigger guard will induce pulled/pushed shots.

I have tried & practiced the isosceles position & I prefer the more or less standard Weaver stance...........for me the results are in the shooting.

I also believe there are 3 types of shooters:

1. Natural shooters who need a minimum of instruction, pick it up fast & for which shooting is more or less automatic & requires no real thought process.........gun comes up, target acquired, squeeze the shot

2. People that are not nearly as natural as above but through instruction, practice & diligence can become pretty good shooters, more than adequate for self defense

3. People that have no feel for guns or shooting & no matter the amount of instruction or practice never rise to the level of being really capable shooters; they never learn to squeeeze

This doesn't just apply to handguns, but to long guns as well............JMHO, JME.

MM

That describes about how I hold mine, mostly I just started doing what felt natural. It seemed to work, at 19 I qualified witha perfect 30 out of 30 with the 1911 at Ft. Jackson.

I'll get flack for this but I took a handgun familiarization course from the Ft. Lauderdale Police Dept. back in the early 80's. Didn't need familiarization but wanted to see what it was about. As part of the course we shot 50 rounds at 25 yards, had to be all double action if you had a revolver (Colt Mark III .357 in my case). I wasn't used to extensive DA shooting at that time so after about 20 rounds my trigger finger got tired, so I put both left and right index fingers on the trigger. Put all 50 rounds in the middle of the bullseye and started using two fingers on the trigger since then. I found it gave me a very balanced grip even when firing really fast. It doesn't help any with a nice SA pull like a 1911 but with a DA revolver or DA only auto you can fire really, really fast and really straight that way.

I know, I know, tactically this is a real no-no for all kinds of reasons so I've weaned myself off of it but still use that grip for bench testing loads. I tried it a bit with the XDm .45 and then again this morning with the XDm 9mm and it gives a really straight back, very fast pull with those striker fired triggers without pulling or pushing the sights off at all.

If you're interested only in the opinions of experienced combat shooters, then you might want to phrase it along the lines of "So, for you folks who have won gunfights because of the way you grip your gun..."

Call it practical or defensive shooting if you prefer, but the universal truth is that a crappy shooter doesn't get better under pressure at the range or in real life.

.....I guess that it has been a LOOONG time ago, but seems like yesterday. For those of us that were shooting it from the beginning, the finger on the trigger guard was the de rigueur technique unless you had unusually small hands. Ray Chapman was the primary instructor of the technique as Cooper advocated the "all fingers around the front strap" method. Ray said that putting the index finger on the front of the trigger guard insured that the handgun was as low in your hands as it could be, and the lower the better. Alot, if not most of the early great shooters shot with their hands on the trigger guard:
Ken Hackathorn:



Rick Miller:



Ross Seyfried:



Mickey Fowler:



and "new shooters" like Bill Rogers:



and Chip McCormick:



Then in between 1981 and 1982 Rob Leatham went from a modified Weaver with the finger on the trigger guard:

[img]http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a317/gmoats/Oldshootingpics026.jpg[/img]

to an Isosceles with the finger off the trigger guard:

[img]http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a317/gmoats/Oldshootingpics173.jpg[/img]

.....and he's been kickin butt ever since.

Your question about "when" the change took place pretty much goes to Leatham and Enos in 1982. Alot of shooters switched from Weaver to Isosceles and the thumbs forward position at that point. It also helped that the next year, the mass exodus from the .45 to the compensated .38 Supers really made recoil recovery much less of an issue.

If your question about "combat" shooting was specifically about actually shooting people---there's only one person in modern history with more recorded kills than Jim Cirillo---and I'm told that he's an LA police officer whose name is kept confidential (could be urban legend for all I know, but Cirillo has BTDT). While he may have been primarily a revolver shooter, here he's shooting da/sa auto---not a particularly good grip.

[img]http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a317/gmoats/OldPics290.jpg[/img]


If you took the old "masters" in their prime-- Chapman, Seyfried, Fowler and especially Raul Walters, and put them up against today's hotshots---today's hotshots would win--UNLESS you made them use 5" Government models with hardball equivalent ammo---then, I'm not so sure. JMO, YMMV.

The real reason those guys shot so well is because of their hats and glasses.



Travis

Aviators ruled even back then----were you born yet???

No.


Travis

I was born in 1977.

Those pics are from what...the late 1800's?


Travis

Winning gunfights can be attributed to a lot of things, mostly timing, mindset and tactics. If you're waiting to hear from someone who attributes victory to a grip you're in for a long wait.

But if you want to know how people are training for combat, and how trainers are training them...a weaver stance with your finger wrapped around the front of the trigger guard ain't it.

Training for "combat" is one thing; "combat shooting" like IDPA, bowling pins, steel plates, the old IPSC is quite another & is likely what the OP was/is referring to.

MM

Come ooooown, Man !!!

MM

One analogy occurs to me, that in golf, the grip is highly important - if not correct you are pretty much guaranteed to suck at golf. But there are different grips - for example most people use a Vardon grip - invented by a famous golfer from 100 years ago. Jack Nicklaus, however, used a so-called interlocking grip due to small hands, and he still holds many records.

I've got pretty short stubby fingers, so the conventional "correct" grip style just doesn't work for me. More practice - now that works better than anything else...

gmoats,
Those are some great pictures. As a kid I grew up reading about all those guys in the gun/shooting magazines way back in the day. They had a definite influence on me and spurred my initial love for the .45 ACP cartridge and 1911 handgun. When I got older a duty assignment saw me taking some handgun and tactical firearms classes at the Green Valley Range which is the old Chapman Academy. I was like a kid again shooting through those ranges and courses. Thanks for posting those pictures.

Good clip, JDS.

MM

Interesting. Jarret was teaching Cooper's surprise break to his student, as that is where we all must begin. He left that behind for the flip and press a LOOONG time ago.

Jarret hardly ever loses by being the slowest. If he does loose it'll be because he missed. He's always running on the ragged edge of what is doable for a human with a handgun.

I never really took into account my grip on the gun.

He is from the United States Army Marksmanship Unit.




Now I want to try the finger on the guard grip now.

If that's you in the bottom pic, personally I'd leave your grip alone and change your stance. That one limits ones ability to transition to the strong side. It also increases exposure to weak points in armor.

I sit firmly on the fence on this grip thing because no 2 people are made the same and even the same person at different times will use something different due to age and injury. All the guys above were at the top of the heap along with many others. As far as gunfighters are concerned, look at Jelly Bryce....check out the grip on his N frame S&W......very unconventional, but it allowed him a high grip on the grip frame.

Look closely at Jim Cirrillos grip....pick up a copy of modern day gunfighter dvd...it looks to me like he had pretty stubby thick fingers and he would start with his finger properly on the trigger and then wrap the rest of his hand around the butt while instructing students...so instead of the handgun sitting firmly in the v between the base of the thumb and index finger....his hand is placed a little more foreward and the thumb wraps around the butt. It didn't appear to slow him down since he had strong hands and was a competitive weight lifter in his yout.

There are principles that you can take away...high grip......shoot a bunch.....probably several more that other can chime in on.

Jelly Bryce pic

Pick up a copy of Jim Cirrillos modern day gunfighter dvd and you will get to see him shoot and tell stories. You will also get to see some of his modified revolvers.....great stuff.

That's an awful lot of muzzle flip for a heavy 9mm and a big guy, my 130# wife has better recoil management than that. Lock them arms out! I know Brian Enos shot that way, but you ain't Benos (and neither am I).

Good stuff Dave, that Bryce was larger than life, the Cirrilo of his day for sure.

I agree with you about revolvers. Jarret defined a 1911 grip perfectly but a revolver may just be a tad different. Miculek doesn't grip his like Jarret describes.

Not me...... yet

I will take into account the tip when I do my training though, thank you, sir.

Makes me wonder what my stance looks like now as well.

It more than helped, maybe the single biggest change..........

If everyone had to shoot non-comp'ed 45ACPs at major power factor load levels, the game would change again.

MM

No it wouldn't, Latham would still be shooting iso and kicking everyone else's a$$.

I will say this though, shooting a uncomped 1911 45acp with a locked out iso stance is HELL on some elbow joints.

Same guys would likely still be winning but the times & scores would definitely change.

MM

Greg, you really stirred the memories with those pictures.

Crap, I feel old!


Pete

There are still plenty of 'single-stack classic' types of matches around. It's pretty tough to compare apples-to-apples with the older shooters vs. the new, but my guess is the emphasis is more on speed than accuracy nowadays.

The other missing element in the equation is that in those days NO ONE was a professional shooter. EVERYONE had a day job and only shot on the weekends and maybe once during the week. Take Max Michel and Ross Seyfried at the same ages using the same equipment and reverse their professions---make Max run a large cattle ranch and let Ross be a full time shooter, and I'm guessing that you'd see more of a parity of Weaver and Iso. Of course, I could be wrong.

1977 US IPSC champion--Kirk Kirkham,a construction worker IIRC
1978--Ross Seyfried, cattle rancher
1979--Mickey Fowler, owned a company that made retail displays
1980--John Shaw, owned commercial real estate, IIRC
1981-- "
1982--Mike Plaxco, metal worker turned gunsmith
1983--Rob Leatham, worked for a news paper.

None of them were law enforcement or military (I think Kirk had been in Viet Nam IIRC)----they all did it on their own nickle after work and on weekends. I may be wrong, but I think that that's a major difference between today's top guns and the old guys----technique, ok, I get it-----today's may be better, but not enough to justify the differences in skill. Todays average competitor shoots more than the champions of the past did and today's professional shooters put more rounds downrange in a few days than the old guys did in a few months. JMO---YMMV

In response to Jim (the OP),

I shoot and grip the gun EXACTLY like Jarret does. The photo was from a VIP shoot where we were having some VIPs shoot some of our weapons. Simply teaching gun safety, followed with a little sight picture and trigger control was the best we could hope for in the 1/2 hour they had ateach station. TAK is correct that the shooter should choke up on the gun. I am just happy that there were no ADs.

An example of how I hold a pistol:



You can see that I bury the pistol as deep as I can. This allows me to better control the recoil. The pistol's slide tends to come straight back more so than flipping up. This gives faster shot to shot recovery times and puts my front sight back on target faster.

Right now though, since I have not been shooting much at all. I should time myself with a sun dial..

To my understanding, the lower the gun in your hands the more accurate you will be? Or is that completey wrong?

I do not know much about shooting pistols anyways.

Not necessarily more accurate. Many different things all combined play into accuracy. Being lackadaisical about grip, sight alignment, sight picture, trigger control, follow through, etc; all can have a negative effect on accuracy. What a high grip does do is allows one to manage recoil better.

Gmoats, Bruce Piatt is still a working/patrolling cop. I'm bettin' he'll clean house at the Bianchi Cup in a few days.

Thank you, sir.

Cleared things up for me.

That being said, in practical shooting, the better you handle the recoil in a consistent manner, generally the more accurate you will be. It is hard to be accurate with your muzzle flipping all over the place.

I can understand that, sir.

The better recoil control the closer your rounds will hit.

If Bruce spends his time patrolling instead of running a range, my hat's off to him.
John Pride was the first of the supercops @ Bianchi although when John asked Ray to come up with an "invitational" shoot he specifically wanted police involvement. I think that Pride was a "range guy" although I could be wrong.