Im sure all of us have been taught the fundamentals of shooting at some point. They usually go along the lines of stance, grip sight alignment, sight picture, breathing, trigger control, and follow through. Very nice, great success! I’m a big fan of those components of shooting. When it comes to teaching professional gunfighters, or reasonably motivated private citizens, I prefer to consolidate them down to just one. Marksmanship.
For practical pistol use, hitting the target on a calm day with no external pressure is what we need to start with, and then build from there. If you can’t hit the target, you are not yet able to learn the stuff that matters beyond that. If you can hit the target, then we can build your ability to do it at speed, under pressure, with real stakes. Don’t think I neglect to teach or train the stuff that leads to marksmanship, assuming you will get it on your own. Absolutely not. We are just not looking at that very basic level right now.
On the other hand, if you want to be good, YOU have to put in the work learning to hit. Just because you pass your agency’s qual or even its instructor qual, does not mean you have the marksmanship part down. Most instructors do actually have it down well enough to move on to other stuff, but not always. If you are a professional tactical guy and can’t shoot well enough to become an instructor, then you need to work on your marksmanship. There is no excuse for a tac guy not to be instructor qualified from a marksmanship standpoint. You will not advance in practical shooting if you can’t fall back on simply hitting the target.
I see people miss round after round, trying to hit a somewhat practical target under what should be minor amounts of stress. Instead of taking a breath and falling back on THE fundamental, they keep flinging lead at the problem, hoping to get lucky. That is a sure sign that they lack the essential skill needed to accomplish their work. We all miss from time to time, it’s what you do to fix that situation that matters.
An early mentor of mine was in a handgun fight one day and discovered that he was missing his target. I think it was his first handgun fight, as his standard weapon was a rifle. When he realized he was missing he slowed himself down (probably only noticeable to himself), focused on his front sight, and started hitting. The fight ended very quickly after that and thankfully my friend was not injured. That is the model to emulate if you find yourself straying too far.
What is an acceptable level of marksmanship? More is always better, but if you can keep your slow-fire shots in the black of a B8 from 25 yards, I would say you are well qualified. 2″ groups at 50 yards might be asking too much, though if I can do it without letting other stuff slip, I’ll take it. Anything in between should be considered excellent. Professionals will be on the looser side and enthusiasts will be on the tighter side, but all of it will work well enough.
One last comment on marksmanship with respect to speed. I like speed quite a bit and will take it whenever I can. I will always take marksmanship over speed if I have to choose. I prefer not to have to choose though, and with a relatively small time investment in daily dry-fire, you don’t usually need to make that choice either.
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SLG, I have finally taken a moment and began reading your articles, JAG shared your link some time ago, in just the couple I have read here at noon today enjoying them very much, I don’t do your job, but I do take carrying a firearm very seriously, so agree I would rather get shot myself than shoot the wrong person
Years ago when we were still fighting to get concealed carry in Illinois, I had a person at Church ask me what was the first thing you had to be prepared to do with concealed carry, he wasn’t expecting my answer, I said you have to be prepared to die yourself
Excellent information. I usually just scan or glance at articles, this time the longer I read it the more interesting it became. You were hitting the target on several things and it all made since.
It should help me in the future, Thanks
Thank you very much, glad it was helpful!
The old saying, “fast is fine, accuracy is final.” Some of the things I have seen on creating stress are time limits then head to head fun competition, meaning steel shooting trees – it is a ton of fun, but once you start to miss you have to slow down and go to the basics.