Went to the Austin Rifle Club this morning with Tom Hogel. Tom is becoming a good friend, and he’s certainly a mentor for me in the realm of shooting (and some other areas too; I learn a lot from him). It was good to have his eyes looking over my shoulder, and I always welcome his input and corrections.

So we met for breakfast (big mushroom omelette, side of grits, fresh squeeze grapefruit juice… mmmm), then headed to the range.

Working

My intention was to work on things from the Combined Skills class, Tom’s intent was to work on some 25 yard shooting. I started just warming up at about 7-10 yards and was shooting OK. Tom was watching me and he directed me over to his 25 yard setup. I was shooting for accuracy and not hitting where I was shooting. Tried Tom’s gun and was nailing it, Tom tried my gun and was also a bit high, so there’s suspect that my sights might be hitting high at longer distances. I’m not convinced that’s the case just yet (1. we should have used a benchrest to verify, but didn’t, 2. I have other issues which I’m about to detail), but I have noted it for later to check into. Watching me shoot more and me paying attention to my shooting, some things were noticed.

First thing noticed by Tom was my trigger finger was bumping into the frame of the gun, thus pushing my shots to the left. I didn’t notice it myself, but once he mentioned it I did notice. My finger is coming into the trigger guard at a downward angle with the pad of my finger touching the “top” of the trigger (where it comes out of the frame); thus, that means the side of my trigger finger gets pressed into the frame and my finger works at a downward angle. When I moved my finger pad to tough the end of the trigger, all was better. Tom suspected it might be subconscious… my fingers are hurting from the past weekend, I’ve got a rubbed raw spot on my right middle finger (where it comes up under the trigger guard), so my body might be trying to avoid it. I suspect not. I suspect it’s just an unconscious shifting of my hands or a poor grip from the get go. I’ll have to watch for this and do a lot of dry fire to try to get the proper trigger finger back.

Second thing was uneven hand pressure. I’ve noticed this lately. I’ve been working hard on that “Todd Jarrett kung fu grip” where you “grip 20% harder”, and there’s no question it helps with recoil management. But what happened was I was putting a majority of my grip into the left hand. It was an effort to put more into my pinky area, to counter the arc the gun takes when it recoils. While it worked well for recoil management, the trouble was I noticed it turned my grip into a Weaver-esque “push-pull” sort of tension. That’s not what you want. What you want is a neutral grip (read Brian Enos‘s book). I had noticed this in the past some weeks, it was alluded to during the Combined Skills weekend, and Tom mentioned it again. So today I worked on that a bit, adjusting my grip (along with the trigger finger), and lo… shooting improved.

Another thing that came from this. I’ve been having problems where I’m shooting and next thing I know my magazine drops free. Not good. I’ve been trying to determine why this is happening. Is it something I’m doing? bad magazine? faulty magazine catch? I’m not sure, and honestly I’m still not 100% sure of the problem, but I suspect it’s me. While shooting today (i.e. being aware of trying to look for the problem), I noticed that upon recoil my left index finger is wrapped around such that it contacts the magazine release on the right side of the gun. Is that what’s happening? I don’t know, but it’s highly suspect. No mags dropped free today, but feeling where my fingers shifted during recoil I can’t help but wonder.

Playing

After having shot a bit, Tom pulled out his .44 magnum revolver. Big gun, heavy. Slick trigger on it. I shot some target loads and they were no big deal. Shot one powerful CorBon load… ooh, that kicks. It wasn’t too bad, to be honest. The main thing it did was fuel my desire for a big revolver. 🙂

Also, every time I shoot one of Tom’s XD-45’s (all Springer Precision customized) I want to get my XD-9 5″ customized.

As well, picking up all of that .45 ACP brass… yeah, I want a gun in .45 ACP. 1911… mmmm….

Got to finally try out the SureFire Shottimer iPhone app. It works but… being under the tin roof of the range, I think there was just too much noise/concussion for the microphone to pick up everything. If a shot went fast enough it could miss a follow-up shot. I played around with the settings some and couldn’t get it quite right. I’ll keep playing with it tho. It’s free so why not.

Summary

So what did I learn:

• Need to be aware of trigger finger bumping into the frame
• Need to even out my grip pressure – neutral pressure.
• Keep watching my grip, if it’s causing the right-side mag release to hit.
• .44 Mag is fun
• I want lots and lots of money to buy more guns and customize them too. 😉
• Tom’s a lot of fun to hang out with.

A good start to the weekend, I’d say.