Definition of a Good Shot With a Handgun

[BE Mike]

The poor OP just wanted a consensus on what "expert" standards were for accuracy and now we have a cadre of LEOs, top Competitors and instructors arguing the finer points of the high end of the trade

BBI's comments on getting a fast first hit, then follow ups are compelling in my mind and seem tactically sound, in his world. I think there are a few basics we all agree on, competition, LEO, MIL, or citizen defending themselves:

1. Only hits Count
2. "Good" (A's, High COM, etc) hits count more
3. Fast good hits count more still, the question is balancing speed v. accuracy
4. Accuracy degrades under pressure
5. Training to a high standard ensures performance when it counts.

Great thread!

Very good post. The only thing I'll add is that misses also can have tragic consequences beyond not just stopping the immediate threat, but also hitting innocent people.

 

[Paul30]

"A good shot" is very subjective. "Well enough to stop someone" would be a minimum goal. We are in the handgun forum, so I assume we are talking with handguns. Personal defense usually happens very close, most states that qualify CCW permit is about 7 yards. If you want to practice to save your life, practice the gun you will carry or use in your home for defense, and practice at different distances with different speeds. A person who breaks down the door, or ambushes you will need shot fast after you determine that is the appropriate action. Practice point shooting without sights as well as using sights, you may not have time to use them. I use pie plates because I can see the black hole in the white background and get immediate feedback where each shot is hitting. Most shooters like to see the best group size they can make at longer distances, but if it's with the gun you will not be carrying, it doesn't do you any good for defense. I still practice longer ranges with more accurate guns, but I make sure I get plenty of practice with my primary carry weapon. If you can hit a man sized target center mass reliably at a self defense distance then you are doing well. Anything else is a bonus.

For fun shooting slowly with a longer range handgun, I still use white paper plates, but I use 1 inch orange dots to see easier and try to group a shot group in each one at about 30 feet. I have made 100 yard shots as well, but anything longer than 50 yards is probably getting a rifle round.

 

[dtkw]

Handgun came in handy when I was in the sandbox a few years ago. We were doing house search for enemies. The house I went in was pretty quiet, not a sound. When I went to a room, shocked to see a Taliban with a AK slinged on his back. He was shocked to see me too. Instead of using my M4, I took my sidearm out and and he was at the same time trying to bring his AK up, but his front sight caught on the chair, so I fired first. Killing him instead of being killed. What a scary experience. I am true believer of a handgun after that experience when in a closed environment.

 

[dross]

Okay, these kind of threads are problematic, I know. I'm not looking for "If you can hit what you're aiming at," or any other witticisms. I don't shoot in competition, nor do I plan to. I just want a standard to work toward. So, let me make my questions more precise:

Shooting at less than 1 second per shot, what size group would you shoot at 10 yards if you were an "expert"? What's intermediate? What's just adequate?

Shooting unsupported, what does an expert shoot at 25 yards? (Please spare me the wisdom that I don't need to shoot people 25 yards away) What is reasonably good at 25 yards?

I'm looking for a measuring stick that I can't seem to find.

It's been a good thread, lots of good stuff has come out. I knew it would turn to all the cute sayings and all the discussion of combat shooting and self defense shooting, so great information. A few people actually answered my questions. I'll ask again, for those of you who have joined the thread later and made it about something else. I'm still looking for more answers to my questions from good shooters. The questions are quoted above. Love to get more answers to them. I fully get that if you shoot a bad guy well enough to stop him, you've done all you need to do. That, however, wasn't my question.

 

[Bfish]

G34. Stipple and sights, otherwise stock in the vid. This winter I added Taran connector kit and glue/grit to the grip.

-rvb

Wasn't sure of the model.. Thanks for the reply, I was just curious.

 

[Maximinus Thrax]

Concur with Cedertop on this one. But instead of listening to my dumb A$$ on what no BS accuracy means to a real BTDT gunfighter (I am only qualed to talk about aircraft from this perspective) let see what MSG(R) Vickers has to say...think he is "qualified" to have an opinion. Apologies for the long quote but it is relevant.

"As anyone who has taken one of my classes can attest I am very accuracy oriented. My classes always stress a high degree of accuracy. That is because in a gunfight accuracy will almost always suffer. There are many reasons for this not the least of which is you may very well be receiving fire from your assailant. In addition there is a high likelihood that you will be moving, your enemy may be moving, and it could be in an environment of limited visibility.All of these factors and countless others will have a negative affect on accuracy. The hope is that if you strive for a high degree of accuracy in your training that when your accuracy suffers in a gunfight, it will still be enough to get the job done. This approach has been used with great effectiveness in Tier One special operations units for years. I am a product of that school of thought, and I have trained a great many of these soldiers with that approach uppermost in my mind.

Whenever I teach drills, I always tell my students to shoot as fast as they can, but not at the expense of a reasonable accuracy standard. One of the techniques I use frequently is to place a 25 yd pistol bullseye center target on the chest area of an IPSC or IDPA target. I then tell the students to shoot as fast as they can on each and every drill but always strive to keep the shots in the black of the bullseye. On drills such as shooting on the move this is opened up to keep your shots on the replacement center paper. This is commonly known as the “aim small, miss small” approach. Part way through the first day I will peel off the bullseye and show the students the large ragged hole that inevitable results from this drill. This reinforces the teaching point that speed is fine, but accuracy is final – words that I live by.

Another question I get frequently asked is what is the acceptable mechanical or intrinsic accuracy for a service pistol or carbine. Meaning what should the weapon/ammo combination be capable of producing from a shooting device or rest that eliminates shooter error. Keep in mind I come from a surgical accuracy oriented special operations background with little margin for error. Based on this and years of experience I have concluded that a service pistol should be capable of head shots at 25 yds and a service carbine should be capable of the same at 100 yds – basically 5 inch groups. However there is a catch; I have found that under conditions of stress a shooter will only be able to shoot to within roughly 50 % of the accuracy potential of a given weapon. And that is only for the best shooters; the majority will not even be close to that. That means in order to achieve my standard of head shots (5 inch groups) at a given distance the weapon/ammo combination needs to be capable of at least 2.5 inch groups. I personally measure that accuracy standard with 10 shot groups. Many quality service pistols and carbines with good ammo will achieve this but there are many other factors involved such as sights and trigger pull characteristics. By these criteria it is not hard to see why a tuned 1911 pistol is so popular in selected spec ops units. Keep in mind that any effort to make a weapon more accurate almost always means tightening tolerances which can lead to a less than acceptable reliability standard for a combat weapon. A balance between accuracy and reliability has to be achieved. Surprisingly there are many pistols and carbines that do a good job offering an acceptable blend of both. In addition weapons of this type will require a higher degree of end user maintenance to keep them running. Don’t expect a pistol to shoot like a custom 1911 but be as forgiving about maintenance as a Glock 17; it just doesn’t happen that way.

In closing always strive to maintain a high degree of accuracy in your training sessions. It will serve you well in case you ever have to use your weapon for real. Remember the motto of this website: Speed is fine – Accuracy is final."

It's been a good thread, lots of good stuff has come out. I knew it would turn to all the cute sayings and all the discussion of combat shooting and self defense shooting, so great information. A few people actually answered my questions. I'll ask again, for those of you who have joined the thread later and made it about something else. I'm still looking for more answers to my questions from good shooters. The questions are quoted above. Love to get more answers to them. I fully get that if you shoot a bad guy well enough to stop him, you've done all you need to do. That, however, wasn't my question.

I really like the above quoted section as a metric. YMMV but that's a VERY high standard to hold anyone to in any circumstance.

At 25 yards 2.5" groups will be VERY difficult but you were asking about expert lever performance so there you have it. Intermediate may very well be the 5" mark and "adequate" might be your paper plate. By that standard, I'm closer to "adequate" than I am to "Intermediate".

The 10yd mark wasn't specifically addressed but I think we can draw some conclusions based on the 25yd metric. At 10yds I would expect the "expert" to be drilling a single ragged hole through the center of the target. I doubt MSG(R) Vickers would be happy at all with "Minute of Plate" at 10 yards.

 

[Rob377]

It's been a good thread, lots of good stuff has come out. I knew it would turn to all the cute sayings and all the discussion of combat shooting and self defense shooting, so great information. A few people actually answered my questions. I'll ask again, for those of you who have joined the thread later and made it about something else. I'm still looking for more answers to my questions from good shooters. The questions are quoted above. Love to get more answers to them. I fully get that if you shoot a bad guy well enough to stop him, you've done all you need to do. That, however, wasn't my question.

If you can run this, I'd say you're a good shot with a pistol. 2" accuracy, 6 shots in 5 seconds from the holster, sort of per the OP.

The Dots


at 25 yds slow fire, keeping them all on a 3x3 post it is better than most, and would qualify as a good shot. (in real life anyway, because we all know groups and shot to shot times shrink by 50%, and distances double on the internet)

 

[Bosshoss]

Okay, these kind of threads are problematic, I know. I'm not looking for "If you can hit what you're aiming at," or any other witticisms. I don't shoot in competition, nor do I plan to. I just want a standard to work toward. So, let me make my questions more precise:

Shooting at less than 1 second per shot, what size group would you shoot at 10 yards if you were an "expert"? What's intermediate? What's just adequate?

Shooting unsupported, what does an expert shoot at 25 yards? (Please spare me the wisdom that I don't need to shoot people 25 yards away) What is reasonably good at 25 yards?

I'm looking for a measuring stick that I can't seem to find.

It's been a good thread, lots of good stuff has come out. I knew it would turn to all the cute sayings and all the discussion of combat shooting and self defense shooting, so great information. A few people actually answered my questions. I'll ask again, for those of you who have joined the thread later and made it about something else. I'm still looking for more answers to my questions from good shooters. The questions are quoted above. Love to get more answers to them. I fully get that if you shoot a bad guy well enough to stop him, you've done all you need to do. That, however, wasn't my question.

Problem with this question is everyone has a different definition of what a expert is.
I'm not going to argue what a expert is so all I can do is give my opinion of what I feel is MY standard.

I am a competition shooter and I shoot pretty much ONLY Revolver in competition. All double action. Iron sights.

1 second per shot at 10 yards is fairly slow and I'm disappointed if the shot isn't touching the previous shot. In other words every shot in the group should be touching.
I can't do this every time but this is a average and sometimes I can do better than that.

1 shot per second is a lot tougher at 25 yards at least for shooting groups.
At 1 shot per second I would probably be around 5-6 inches.
In a match shooting at a USPSA target if I do my part at 25 yards I can get 2 A zone hits in .4-.5 seconds but I'm using the whole A zone.

These groups would go down in size if I was shooting a autoloader with a light trigger and up in size if I was using a compact gun.

I don't shoot many groups anymore as I don't get much info for what I do from doing that. I have other drills that I do to practice what I need to get better at.

Not a easy question huh?

Hope that gives you some info, but I'm no expert.

Sorry for previous thread drift

 

[Bosshoss]

(in real life anyway, because we all know groups and shot to shot times shrink by 50%, and distances double on the internet)

^^^^^^^

Nailed it

 

[bwframe]

^^^^^^^

Nailed it

I normally have to worry that there isn't powder residue on the pics of my 25 yard groups.

 

[Bosshoss]

I normally have to worry that there isn't powder residue on the pics of my 25 yard groups.

Hah that's easy hang 2 targets at the same time one over top of the other.
Shoot and remove top target and take pictures of bottom target.


Hum maybe I am an expert after all. ☺

 

[VERT]

Hah that's easy hang 2 targets at the same time one over top of the other.
Shoot and remove top target and take pictures of bottom target.


Hum maybe I am an expert after all. ☺

Rep inbound

 

[bmbutch]

I'm always trying to improve, have went from not able to hit the huge piece of plywood @ Sugar Ridge's 25yd range to putting holes all (notice I say all) over a 8" target. Working on getting that down to say 1/2 the target full of holes.

Since RTBA indoor range opened, been also working on 10 yd accuracy with as fast as I can go & still hit target.

Note: I have ran into quite a few 2" group shooters @ 25yds, yet when I see them at the range, 2" = can't even hit the target, 1 of them left me a new piece of plywood when he left.

I have seen an older gentlemen knocking down bowling pins at 50yd range, shooting 1911 off a sandbag. He missed some, I'd guess 25% hit rate.

PS: My handgun shooting is always off hand, I do work on level changes & shooting at multiple targets (transitioning). Switching hands has lead me to understand I need to work on that more. Actually better 1-handed (weak side) than 2-hand.

 

[SwingW/theWing]

I'm going out this afternoon to get a zero on red dot I got for my AR and to try out my first glock. I'll be bringing some paper plates with me. Can't believe I never thought about just trying to hit a 10" target.