Hey trainers, how do you measure "success" during dry fire?

[BehindBlueI's]

I'm trying to get back into dry firing, primarily with my handgun but also with the AR at some point. I know, I know, its a failure on my part for getting away from it. I know it makes me a better shooter, and I know my times have suffered because I've started neglecting it. I have had the talk with myself, and myself seems to be willing to listen. However, the internal conversation got me thinking about something. How do you know you're doing it right?

1) I'm trying to learn to shoot with both eyes open. After noticing the marked difference with a red dot on a rifle, I want to translate this over into a pistol. Luckily, the Trijicon HDs on my Sig seem pretty well set up for this, as the orange dot "floats" pretty well and if I close my non-dominant eye after "firing" I seem to be lined up as well as I am with only the dominant eye open. Without a bullet hole to tell, I'm not positive, though. I check sight alignment, but I could be unintentionally adjusting them after the shot. How do you measure "success" without a hole?

2) I seem to focus a lot of attention to my grip, reminding myself to relax my dominant hand repeatedly. I seldom consciously think of the trigger pull. Should I? Is dry fire more the time for considering individual fundamentals, or a more "organic" approach, and if the latter, how do you pay attention to everything at once and know if you did it right?


Objectively, I know this practice helps me shoot better. Subjectively, I sometimes battle the thought I could be ingraining bad habits without knowing it since I'm not really sure how I should define success.

 

[the1kidd03]

I create a mark on a piece of paper in a color which contrasts that of your front sight. I make it in a size which is virtually the same size as the front sight when you're aiming at whatever distance you are. I use graph paper to help keep it measurable and consistent. The idea here is that if controlling all things well, when the "shot" breaks you should not see much (preferably any) of the dot (target) peeking out from behind your front sight.


Here's the catch. The challenge isn't doing the work. The challenge is in being able to objectively self-asses what you did with each trigger pull; being able to identify where that theoretical bullet would have landed based on the sight/target alignment at the time you heard the click. In other words "calling your shots," and this practice carries over to live fire too. Ultimately, to become better you should be able to know where your shot went without having to see its POI. Upon viewing the POI you may not be right 100% all the time, but the more often you are the more you know you are being truthful with yourself and the more you're enabling yourself to identify what you did wrong with each trigger pull; which you should also be focusing on after each shot.

Of course, this is for basic mechanics and not so much for dynamic shooting such as with movement, but hope it helps. These practices are what I was taught early on and what is still taught today to help Marines for qualification (referring to it as "snapping in"). It helps immensely for most shooters IME.

 

[ViperJock]

As above. The glory of dry fire (other than being infinitely cheaper) is that there is no recoil to obscure the errors we make in trigger control. You should be able to tell if the front site deviates from the target and work on the trigger pull until it is perfect. I use a 3x5 card with a bright green nickel sized sticker on it at 7yards. The site to target ratio is about right for me with that set up.

Another skill to practice is to check the trigger reset. So after I dry fire, while holding the trigger down, rack the slide. Then let the trigger out to reset and take your next (dry) shot.

 

[Expatriated]

I might be a little different here than most. I have found little value in dry fire per se. I think that the benefit of it (for me at least), is the weapon manipulation--moving off line, drawing, acquiring front sight, sight alignment, tap rack, scanning, quick reloads or clearing malfunctions (with dummy rounds) etc.

I have found that most trigger problems are related to recoil anticipation. What I have also found is that few shooters jerk the trigger when they KNOW the gun won't go bang. I have found precious few students mess up the trigger pull substantially when the weapon is dry and they know no noise or movement will come.

How I diagnose this on the range with a student that is having a problem with say, the standard low left pattern on a right-hander is this:

I have them aim in and I pull the trigger while I talk to them. They don't know when I'm going to break the shot. So, all they do is aim in. The rounds go dead center, many of them touching from 5-7 yards. Because I can watch them when they pull the trigger on a KNOWN dry gun and see that they are not moving the gun substantially, I can safely say it's recoil anticipation.

Most instructors try to address this with dry fire. I have found it to be of little help. Ball and dummy is better. Addressing a weak support hand grip is worse. I have found the best remedy is to a) correctly identify the problem as recoil anticipation and b)get them to address the mental issue that is the noise and movement. Once they can get themselves to forget about the noise and movement, their shooting improves exponentially.

I remember 20 years ago, I was taught to put a dime on the front sight and dry fire without it falling. I could do it 100 times in a row. I still jerked a live gun when I KNEW it was live. I could never make the leap between how one thing was related to the other.

That's an extremely long answer to say that I measure success with dry fire only when my weapon manipulations are smooth, fast and repeatable over a period of 10 minutes or more. In other words, am I getting less and less flubs over time?

A lot of people will disagree with me but I think that we spend far too much time on marksmanship that we do managing the gun and the situation. Most people can learn marksmanship fairly easily WHEN THEY ARE STATIC, WITH NO STRESS AND NO TIME. Once we start adding the other things, the marksmanship goes down the drain. What most of us don't realize is that we can practice 90% of those "other things" off the range. So that our range time is spent most efficiently by live fire testing how our marksmanship holds up under the stress of forced weapon manipulation and event management.

 

[ViperJock]

I might be a little different here than most. I have found little value in dry fire per se. I think that the benefit of it (for me at least), is the weapon manipulation--moving off line, drawing, acquiring front sight, sight alignment, tap rack, scanning, quick reloads or clearing malfunctions (with dummy rounds) etc.

I have found that most trigger problems are related to recoil anticipation. What I have also found is that few shooters jerk the trigger when they KNOW the gun won't go bang. I have found precious few students mess up the trigger pull substantially when the weapon is dry and they know no noise or movement will come.

How I diagnose this on the range with a student that is having a problem with say, the standard low left pattern on a right-hander is this:

I have them aim in and I pull the trigger while I talk to them. They don't know when I'm going to break the shot. So, all they do is aim in. The rounds go dead center, many of them touching from 5-7 yards. Because I can watch them when they pull the trigger on a KNOWN dry gun and see that they are not moving the gun substantially, I can safely say it's recoil anticipation.

Most instructors try to address this with dry fire. I have found it to be of little help. Ball and dummy is better. Addressing a weak support hand grip is worse. I have found the best remedy is to a) correctly identify the problem as recoil anticipation and b)get them to address the mental issue that is the noise and movement. Once they can get themselves to forget about the noise and movement, their shooting improves exponentially.

I remember 20 years ago, I was taught to put a dime on the front sight and dry fire without it falling. I could do it 100 times in a row. I still jerked a live gun when I KNEW it was live. I could never make the leap between how one thing was related to the other.

That's an extremely long answer to say that I measure success with dry fire only when my weapon manipulations are smooth, fast and repeatable over a period of 10 minutes or more. In other words, am I getting less and less flubs over time?

A lot of people will disagree with me but I think that we spend far too much time on marksmanship that we do managing the gun and the situation. Most people can learn marksmanship fairly easily WHEN THEY ARE STATIC, WITH NO STRESS AND NO TIME. Once we start adding the other things, the marksmanship goes down the drain. What most of us don't realize is that we can practice 90% of those "other things" off the range. So that our range time is spent most efficiently by live fire testing how our marksmanship holds up under the stress of forced weapon manipulation and event management.

Interesting. Who do you teach for? Most of what you said is contrary to the idea if developing muscle memory and foundations. The reason marksmanship goes down the drain IMO is because it was never mastered. I'm not saying you are wrong. I would live to see some objective data studying methods.

 

[ModernGunner]

I only use dry fire practice for 'perfecting' (as near as can be) the trigger press and/or manipulation drills, as Expatriated noted above.

For keeping those sites on target during firing, I've found nothing better (so far) than ball & dummy.

Others above have posted excellent suggestions, and make similar suggestions (and use them myself). Aim at a small target, squeeze, see if the gun is still on that target 'spot'. I just don't personally utilize them to indicate 'success'.

 

[Expatriated]

Interesting. Who do you teach for? Most of what you said is contrary to the idea if developing muscle memory and foundations. The reason marksmanship goes down the drain IMO is because it was never mastered. I'm not saying you are wrong. I would live to see some objective data studying methods.

You've asked a couple of different things, I think.

1.) I have found that muscle memory does not AUTOMATICALLY override the mental process. In other words, I can have a student do 1,000 dry fire trigger presses perfectly, with no dip in the front sight. And within 10-50 live rounds, he could begin jerking the trigger if he has recoil anticipation problems, which I think most of us do to some extent. Lining up 3 dots and pulling the trigger to the rear is pretty easy. Doing it when you know it's going to get loud is when it's difficult.

Most people can shoot a .22 pistol better than a .45. They aren't gripping the .22 better, they aren't pulling the trigger to the rear better, etc. They are less concerned about recoil.

Of course, training can overcome the recoil issue. So that great shooters shoot great with .45's or .22's but I'm speaking from the perspective of someone learning to shoot.

I am 100% all for muscle memory. It's why I believe repetitions in dry practice is so essential. I just don't think that dry firing repetitions are super helpful in marksmanship fundamentals. Dry fire benefits come from weapon manipulation, speed and building up of the ability to do things smoothly and rapidly so that under stress, there is no thinking about how to clear a jam, for example. Dry practice definitely shortens the OODA loop time and that's where I think the most benefit is derived from it.

I just think that some people who have issues jerking the trigger don't seem to benefit from dry fire since they only jerk the trigger during live fire and not during dry fire.

2.) Marksmanship is mastered within a given amount of stimulus. For example, shooting at a bullseye with no time limit from 25 yards is a way to develop marksmanship. You may get to be excellent, keeping groups of just a couple of inches across. Now, let me shoot paintballs at you as you run to cover and try to hit the same target anywhere on the paper and the marksmanship you mastered is nowhere to be found. So, as you add stimulus to your training, your groups get bigger. That does not mean you haven't mastered marksmanship fundamentals (at least in my opinion it doesn't), it just means that your marksmanship training did not account for the real world. I've seen great trigger pulls under no stress and horrible slapping when stress is added. (incidentally, this is why the whole 60/40 grip thing is bogus to me--I know, another sacred cow )

So, my expectations of marksmanship progress are: small groups. Add additional techinques, stress, etc. Groups get larger. You practice those skills all together until the groups are small again. Then add more stimulus, which equals larger groups. Practice gets them small again. Large, small. Large, small. And the cycle continues until you reach whatever level you deem satisfactory. For SPECOPS maybe it's double tapping a 3 x5 card at 25 yards while moving. For the MEUSOC pistol course, it's a pair standing, pair kneeling to the body in 9 seconds from 25 yards, starting with a Condition 4 carbine, fired on a empty chamber. That level of marksmanship is different than shooting bullseyes at an indoor range all day.

I don't have any objective data sampling other than my personal experience from teaching over the last 10 years and my own learning process over the last 20.

 

[Streck-Fu]

I use this. LINK

 

[gregkl]

Expat, being a noob I am trying to learn all I can. I like what you are saying. I can shoot my .22 better and it is because of the lower recoil and noise. The trigger is not as good as on my 1911 but I still shoot it better, just like I do my .22 revolver.

It is hard for me to practice dry fire to work on trigger feel when I have to rack the slide each time. If I don't, the trigger doesn't feel much like what it does while actually shooting it.

So for me, at least for now I practice mag changes keeping the muzzle pointed where it should be, pistol in front of face, etc. I practice drawing from a holster, re-holstering and I even practice making the gun safe after a string. (mag out, slide back, empty chamber, slide forward, hammer down, holster).

I also practice shooting from cover, strong hand, weak hand, transition from strong hand to weak hand and picking up the gun off a table.

I figure being new, I would be best off making sure I am safe first and know how my pistol works.

 

[gregkl]

I use this. LINK

That may go on my Christmas list for this year.

 

[Expatriated]

Expat, being a noob I am trying to learn all I can. I like what you are saying. I can shoot my .22 better and it is because of the lower recoil and noise. The trigger is not as good as on my 1911 but I still shoot it better, just like I do my .22 revolver.

It is hard for me to practice dry fire to work on trigger feel when I have to rack the slide each time. If I don't, the trigger doesn't feel much like what it does while actually shooting it.

So for me, at least for now I practice mag changes keeping the muzzle pointed where it should be, pistol in front of face, etc. I practice drawing from a holster, re-holstering and I even practice making the gun safe after a string. (mag out, slide back, empty chamber, slide forward, hammer down, holster).

I also practice shooting from cover, strong hand, weak hand, transition from strong hand to weak hand and picking up the gun off a table.

I figure being new, I would be best off making sure I am safe first and know how my pistol works.

Sounds like you are on the right track. I'm a big fan of spending a LOT of time with your gun. Whatever time you spend on the range in live fire, I encourage everyone to spend 10x that with your gun during dry practice. If you spend an hour on the range, spending 10 hours learning your weapon is ideal. Yes, that is a lot. But, in the beginning, many shooters have problems with confidence and repetition. Building good habits take time.

When you are dry firing and you only get one click on your gun and it has to be reset, use that as an opportunity to build in tap racks. Click-step offline while tapping, racking, back online and fire again. Obviously you'll need your mag out or some dummy rounds to make your slide go forward.

Personally, I don't agree with a trigger pull being in the sequence for making a weapon safe, but that's me. I'm not a proponent of pulling the trigger unless I'm training or shooting for real. Even when it's necessary to take the weapon down, I use the trigger pull as a training repetition. Meaning, I ensure the weapon is safe and then aim in on something and do a proper trigger pull. Then break the weapon down.

I have been on ranges where they required us to pull the trigger to make the gun safe. I have observed the tendency to be to just pull the trigger with the gun down range. In my opinion, that's building complacency in one of the four rules. And I know for a fact that people have had ND's as a result of this process.

I realize it is taught a lot. By people with more experience and better shooters than me. But it's just not something I can get behind. I guess the theory is IF you're going to have an ND, you should have it before you put your pistol away? I prefer to make the weapon safe and ensure it is safe with no need to pull a trigger unnecessarily. Build faith in your abilities and your concentration, not in pulling the trigger just because you can't really ever trust yourself fully.

Sorry for the extra rant there--feel free to hate me

 

[Expatriated]

I use this. LINK

I'm interested in this. Do you find yourself looking at the laser or still focusing on the front sight? One of the reasons I'm so opposed to lasers is the bad habit of taking your eyes off the front sight.

 

[gregkl]

I realize it is taught a lot. By people with more experience and better shooters than me. But it's just not something I can get behind. I guess the theory is IF you're going to have an ND, you should have it before you put your pistol away? I prefer to make the weapon safe and ensure it is safe with no need to pull a trigger unnecessarily. Build faith in your abilities and your concentration, not in pulling the trigger just because you can't really ever trust yourself fully.

Sorry for the extra rant there--feel free to hate me

No hate. The two Steel Challenges and one IDPA match I did required "hammer down".

 

[Expatriated]

No hate. The two Steel Challenges and one IDPA match I did required "hammer down".

I have seen it alot there. I would separate self-defense training from competition training. Yes, there is some overlap of components. But there are also some aspects in one that will be detrimental to you in the other.

 

[Streck-Fu]

That may go on my Christmas list for this year.

I use it with the caliber specific insert (9mm in my case) and it works great. But, then, I have hammer fired gun. If you have a striker fired gun, you have to reset the striker each shot. An alternative is the SERT trainer kit they sell: LINK

 

[Streck-Fu]

I'm interested in this. Do you find yourself looking at the laser or still focusing on the front sight? One of the reasons I'm so opposed to lasers is the bad habit of taking your eyes off the front sight.

I don't find any issue with looking more at the target. Sure the laser is visible but the target is red so it's not too prominent. The target does not display the result of each shot until you 'shoot' the circle labelled DISPLAY which has it display the results of that string. Shooting RESET clears the target.

I was skeptical at first but really like working with it now. It's great for practicing draw strokes as well.

 

[maansmit]

I use this. LINK

I just ordered one of these, should be here this week. I am hoping it will help my wife get more interested in shooting.

 

[bmbutch]

Dry fire practice has helped me somewhat. I still use it, especially if away from a range for more than a few days.

What helped me more, was loading a mag or 3 with randomly placed snap caps. Shuffle mags around, load them without looking (as much as possible), then begin shooting. When I get to a snap cap, any trigger issues are very evident.

Helps if others are present, the embarrassment factor of your firearm moving when you hit a snap cap.

I've helped 3 different shooters at local public range using this technique. They each swore the gun was a pos, after loading their mags with a few snap caps, they quickly found out it wasn't the gun. One guys M&P bounced off table when he hit the first snap cap. (Note, he was sitting down, grip slightly off table). All 3 improved over the course of only a few mags. All indicated they were going to buy some snap caps.

I still use this method if having a bad range day, usually fixes the day to a good range day.

I'm not a trainer, expert, etc., just a guy that couldn't even hit the plywood @ 25 yds, much less a target. This method has helped me stay on target. Still not a 2" group @ 25 yards using off-hand, but getting better all the time.