I’ve been doing a lot of shooting lately for TTAG. Unfortunately, not many of those shots have been for my own personal pleasure or joy. I’ve been really focused on collecting data or trying to break something. Even though I have put thousands of rounds down range this year, I haven’t focused on becoming a better shooter. My peers call that “a really sucky situation.”
With my fiancée working another graveyard shift and the cat giving me the stinkeye, I decided to hit the range with my very dusty 1911. I wanted to put some holes in paper just for the sake of putting holes in paper. And honestly, the old girl needed some attention (the 1911, not my fiancée).
My dad bought this particular Colt in Houston in the early 80’s after a break in. He shot it a few times over the years, but it remained largely unused. I resurrected it last year after being afraid to shoot it as a youngster. And I’m happy to say that I regularly outshoot my stall mates at the local range with a gun that is close to thirty years old. But after spending decades without getting regular exercise, I know the old girl is sensitive about lack of use. I should be a better caretaker.
If I’m being honest, I need to get my ass in gear about getting my CHL. I know it and so do you. So I figured that this would be a good opportunity to practice some very basic FTF drills, mag changes, and one handed firing. Ideally, I want to establish a baseline for where I am now versus where I want to be six months from now.
When I arrived at my favorite range, I realized that I didn’t own any snap caps. Luckily, my local shooting hole is more than happy to sell me snap caps for just a bit more than MSRP. While I was at it, I figured I should film myself shooting so I could critique things later. I picked up on some nasty habits watching myself shoot for the Umarex/Colt reviews. Here, for your viewing pleasure, is my first go round using said snap caps.
First off, I have no idea why my index finger is riding the front of the trigger guard. If you had told me that I do that, I would have called you a liar. Second, look at that flinch when I squeeze the trigger. I never would have known that I did that without the caps. And the camera. I’m not sure if you can catch me cursing at myself under my breath and that’s probably a good thing. Fast-forward a few minutes and about 20 rounds later…
I fixed that little finger thing and felt like I had quite a bit more control over things. And check out that snap cap fire. I cut down on the flinch. And damned if my shooting didn’t get a lot better for it.
So what have I learned? $15.95 was a small price to pay to not only identify my weak areas, but bring them out in the bright, harsh light of reality. I’m willing to bet that some of our readers are going to pick apart some other aspects of my shooting form, and I welcome the criticism. I’m only going to get better because of it.
I also know that I won’t feel comfortable carrying concealed until I’ve spent some time with a competent instructor. I hope Nick is ready to do some pistol shooting while he is down here. Lord knows I need the help.
I don’t like snap caps, I think they teach you bad habits like the loading of a gun and expecting it NOT to shoot and most people end up doing it at home, I believe this to “lower your respect” for the firearm and could lead to a ND.
We never used snap caps years ago when we were at the range for yearly quals. We would fire a couple of dozen rounds to warm up. Some of that empty brass was loaded into future clips to see if flinching was an issue. The change in shooting dynamics over the 14 years was amazing. At the start in ’89 you would simply raise your hand if you had a malfunction or failed to get all your rounds off in the allotted time. We switched to Beretta 9mm in 91. They still gave us commands on how and when to reload our mags. After a few years, it became apparent we would shoot in the street like we practiced biannually. So it was overhauled and we had to manage our own reloads and mag changes. If you wound up with an empty clip there were no alibi shots, like in real life! I wasn’t ever the best shot in our force, but I always qualified and felt confident if I ever needed to draw it I could utilize it effectively. Given the hate and hysteria against law enforcement, I do not miss wearing the gun, badge or vest. These days I only protect and serve my own!
Although I was able to glean worthy info from here, it surprised me that none of the responses covered the snap cap area of function that is one of their central purposes; smoothing the trigger mechanism with repetitive dry firing w/o damage to the firing pin (nor wallet).
A world of positive improvement on my CZ 75B , SP01 and Rami .
Inhale ,squeeze trigger not pull. Ever. Exhale. Learn safety n weapon maintenance first.
My father, bless his heart, had me shooting 12 ga and 30-06 at the age of 10. I was about 5’7″ and 85 lbs at the time. I sincerely hope that he didn’t do it just to watch me get stomped, but what he did was instill bad habits that took years to break!
Come time to train my kids I did it right: .22LR until they had mastered everything. Then we moved up to .30 Carbine and .308, and (eventually) to .338L. Inspired? I dunno, but it must have worked, because my boy just made the swat team aboard his carrier. He’s a real son-of-a-gun!
Charlie