Point Shooting... not me

[Tango147]

AB hit on it about Bill Rogers (Rogers Shooting School). He is a former World rated "speed steel" shooter. I have no idea if the governing body where he competes even exists anymore. That said, the man can shoot. I have seen him fire literally hundreds of rounds at automated reactive steel targets (which limits their exposure time) and can count the misses on one hand. Most of those he hit with follow ups. He did that because he knew based on the sights he was off and made a correction. Based on the speed at which he does it, there is no spare time to "find the sights" because you missed. He will run a zero light drill where you hear the target swing up and orient towards it and fire. Essentially a "point shot" because you can't see anything. He would use the flash of the muzzle to light the area and show him his sights then correct and hit with the second shot. No BS. Seen him do it over and over.

He said he has seen some amazing point shooters in his day. He came from the FBI when some of the old range guys could shoot decent groups in the Rex Applegate crouch at 50 yards. However no point shooter has ever cleaned his range drills. He concludes that with thousands of rounds you can extend your point shooting ability to beyond conversational distance, but there is a point of failure in every point shooter and most handguns, with decent sights, can score hits at 100 yards on chest plates.

I was one of those lab rats in the fancy hat with all the cameras pointing at me in the FSU study. My eyes tracked to the sights. I would say in part, because that is what I was trained to do, but also in part because I consciously recognized there was no pain or death penalty for failure and the gun was the only tool they gave me.

So my conclusion is always train to find and align during the firing process for any shooting position where the sights can be found. Sure, some may break on the rise but ultimately you are working that trigger and weapon into the sighted orientation. Some targets do not give you feedback and without that feedback and without using the sights then you have no idea what correction to make for effect.

Many a hopeful magazine has been dumped down range in bewilderment over no decent hits despite the fact the shooter "felt" like they were pointing the gun right at them. I have recruits spend the entire first magazine "pointing" at hostile role players and only realize when they have to reload that perhaps one sighted shot would solve their problem.

If God has so engineered me to sometimes find my sights and other times not under high stress, well there is nothing else I can do about it.