I need help. I can't shoot at 25 yards. *update, pg. 2*

General Firearms Handguns - Semi Auto
1

I’m getting frustrated with my handgun shooting.

I’ve been shooting semi-autos for over 10 years, most of my time is on 9mm Glocks. I love 'em. They’re light, they’re reliable, they’re cheap and I have everything I need to carry, compete, train and fix 'em.

I’m not thinking about a different gun, I need to fix myself. I’ve sold off all my unnecessary guns and gear and bought about 20K rounds of 9mm ammo so I’m freekin’ ready to get this right.

I’ve been through Tigerswan, Redback One, Sheepdog Solutions and a few other classes (always one of the better shooters at class) and have shot competitively for about 5 years. I’m a decent hand with a Glock 17 or 19, my match accuracy is fine.

BUT. I like to shoot 25 yard bullseye targets (slow fire) to evaluate myself and I can’t get a good group to save my life. This has been bugging me for awhile because I can’t pin it down.

Pistol: Glock 17RTF2, all stock with DeFoor sights.
Ammo: 115 grain S&B (today, but I get the same results with everything)

I shoot for groups standing, pretty much isosceles, high thumbs forward, focus on the front sight, pull through the take-up, hit the wall, keep squeezing, burn a hole in the front sight and still wind up with 2 or three fliers that open my group to 10"-12". The fliers are not consistent in their location on the target (one low, one right, one high… wherever).

I shoot horribly from a rest and if I just get irritated and blow 10 rounds at the target in 6 or 7 seconds, my groups really don’t open up much.

I’m about ready to order a super-badass trigger kit to throw in the Glock, but that’s a real solution because I shoot high-end 1911s about the same.

Advice?

2

At what distance do you see these fliers begin?
What shot are they in the string?

I wasn’t tracking on this comment:
“I’m about ready to order a super-badass trigger kit to throw in the Glock, but that’s a real solution because I shoot high-end 1911s about the same.”
Seems like a critical word got left out.

Do you shoot anything particularly well?
Have you developed a trigger preference, or compromise that you are happy with?
Have you tried varying trigger finger placement?
What cadence/time is applicable to your “bullseye” shooting?

I can give you some simple precision drills to do to work through the issue, which can be more productive than trying to get a detailed explanation.

3

Your fliers are likely caused by anticipating the shot, especially if they are inconsistent in placement.

Shoot at NRA bullseye targets at 25 yards to practice. Dry fire first, then shoot live rounds. Throw in some dummy rounds at random points in your mags and see if you can catch yourself anticipating the shot. Remember, once you commit to pressing the trigger, press all the way through in one smooth motion. Do not stop the trigger press waiting for “perfect” sight alignment, this can be a big mental hurdle for shooters when they step back to 25 yards and farther.

Try to shoot back to 50 yards as well. It will make the target appear much larger when you move in to 25.

4

How’s your eyesight? You might think it’s fine, but it’s good to have them checked by an optometrist to know for sure.

Do your sights move at all when you dry fire at home? If they do, you’re not focusing enough on isolating your grip from your trigger finger. Nothing is more productive than dry fire practice, followed up by mixing dummy rounds randomly with live rounds at the range.

Well, nothing except professional coaching. By coaching I don’t mean training. Having a one on one session (or sessions) with a shooting coach can help you identify all manner of issues that you might not be aware of.

Finally, remember that practice doesn’t make perfect, perfect practice does. Don’t further ingrain bad habits by doing a ton of shooting before isolating your issues.

Finally, remember that a G17 is a combat accurate handgun. You might never get sub 4" groups at 25 yards, regardless of ammo. Even from the bench. And that’s OK.

5

Are the fliers randm, or do they start to occur about the same time when you are shooting?

6

Have you tried different kinds of ammo? Maybe your glock is picky on ammo types. The right ammo for the right barrel can bring some amazing results.

7

Would be appreciated.

8

You could load 4 or 5 mags with a random snap cap in them and then mix them up in a bag. When you come to the snap cap, if you dip your sights or jerk the trigger it will be readily apparent.

Another way to do this is to have a buddy load or unload the pistol while you have your back turned. Then you take the pistol, present and press the trigger - if you jerk or dip on an empty chamber then you know what the problem is.

Or go train with LAV. He’ll get you to see El Snatcho too, often with one of the above methods.

9

A few things:

First off, a few hardware notes:

Ammunition selection seems to be pretty important for me when shooting bulls at 25 yards. I have not had very good luck with lighter weight bullets in various Glocks 9mm’s I have shot extensively. 124 and 147 grain bullets seem to give me the best accuracy and point of impact at 25 yards.

My personal experience is: most Glocks can hold around a 5-6 inch group at 25 with the right ammo out of the factory barrel… with some around the 3-4 inch range if you’re lucky… this is based on me shooting offhand at 25 yards.

Sights can make a big difference once you get back to 25 yards. Some people have better luck with a narrower front sight like the Ameriglo Defoor sights. I really like the Defoor sights for 25 yard bull shooting.

Software notes:

The old “have a buddy balance a spent casing on your front sight” drill is a really good way to check your trigger control. If you can keep the case from falling off while you dry fire… your trigger control should be pretty good. It also forces you to focus on your follow through so the casing doesn’t fall off after the striker falls.

Ball and dummy drills have already been suggested… I’ll second it…

I learned a bunch about 25 yard shooting by firing a double action revolver at 25 yards and going just for group size. A good revolver with good ammo can punch 6 rounds into a 1 1/2 inch hole at 25 yards and can teach you a lot about precision shooting with a pistol. I’ll probably get ridiculed by the peanut gallery for saying that… but If you already have one… it may work for you… and give you more confidence at 25 yards with the Glock.

10

About five years ago, I found out how much better I shoot using the modified weaver stance. You are gearing for a fight and this is the position that works better for me in a boxing / kickboxing stance as well as for shooting.

How is your focus on the front sight? I do not think that you are anticipating as your shots go all over instead of in one place. Eyesight is a big deal for me and even stretching my strong arm out as far as possible makes a difference for me.

11

Trigger control and anticipation are likely causes, and remedies have been covered.

25yd bulls also have a big mental component. It is easy to say fuck it and squeeze off a bad shot. What really helped me was to shoot one shot at a time. I would shoot, holster, pick up my brass, go record my shot, and tape it, then, when my head was ready I would make my next shot.

Don’t think about shooting a good 10 rd group, think about repeating a perfect shot 10 times.

12

Borrow a red dot equipped slide, RMR, Deltapoint, JP, whatever, from somebody and see what you get with it. It is the only way that I know of that helps you separate, at least partially, your technical issues vs vision issues/sight picture consistency/sight alignment. It also fairly promptly puts to end any notion that routine 3 inch groups are a rarity with most Glocks. Using red dot helped me tremendously in stopping wasting excessive amounts of time on trigger control/anticipation drills.

Shoot high contrast small targets. Let target help you before you become target-indifferent. I am better at 3x5 then bull at 25.

Shoot outdoors under the best lighting conditions.

These three things helped me to move forward with my bullseye shooting; another thing that Ive not done is to shoot bullseye with DA pistol or revolver

13

I would suggest taking good, match grade .22lr pistol and shoot it at 25 yard. It greatly helps to improve fundamentals like solid, balanced stance, grip, breathing, sights picture, trigger control.

Good trick to make correct stance is to grip your pistol and with closed eyes bring it up to target, then open eyes. If pistol is aimed to either side of the target, adjust your legs and try again, until you naturally point into bullseye. It is important that you do not need to flex your body toward target but are pointing at target naturally. Then remember about separating shoots. After each shot, lower your pistol, to remove muscle tension, relax, calm down and aim again. 1 shot per 30-45s is good pace here. Remember to not move your legs between shots.

All this must be observed too shoot good groups at 25 yards (or meters, as we shoot here). Then, when your groups will become satisfactory, move back to centerfire pistol and apply same skills.

I’ve seen people routinely shooting under 2" 10 shot groups with Glock 17 at 27 yards (25m) with proper technique. There is very good accuracy potential in Glock.

14

I dont know if this will help you or not, but it helped me. I used to not be able to hit crap at 25 yrds. Now I have no problem making head shots at all at 25. Where did it come from? less time at the range and more focus on dry fire practice. I also have a set of warren tactical sights on mine wich helps. I got to the point where I was keeping all my rounds on a torso at 100 yrds. I know that is not bulseye stuff…but. Anyway, once I stopped dryfiring a lot, my skills got a little rusty again. Dry practice seems to be just as important, if not more for me. YMMV

15

I try to shoot 200 drills as often as possible. Its a fast version of the humbler 700 - its on defoors site.

The biggest aid for me was dryfire. I run a negative connector on my carry g19 with a standard spring. So for dryfire I put a ny2 into a 17 I have. Burn good reps each type of grip and blamo, you will see your accuracy at distance improve drastically.

Sadly there is no one shot answer to this. You have to put the practice time in and dryfire is very underrated.

16

I started shooting at B8’s at 25 yards back in January in prep for a Northern Red class. When I started, I was pretty frustrated with how poorly I was doing, so believe me I understand what you’re going through. With some perseverance and diagnosis of what you’re doing though, you should see your scores move up significantly, as I did.

So with that in mind, a couple thoughts and questions for you based on advice I’ve received and things I’ve learned on my own:

[ul]
[li]Do you know your exact POA/POI at 25 yards?
[/li][li]You said you’re burning a hole in the front sight, but what about at the moment of the shot? Can you call your shot with 90-100% certainty without looking at the target?
[/li][li]Make sure you set your stance up to benefit from your natural point of aim
[/li][li]Look through the center of your eyeballs; meaning, don’t turtle and look through the top of your eyes/eyepro
[/li][li]Are you coming back down between shots or shooting one string in a row?
[/li][li]And last but not least, how long are you taking to break your shot? If you do a slow trigger press that is taking too long, you will begin to shake, potentially imperceptibly. If you hit that point, bring the pistol back in, reset, and go again.
[/li][/ul]

17

Dry fire and range time. I used to shoot horribly with both of my Glocks, they shot to the left no matter what I did. I increased my dry fire routine, shot in a more controlled fashion at the range with a specific goal of becoming comfortable with the gun at each range session. I also got a trigger job and replaced the disconnector on both pistols with a 3.5lb from Lone Wolf. Vast improvement.

18

How do you do when you fire 10 rds slowfire, from a supported (ie. benched or sandbagged) position?

In slowfire, are you lowering the pistol and taking a rest between each shot?

19

Step one get rid of variables:
0) Make sure your barrel isn’t shot out and that isn’t the problem.

  1. Ammo, are you using factory reloads or commercial off the shelf? I have already seen first hand 3 cases of factory reload ammo causing bad groups. In fact it happened in a Kyle Defoor pistol class last week. Both Kyle and the student were ??? because Kyle knew the student was a great shot but his groups were F’d up. Kyle shot the students ammo then shot his. Culprit was factory reloads from an unknown source (I bet it was BVAC). I know of another from a post on M4carbine.
  2. Do not oversight the sights. Spend 3 seconds on it and if you don’t pull the trigger come off the sights and relax your eyeballs.
  3. Get good lighting. Outdoor w/ sun behind you and no shadows is ideal but I’m sure you get the idea and can tell if lighting is a issue or not.

Step two diagnose:

  1. Ball and dummy drill, solo version.
    3 magazines and load them up randomly with dummy rounds and bullets. (2 dummys one ball, 2 balls one dummy etc. etc.)
    Put them in a bag, dump pouch or pocket and mix them up. Then load the gun, w/o cheating by looking at the mag, and start shooting.

If you see a flinch, there is your problem. If you don’t and you look at your target and have fliers then it isn’t trigger control but a sight issue. Try and shoot at max two rounds and then relax. Holster the gun and try to relax your eyeballs.

That is it. Most likely you have a flinch or have issues with aligning the sights when you get tired. Remote chance that your ammo is F’d up or your gun is shot out.

Good luck, I feel your pain.

ps
Me and a shooting buddy went out and shot at the 25. His groups were crazy when he shot slow but when he went fast his groups actually shrank. So its not that unreal to have big flinches when doing slow fire and not having issues when going fast.

20

Are you patient with each shot?

How big is the bullseye and what size groups are you trying to achieve?