Pistol shooting tips for a beginner

Use rat shot, you'll hit whatever a lot more.
Welcome to the dark side by the way.

If you can you should find a friend or someone who is an experienced pistol shooter to go with you and instruct you directly.

But for a few tips to get you started here ya go. Your grip will be essential and sight alignment would probably be next. As the earlier poster suggested focus on the front sight to the point where the rear sight is out of focus.

Always. . Always safety should be a primary concern. I have seen some close calls due to ignorance on the firing line.

Good luck and report back on how your early shooting goes.

Thanks for the help guys, keep it coming. I've only shot twice: once to decide which pistol to get, and once after buying the springfield. I remain extremely careful. I was taught how to completely field strip a Glock and Springfield xd before I ever loaded or shot one.

Make sure your off hand is not covering the slide when it racks back. Usually beginners grip the pistol and place their thumb over their wrist. Lock your off hand thumb over your dominant thumb to prevent this.

Also, Make sure you control your muzzle and don't point it at people when you are turning around and such. This happens with too many people to count, and is a bad habit to get into.

After a misfire, or a jam, stovepipe, failure to feed --clear the round and check the barrel for obstructions before firing again. It is a small chance of an obstruction, but it will be a catastrophic failure if there is debris in the barrel.

There are lots of names for stances: Modified Weaver, Weaver, isosceles, and modified isosceles can give you a great google head start.

This one will teach you a lot...

LINK

quote:

---

Looking for some help. Can you guys post some videos that would help out a beginner with a new pistol? Proper grip, stance, how to manipulate the sights, etc. Thanks in advance!

---

Check out this guy.

Haley Strategic

First rule: Both eyes open always. Know which eye is dominant & shoot that handed. There are tricks competition shooters can use with pinholes on glasses etc, but first & foremost keep both eyes open (this goes for all shooting).

The steps for shooting are:

1. Hold control - squeeze tightly, but not so much you shake. Keep thumb loose and not touching the gun. Lots of opinions on how to do a 2-handed grip. I prefer rotating my body to the dominant side & using a pulling force with a bent elbow on my non-shooting hand. Helps recoil I think. There are good points to be made for a simple isosceles triangle, straight in front, straight arms hold.

2. sight control - focus on the front sight, not on the target like with a rifle.

3. Breath control. stop your breath on the outbreath for slow fire. Stop breath wherever you are for timed fire, hold breath the whole time for rapid fire II'm talking competition terms here)

4. Trigger control. Smooth. Practice dry firing. A lot. Don't listen to the "dry firing is bad for your gun" people. A gun is not your arm not throwing a baseball.

5. follow-through. realign the sights on target after each shot

6. Enjoy the nice holes in your target.

ETA: Prompted by other responses:

Learn muzzle discipline - never point anywhere except downrange

Learn trigger discipline - keep your finger off the trigger until you're ready to shoot.

Thanks guys

quote:

---

Learning how to grip my pistol has made the most difference for me.

---

Same for me. My groups tightened up ALOT once I figured out that your left hand doesn't go under the butt of a plow-handled .357