How to stop flinching

[chief38]

Along with this advice control your wobble with the trigger. Every one has a sight wobble, slight or major. Put yours in as small a circle as possible. While focusing on trigger pressure only add pressure to it when you are in the last quarter of the circle approaching the target, never when you are moving away from it.
The concentration of these two things should keep your mind off of "This is going to be load, unexpected and painful".

I could not agree more! The smaller the target circle, the less your drift will be and the smaller your groups will be. "Aim Small - Miss Small" so they saying goes. I try and get that point across to new shooters who thinkl they will embarrase themselves less by shooting at a giant bullseye. When I give them a B-3 NRA target for use at 50 feet and put a 3/4" red sticker inside the 2.5" black circle they bitch and moan - until I make them try it. Then they surprise themselves.

Just showing you the 3/4" orange circles within the 2.5" B-3 targets. Certainly not my best shooting last week.

 

[rockquarry]

I could not agree more! The smaller the target circle, the less your drift will be and the smaller your groups will be. "Aim Small - Miss Small" so they saying goes. I try and get that point across to new shooters who thinkl they will embarrase themselves less by shooting at a giant bullseye. When I give them a B-3 NRA target for use at 50 feet and put a 3/4" red sticker inside the 2.5" black circle they bitch and moan - until I make them try it. Then they surprise themselves.

Just showing you the 3/4" orange circles within the 2.5" B-3 targets. Certainly not my best shooting last week.

Another here in favor of the smallest target you can clearly focus on without eyestrain at your selected distance. I like to shoot at a 2" square at 25 yards with all handguns, bullseye style. Groups are always smaller than when using a commercial target with an enormous 6" bullseye, though the latter is passable (but still a bit large) for 50 yard shooting - something I'm still not good at but I'm trying...

I never found dry firing to be beneficial, but if it works for you, keep at it.

 

[GnarlsR2]

I could not agree more! The smaller the target circle, the less your drift will be and the smaller your groups will be. "Aim Small - Miss Small" so they saying goes. I try and get that point across to new shooters who thinkl they will embarrase themselves less by shooting at a giant bullseye. When I give them a B-3 NRA target for use at 50 feet and put a 3/4" red sticker inside the 2.5" black circle they bitch and moan - until I make them try it. Then they surprise themselves.

Just showing you the 3/4" orange circles within the 2.5" B-3 targets. Certainly not my best shooting last week.

Flinching or no flinching, that is dad gum good shooting, I don't care who ya are!

The advice from mtgianni is excellent and takes enormous amount of concentration and eye-finger coordination.

At the range, between 4 yards and 12 yards, my lasers have really improved my targeting and POI because I can see the dot moving on the target at the split second I squeeze the trigger.

 

[JwesleyN]

I do the same thing but use a centerfire .38 special , after they are comfortable I may sneak in a light .357 or two and then tell them afterwards they fired .357, some say I noticed a couple seemed hotter but they no longer fear it.
Btw, I would not try that in a small or light gun, I use a 6" Model 27 which is a pussycat at taming recoil.
On a side note,
I would recommend inserting a few fired 22lr casings instead of empty chambers in your K22 as the firing pin on a rimfire will strike the cylinder edge eventually peening it.

Cheap .22 snap caps can be found at the hardware store. The yellow wall anchors for screws work perfectly and will extract in revolvers and autos. I use them in my .22 autos that can't be decocked other than pulling the trigger when I put them away.

 

[Yendor357]

Fired mostly glocks…..plural. That means more than one Glock. Poor guy.

Jerry Miculek says close your eyes and dry fire. I've never tried it but Jerry is a whole lot smarter than I.

 

[Thirsty Traveler]

For me, I feel It just takes a conscious effort and a lot of practice to stop flinching. I remember firing a marlin 444 once, when I was a teenager new to firearms, that made me flinch! Lol

TT

 

[nhw]

What works for me, I only shoot double action. I find that my grip when shooting double action helps with my perception of recoil. I focus on the trigger squeeze. I try and get the cylinder to rotate quickly enough that I can feel it lockup. At that point after the lockup, I then focus on sight alignment. It doesn't take much more trigger pull until the revolver fires. A larger cyclinder revolver is the best choice for this technique. Dry firing in a safe manner will help. Good luck.

 

[Tabby Lynn]

How do you stop flinching? Other than man up!!! 357 (rarely 38) and 44 mag is what I'm shooting.

I've shot mostly Glocks and other semi-autos most of my life and now that I'm getting into revolvers, I flinch more than I want to. Especially double action.

When you graduate into revolvers you will find that for the most part semi auto calibers do not compare to the power and effectiveness of real handguns. They shoot harder, go faster and are way more accurate than most semi autos. Take for example, a 357 mag has heavier bullets, goes faster, has more energy and hits harder than even your beloved 10mm, and thats just for starters. You also don't have any semi auto action to take up the recoil. If you are flinching the only way to stop flinching is to concentrate on proper shooting techniques, quit jerking the trigger. The only way you can flinch is if you know the gun it going to go off. If that is the case you are jerking the trigger and expecting the recoil. If you are properly pressing the trigger you will not know when the gun is going to fire, thus you cannot flinch.

Breathe in, breathe out, hold your breath, aim and press the trigger. Once you hold your breath the gun needs to fire within 5 seconds or your vision will start to blur and you will begin to tremble. No shot in 5 seconds, stop, relax, go back to a ready position, take a breath and start over .

 

[Tu_S]

I just tell people to focus on keeping their eyes open and get to the point where the last thing they see is the muzzle flash covering the target behind the still lined up sights.

 

[Shootist00]

What you call flinching could simply be a reaction to recoil and in my opinion that is something everyone does. Almost impossible to stop it. It is a natural reaction. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Then you have what I call trigger yank you are on target, FINIALLY, and yank the trigger back.

 

[GnarlsR2]

When you graduate into revolvers you will find that for the most part semi auto calibers do not compare to the power and effectiveness of real handguns. They shoot harder, go faster and are way more accurate than most semi autos. Take for example, a 357 mag has heavier bullets, goes faster, has more energy and hits harder than even your beloved 10mm, and thats just for starters. You also don't have any semi auto action to take up the recoil. If you are flinching the only way to stop flinching is to concentrate on proper shooting techniques, quit jerking the trigger. The only way you can flinch is if you know the gun it going to go off. If that is the case you are jerking the trigger and expecting the recoil. If you are properly pressing the trigger you will not know when the gun is going to fire, thus you cannot flinch.

Breathe in, breathe out, hold your breath, aim and press the trigger. Once you hold your breath the gun needs to fire within 5 seconds or your vision will start to blur and you will begin to tremble. No shot in 5 seconds, stop, relax, go back to a ready position, take a breath and start over .

"The only way you can flinch is if you know the gun it going to go off. If that is the case you are jerking the trigger and expecting the recoil. If you are properly pressing the trigger you will not know when the gun is going to fire, thus you cannot flinch.

Breathe in, breathe out, hold your breath, aim and press the trigger. Once you hold your breath the gun needs to fire within 5 seconds or your vision will start to blur and you will begin to tremble. No shot in 5 seconds, stop, relax, go back to a ready position, take a breath and start over ."

Obviously shooting techniques can vary between shooters. My experience is different.

Years ago, I was a serious film photographer for about 15 years. I learned very early that 95% of all photographic failure is camera movement. In the Nikon School of Photography the very first lesson is how to minimize camera movement. Gently pushing the shutter button at the bottom of your exhale is the proper technique. Since shutter speeds can vary, once the shutter is released your finger should not move off the shutter button for a spit second, it's like follow though. Holding your breath is a no-no. Your CO2 level in your blood goes up quickly when you hold your breath causing muscle contractions and shaking. Your subconscious immediately goes to DEFCON 4.

I have always practiced the same technique at the range when working on POA/POI. I make myself conscientiously aware of my breathing and trigger release. It's become fairly automatic, but I still focus on my breathing when I'm sighting in for accuracy.

For extreme target accuracy at the range, when I press the trigger I want to know precisely then it fires a round. Holding the trigger after firing helps to keep me from flinching.

 

[A10]

I recently watched a vid by Jerry Miculek. He said he has students get to a safe place, point the gun into a berm, close their eyes and fire the gun. He said no one flinches when their eyes are closed. He recommended firing several times and imprinting the feel into your brain. Then return to the firing line and the issue may be resolved.

I haven't tried it but I'd buy into whatever Jerry says!

jerry miculek flinching - Google Search

 

[Brian Parrish]

You are way ahead if you know you've got this problem, so kudos to you,
You can weigh all the responses here but pay special
attention if a trainer comes on who can show how he successfully trained this out of his students.
This is an autonomic response so the solution needs to address the subconscious process.
Are you wanting to be a better bullseye shooter
or are you wanting to win a gunfight?
Are you wanting to make better split times; thinking of competition shooting?
For defensive shooting at combat ranges be aware that your adrenaline response, fight/flight reaction, tunnel vision etc will be a much bigger factor in losing the fight than flinching. I have seen countless mag dump videos and nobody is flinching, but neither are they hitting either.
Let us know what works for you.
Kind Regards,
BrianD

 

[diver61]

Empty gun and dry fire.
If using a semi auto, dry fire with 4 or 5 nickels on the slide. When you don't drop any, use dimes. Concentrate on your front sight.

 

[Fvernic]

Anyone ever balance a coin on the barrel while dry firing?

YES!
Very humbling

 

[malph]

Provided a person's doesn't have arthritis or something, tolerance to recoil can be built up with practice.

Dry-fire or using lighter recoiling loads are great ways to build trigger control without beating yourself up.

Shooting heavy recoiling loads is somewhat physchological. Once your mind realizes you are not going to get injured, it will calm down and deal with recoil better.

This comes with practice -- the ugly "p" word.
One thing about practice though, once you start flinching, put the gun down. Maybe take a break or shoot a lighter recoiling gun.

Don't let flinching become an ingrained response.

 

[TheTinMan]

Anyone ever balance a coin on the barrel while dry firing?

I forgot about that but yes, I used that method with my 642 to get rid of my flinch. If you can pull the double action trigger on a gun that light without dropping quarters, you're fine IMHO.

 

[Mister Coffee]

The key is to relax. That's why I always light a few scented candles, chill some dry white wine and put on my favorite Anita Baker CDs from the '80s.

Wait a sec. That's what I do when I take a bubble bath bath. Never mind.

 

[Neumann]

Flinching is 100% mental. My approach is to focus on the front sight, and think of reaching out to the target, It takes my mind off of the action of pulling the trigger and subsequent recoil. This level of concentration takes regular practice. Any job goes better if you concentrate on results rather than effort.

 

[THE PILGRIM]

Speaking of the 375, back when I was active gun trading, one of my specialties was left-hand rifles.
And on two different occasions, I had Mauser 3000s in 375.
So do I regret not shooting either one of them?
No, not really. But I do regret not keeping some of the ammunition.