Trigger Control…How can something so simple be so hard?

We’ve all done it. Slapping, jerking, flinching, anticipating…What do these things have in common? You don’t hit what you are aiming at! Maybe by a little, maybe by a lot, but if you aren’t going down the rabbit hole (or making Mickey Mouses) you aren’t quite there. (I know, most of us mere mortals can’t do that every time, but isn’t it a goal to get a good grouping?) What is the ideal trigger pull? Using the front pad of your index finger, between the tip and the first joint, resting comfortably on the trigger, and smoothly pulling straight back until the gun fires, slightly surprising you. Then, you continue to hold the trigger back for a fraction of a second while you reacquire your site picture and gently ease the trigger out until you feel the “click” which is the reset. That is as far as it needs to go. Stop there and you are ready to pull straight back, smoothly, until the gun fires. Is this easy? No. Does it take practice? YES! I didn’t even know about the reset (after shooting for over 10 years) until I spent time with an instructor. He spotted me slapping the trigger in the first minute, explained the reset and helped me to feel it. This was a great drill, side by side in the booth, his finger over mine in the trigger guard, I was pulling the trigger but he was following my finger and then held my finger after the fire and eased it out so I could feel it. Well, I went from a respectable grouping to a great grouping in less than 10 minutes! Until you understand what you are doing, you can’t fix it. If, like me, you didn’t know about the reset…slapping made sense. What about anticipation and flinch? If you dry fire, you can rest a coin or an empty cartridge on the barrel, you will know right away if you are moving the gun at the last instant before firing. If you can’t dry fire, for whatever reason, you can get plastic dummy rounds, sized for your caliber and mix them in with your practice ammo. Better yet, have someone load for you so you have no idea where the dummy round is. What will happen when you get to the dummy round is you will pull the trigger and nothing happens. You should be able to see if you are dropping, or raising the muzzle in anticipation of the “bang”. The morale of the story could be that even people who have been shooting for a while can learn something from a good instructor. The finger over finger is a technique I’ve used with a lot of students and the response has been universally positive. It works! Stay Safe!!