Left-handed, but right eye dominant – advice requested

[Novice]

First off, I read through most of posts on the forum, and this is one of the better forums I have found so far – thanks for creating it.

I am a relatively new shooter (five years shooting experience once or twice a month). I think I can control handguns better in my dominant left-hand, but find that when I present the weapon with my right hand, it lines up very naturally with my right dominant eye. I would like to think that I am not so far ingrained in shooting left-handed, and that I might be able to train myself to shoot very well right-handed with my dominant eye because I think this would give me an advantage in a tactical situation; I can flash the sites much more readily shooting with my weak hand and dominant eye. However, if one were to forget about aiming, and only focus as a thought experiment on controlling the firearm, moving it onto target and following a target, as well as reloads, slide and magazine drops, etc., my left hand is pretty much automatic by now in a good way.

I would very much appreciate your advice on whether or not I should focus on shooting dominant arm and dominant eye, or if I should switch to dominant eye weak hand.

On an unrelated but also very important note, I had an epiphany (somewhat rare for me! :-)) – I can shoot 9 mm much faster and with more realistic confidence of hitting the target then I can with 40 and 45 caliber. What is your opinion on selling all of my autoloaders and settling on a single pistol in 9 mm (of course having duplicates of the same gun) and becoming really, really good at it? For recreational shooting I am a revolver guy, so all of my autoloaders, while shot often, hold no emotional pull for me. Sorry for the length of this post, but I will take your advice to heart. Thanks again, Mike.

[ToddG]

Short version: use your most dextrous hand with your dominant eye and don't think about the rest.

Long version: see here

[JeffJ]

What Todd said, I'm cross dominant (but opposite from you) - It makes absolutly no difference in a pistol, I don't even realize that I do anything different that anyone else, although occasionally another shooter will notice.

It becomes a bit more of an issue with long guns, but FWIW I used to do a decent amount of sporting clays and skeet and I shoot a shotgun off of my right shoulder (left eye dominant) with both eyes open - the only trouble I ever had was if I shot somebody's gun with one of those damn fiber optic sight on them - my left eye would grab that sight and I would basically be sighting down the wrong plane. Rifles are of course another story and I just squint my left eye a little and let the right take over (with iron sights) a scope does the work for me - the .mil guys will tell you to switch shoulders and shoot both eyes open on a rifle, but that takes a lot of commitment and I don't shoot rifles enough to make the swich YMMV

As far as the caliber thing goes, I think you'll find plenty of 9mm fans on this forum - I think the adavantages (cost, recoil, capacity) definatly outweigh the disadvantages (neglible (flame retardent suit on now) ballistic differences in modern JHP ammo). Practicing with one platform will most likely get you to a higher level faster than jumping around. Now selling all your other guns... maybe, maybe not - some people enjoy collecting, and others enjoy shooting, others enjoy both - it's really a financial decision that's up to you as far as if you want a bunch of "safe queens" or if you want to convert those to more ammo and shoot more.

[JHC]

Timely topic for me. My younger son is a lefty and can shoot a rifle reasonably well but has had a helluva bad time with a pistol. Sunday as I was completely tapped out for more coaching advice I just said fuckit, lets try something completely different and switched him over to right hand. He is left eye dominant. And right handed his hits improved dramatically. DRAMATICALLY. I look forward to studying Todd's "long version" on the blog.

[JeffJ]

JHC - I didn't realize that I was cross dominant until I was in college and started shooting shotguns a lot. I had done some rifle shooting growing up and always just closed my left eye - never was around anyone to tell me I was doing it wrong.

Once I discovered that I was cross dominant, it helped with a lot of different things; throwing darts, shooting pool, even doing things like woodwork, especially with hand tools and cutting to a line etc. It's something that is good to be cognizant of but, when it comes to pistols it's so easy to bring the gun up to the dominant eye that it really doens't affect much.

[Novice]

Thanks for your advice – I'll focus on dominant eye with the dexterous hand from now on. Great article, too.

[mongooseman]

"What is your opinion on selling all of my autoloaders and settling on a single pistol in 9 mm (of course having duplicates of the same gun) and becoming really, really good at it?"

I've jumped platforms and calibers for years with two goals in mind:to become proficient (relatively ) with anything I pick up, and to find the magic combination of caliber and handgun. That being said, I've been shooting only one handgun for months in 9mm and I see a huge difference. Partially because I'm more structured in my practices and because I have been shooting so much. I have to qualify with a .40 caliber Glock and I have no problems making hits with it. I also shot a co-workers XDM in .45 and it was fun to slam steel targets around with the 230 grain ball. After shooting those pistols I was amazed at how easy follow up shots with the 9mm are. As soon as I take care of some bills and repairs, the plan is to get another pistol in the same caliber. Find what works best for you and stick to it.

[ubervic]

What Todd said, I'm cross dominant (but opposite from you) - It makes absolutly no difference in a pistol, I don't even realize that I do anything different that anyone else, although occasionally another shooter will notice.

It becomes a bit more of an issue with long guns, but FWIW I used to do a decent amount of sporting clays and skeet and I shoot a shotgun off of my right shoulder (left eye dominant) with both eyes open...

I have shot clays for many years and noticed my cross-dominance issue only within the past few years (as my overall eyesight has declined a bit). I find no issue or challenge with pistol-shooting, however, perhaps because so much focus is trained on the front sight alone, and I can sight-in well with right eye/right hand.

[Jason]

Close/squint one eye, the open one becomes dominant.

[JWTORNADO]

I am right eye dominate yet I changed over from right pistol shooting to left hand and now I shoot max left handed. I also shoot shoot ambidextrous with rifles, but better right handed, and I am equally ambidextrous with shot guns. I learned this trait in my early thirties when my hand gun jammed on me and I had to use my Dad's gun to qualify at the range, and since i had never used his weapon I bit the bullet and went to the range to see how I would with my left hand and found that I went from 140 out of 150 to 150 out of 150 so now I am lefty and right dominate with pistols. I have premuch used the same process with rifles and shot guns all my life so it is diffucult to say if one would benefit by the change without trying it out.

First off, I read through most of posts on the forum, and this is one of the better forums I have found so far – thanks for creating it.

I am a relatively new shooter (five years shooting experience once or twice a month). I think I can control handguns better in my dominant left-hand, but find that when I present the weapon with my right hand, it lines up very naturally with my right dominant eye. I would like to think that I am not so far ingrained in shooting left-handed, and that I might be able to train myself to shoot very well right-handed with my dominant eye because I think this would give me an advantage in a tactical situation; I can flash the sites much more readily shooting with my weak hand and dominant eye. However, if one were to forget about aiming, and only focus as a thought experiment on controlling the firearm, moving it onto target and following a target, as well as reloads, slide and magazine drops, etc., my left hand is pretty much automatic by now in a good way.

I would very much appreciate your advice on whether or not I should focus on shooting dominant arm and dominant eye, or if I should switch to dominant eye weak hand.

On an unrelated but also very important note, I had an epiphany (somewhat rare for me! :-)) – I can shoot 9 mm much faster and with more realistic confidence of hitting the target then I can with 40 and 45 caliber. What is your opinion on selling all of my autoloaders and settling on a single pistol in 9 mm (of course having duplicates of the same gun) and becoming really, really good at it? For recreational shooting I am a revolver guy, so all of my autoloaders, while shot often, hold no emotional pull for me. Sorry for the length of this post, but I will take your advice to heart. Thanks again, Mike.