The reality behind "Slow is smooth and smooth is fast."

[PPGMD]

3) I DON'T use a timer because there are no timers in a gunfight.

My response to that one is "Oh yes there is, but you find out if you didn't make the par time based on whether or not you get shot."

[JHC]

I think it's only right for the people it's right for.

Having been involved in competition shooting before I ever got any decent formal training, the tendency is to go fast, early, reinforcing bad habits before you even know you have them. The idea of getting someone to understand that they should work on the repetition slowly, to possibly un-learn those bad habits, is a good one.

There is a major trend in the shooting world for the various talking heads to forget where they came from, or what it was like to be a new(er) shooter, or just making that transition from dirt-shooter to purposeful-shooter, or whatever.

Slow is smooth, smooth is fast.

Seems pretty straightforward, and on-point, to me.

But, then, we live in a world where people also want to re-write the four rules, so go figure. I guess everyone needs a niche, whether it's useful, applicable, or not. Controversy seems to breed followers, and that seems to be what most people are after, so...

But the author explicitly made that point. Slow is to start learning the efficient method. But it does not equal fast.

[GardoneVT]

In the circles ive heard it at -read military folks at the local gun range-its just another cliche excuse for piss-poor performance.

Fast is Fast, Slow is Slow, and a hit is a Hit. Period. Imagine how fast i'd get laughed at if I failed my PT run time and said to the Clipboard Lady 'slow is smooth and smooth is fast'.

[John Hearne]

The phrase probably isn't perfect but the thought it is. Let's face its, spastic jerky motion is very inefficient and ends up being slower than smooth motion. No matter how you slice it, the best way to build perfect motor programs is to start slow and perform the desired movements PERFECTLY. At most 20% of my dry fire is at full speed, I very deliberately perform each step slowly and build from there to full speed.

I always saw the phrase as a long term training philosophy. With that said, it is a great excuse for mediocrity.

[nycnoob]

This phrase has always interested me since there are numerous martial arts which perform most practice at a slow speed (tai-chi and Aikido for example) so I would thing that there is some benefit to practicing at 1/2 speed or slower.

However if there is a benefit I have not been able to find it.

Bill Rogers has explicitly told me that he does not think this kind of practice helps people learn to shoot at his ranges full speed.

[GJM]

The phrase probably isn't perfect but the thought it is. Let's face its, spastic jerky motion is very inefficient and ends up being slower than smooth motion. No matter how you slice it, the best way to build perfect motor programs is to start slow and perform the desired movements PERFECTLY. At most 20% of my dry fire is at full speed, I very deliberately perform each step slowly and build from there to full speed.

I always saw the phrase as a long term training philosophy. With that said, it is a great excuse for mediocrity.

Maybe.

This past summer, out at our cabin, I was practicing draws to an 8 inch circle. at 7 yards. Not my preference, but a local guy, gun dude, hung around watching. My draws were pretty much in the .80's. His comment was I had tension, looked jerky in my hand movement, and should try to be smooth as "that was faster." My view is the timer doesn't lie, and assuming the same accuracy for both, I would rather have a jerky/tenser .85 draw, than a smooth 1.10 draw.

[Mr_White]

Bill Rogers has explicitly told me that he does not think this kind of practice helps people learn to shoot at his ranges full speed.

Bill has a great phrase on this point, 'You can't learn to hit fast pitches by hitting slow ones.'

This is one of the subtleties that affects how true or not 'slow is smooth, smooth is fast' is: is the motion itself actually the same when done slow and when done fast, or does the motion/technique become different or need to become different when done 'at speed' as opposed to when being done slower?

It doesn't just apply to the Rogers Range either.

Here's an example: lots of people have practiced releasing the trigger only to the reset point because they've been taught it's the most efficient way. They do various unpressured and mildly pressured shooting while 'riding the reset.' Works great, slow is smooth, smooth is fast, there it is. But then have them shoot faster because of being under a high degree of pressure (self-imposed or imposed by circumstance), and the motion itself often changes and the person can be seen to be letting the trigger out further than the reset when running the trigger at speed. Now, was slow, smooth practice at riding the reset even relevant? A discussion for the ages, I am sure.

And in this example, it also brings into question whether strict economy of motion is the overriding factor in final efficiency. Letting the trigger out further than the reset is, on it's face, more motion than only releasing to reset. But one way works for shooting at speed and the other doesn't work as well.

[orionz06]

Maybe.

This past summer, out at our cabin, I was practicing draws to an 8 inch circle. at 7 yards. Not my preference, but a local guy, gun dude, hung around watching. My draws were pretty much in the .80's. His comment was I had tension, looked jerky in my hand movement, and should try to be smooth as "that was faster." My view is the timer doesn't lie, and assuming the same accuracy for both, I would rather have a jerky/tenser .85 draw, than a smooth 1.10 draw.

I think the issue there is the time window. Take some footage and slow it down, how does it look then. I've done that about a year ago and found in real time a 1 second draw may look jerky, at half speed it looks smooth.

[Mr_White]

Maybe.

This past summer, out at our cabin, I was practicing draws to an 8 inch circle. at 7 yards. Not my preference, but a local guy, gun dude, hung around watching. My draws were pretty much in the .80's. His comment was I had tension, looked jerky in my hand movement, and should try to be smooth as "that was faster." My view is the timer doesn't lie, and assuming the same accuracy for both, I would rather have a jerky/tenser .85 draw, than a smooth 1.10 draw.

I have a pretty similar thing going on with my draw. I fumble it much more if I try to go slow and be smooth, because the motion is different than when I do it at full speed. When I draw at speed, it's explosive, I use some energy, I draw hard. There is what may appear to be excess motion. But put it on the timer and there isn't any question about what gets me a better result.

I don't know which one it was on, but Ben Stoeger commented in one of his podcasts that of the top level shooters in USPSA, some of them looked really smooth and effortless and others looked like they were jerky and explosive, but all had gotten to an objectively high level of skill. The point being that the way someone looks (smooth vs. jerky) wasn't a useful indicator of skill level or actual results.

[GardoneVT]

This phrase has always interested me since there are numerous martial arts which perform most practice at a slow speed (tai-chi and Aikido for example) so I would thing that there is some benefit to practicing at 1/2 speed or slower.

In my Karate dojo, we only work slowly when learning a new technique set or "kata". Once we've practiced the basics enough, we move on to sparring and faster execution, so that eventually we can perform the kata properly AND quickly. Personally , it all goes back to what Todd G said so long ago-we can't just have perfection of form OR high speed. To do "gun-kata" right , whatever you consider it to be , we need both at the same time. Without both, we're doing it wrong.