The Flinch, Pre-Ignition Push, "Unwanted Gun Movement"

[Sal Picante]

This is a cross-post from another discussion board, but I think it has merit here:

Getting back to shooting has been rough and I've noticed that I've developed a bit of a flinch...

To combat that, in the past, I've used a Rogers staggered ball-and-dummy drill (Search this forum for a post about it...) to fix. I want to push beyond a largely static drill and do something more to engrain shit into my psyche not to flinch.

So... We've started practicing a lot with snap caps mixed in. Lots of snap caps. The idea is that once you notice you have a flinch, you complete your drill (a stage-let) and then immediately work through a Rogers staggered magazine (~5 live shots). You're looking for the flinch to be minimized, almost eliminated. Planning to work this into my standard practices over the winter.

Questions:
1.) Does anyone use this or a similar approach in their training? Did it help?
2.) I think the pre-ignition push/flinch is a ruin of accuracy. I think seasoned shooters have better "timing", but that it is unpredictable and goes agains the whole "press the trigger straight back without disturbing the sights". What say you? Do you have evidence to the contrary?
3.) I'm curious what some of the precision shooters might have to say about this... Do you guys try to get rid of the flinch?

[ubervic]

I struggle to stifle the flinch. It's hard not to creep towards exerting a little force to counteract the anticipated recoil during long live-fire sessions.
I've been dry-practicing much more lately, so I am tracking the impact of that dry work as best I can during live-fire.

[voodoo_man]

Flinches a funny thing because they come and go, sometimes its mental, sometimes its physical.

I cannot speak for other but i experience flinching with a pistol after or in specific scenarios:

Punching, hitting or impact to my trigger hand. If I want to shoot immediately after an impact I know that I need to slow down and take my time with the trigger because I know through experience and training I will have a temporary flinch.

After I do a lot of trigger pulling, especially with an auto weapon I will develop a temporary trigger flinch.

Overly concentrating on my trigger press produces the same temporary flinch.

I mitigate this by knowing I have it and knowing that i need to slow down.

Normally putting the gun down stepping away and clearing my head will work.

[rob_s]

Longtime flincher here. With a long time shooting and fighting the flinch I have a really good sense of what it means to me. I haven't been shooting in months due to recent move and job change. When I get back to it I intend to use this.

50/50 Drill #1
Load one round in the gun and bring the gun to the line, hold the sights aligned on the horizontal line and calmly press the trigger. Once you fire the shot, hold it there for a moment, then bring the firearm back down and then — within three seconds — bring it back up and dry fire immediately. Note your reaction when you dry fire the shot. Repeat this sequence 50 times.

50/50 Drill #2
Load one round in the gun, bring the gun up to the line and fire the shot. Immediately reacquire the sights and dry fire the second shot. Note your reaction.

[Luke]

How does one separate post ignition push and flinch?

Is post ignition push a bad thing?

[Jared]

The 22 helps, and dear Lord do I miss the days of readily available 22LR for under $20 for 500+ rounds.

Jay Cunningham has posted some really good stuff about flinching.

I've got a pet theory (that's likely unprovable) about flinching and the "honeymoon period" people tend to experience after a gun switch.

[YVK]

Questions:
1.) Does anyone use this or a similar approach in their training? Did it help?
2.) I think the pre-ignition push/flinch is a ruin of accuracy. I think seasoned shooters have better "timing", but that it is unpredictable and goes agains the whole "press the trigger straight back without disturbing the sights". What say you? Do you have evidence to the contrary?
3.) I'm curious what some of the precision shooters might have to say about this... Do you guys try to get rid of the flinch?

1. I used to do B&D a lot and it didn't do much for my flinch. I do believe in a theory that B&D is not helpful at faster rates when the observer can't reliably differentiate from pre- vs post-ignition push.
2. I agree that it is a ruin of accuracy but I have struggled to assign a value of relative importance. At some point I convinced myself that my trigger control was fine and my misses were because of a flinch. Later I became surprised that my hits became better after I worked on trigger press.

I am being a master of obvious here but I treat flinch as a function of tension, and tension as a function of pushing hard. When I see myself flinch, I try to relax.

[TiroFijo]

Never used a ball + dummy, or coin on top of the slide, or anything like that...

Still, I'm a decent shooter (when I don't flinch ) and since I know what the gun, the load and myself can do it is very easy to recognize when I'm the cause of those ""Unwanted Gun Movements" at moment of firing.

Like the others said, relax, put the gun down, and clear your mind. Then start again.

[Mr_White]

So... We've started practicing a lot with snap caps mixed in. Lots of snap caps. The idea is that once you notice you have a flinch, you complete your drill (a stage-let) and then immediately work through a Rogers staggered magazine (~5 live shots). You're looking for the flinch to be minimized, almost eliminated. Planning to work this into my standard practices over the winter.

Questions:
1.) Does anyone use this or a similar approach in their training? Did it help?
2.) I think the pre-ignition push/flinch is a ruin of accuracy. I think seasoned shooters have better "timing", but that it is unpredictable and goes agains the whole "press the trigger straight back without disturbing the sights". What say you? Do you have evidence to the contrary?

I haven't tried mixing snap caps in for some time. The last time I did, a couple years ago I think, I remember feeling like it was actually inducing a flinch. That was random ball and dummy (I don't remember what kind of drill I was doing though) and I feel like it amounted to too much concentration on not flinching, leading to flinching.

I much prefer the Rogers staggered ball and dummy, but that's a little different from the way it works with random ball and dummy. Actually, I guess I do end up doing a similar thing to you even if not in the staggered ball and dummy format. It I catch myself flinching, I often immediately unload and do some dry presses and make sure I don't flinch and I reaffirm isolating the trigger finger (as time goes on, that has a more and more distinct internal feeling for me.)

The pre-ignition vs. post-ignition thing also kind of messes up the random ball and dummy scheme, unless someone is really good at telling the difference between pre and post ignition push. Very easy to mistake one for the other. I agree that post-ignition push goes against the idea of a surprise trigger break (if that's what you meant by 'press the trigger straight back and not disturb the sights.') But I don't think there's any getting around it if we are talking practical shooting or shooting at speed. That's one of the things that I think makes it difficult. Shooting is physically tense. Mentally, I think people are usually better off more relaxed. Drawing, reloading, shooting, transitioning, all involve rapid switching back and forth between tension and relaxation and that's challenging. We do need to press the trigger straight back and not disturb the sights....until the shot is fired, then we need to get the gun back on target. But don't do the second part before the first part. Internal timing, yes. Varies, yes. That's why it's hard.

I don't think I gave you much an answer there. Basically, what you said is the way I think it is, and it is definitely challenging. But I used so many words again, so at least there's that.

[Sal Picante]