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Thread: Thumb conundrum

  1. #11
    Deadeye Dick Clusterfrack's Avatar
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    Thumb conundrum

    Shooting handguns well takes a lot of hard work. Grip is possibly the most fundamental thing of all. So, #1 is the way to go for sure. #2 is a no-go because building other skills on a suboptimal grip will become more problematic. “What works for me” isn’t important until you get to a much higher level. Until then, stick to technique accepted by the top shooters.

    You’re already off to a good start by being self-critical and asking for advice.

    Edit to address question above: don’t worry too much about interfering with the slide stop. Just shoot for a while and get used to the new grip. Watch how your sights track in recoil. (Straight up and down is good.) Then, you can figure out of there’s a problem with the slide stop.

    Quote Originally Posted by Chewbacca10 View Post
    1. I just need more time to acclimate myself to the new grip. Thus far, I have spent about two hours with the thumbs-forward grip in the basement. Once I practice more extensively with it, I'll be a better shooter.

    2. That grip just does not work for me, and rather than try and completely change my grip, I ought to continue with what seems to be working for me and work on building other skills from there.

    I should probably specify that I am not interested in competition shooting or shooting pretty touching groups. I'm interested in reasonable accuracy at reasonable speed for self-defense purposes (my current benchmark that I use to measure my progress is the FBI qualification test). Obviously, those terms are open to interpretation, but that's a rough description of why I am shooting handguns.
    Last edited by Clusterfrack; 08-03-2020 at 10:21 PM.
    "You can never have too many knives." --Joe Ambercrombie
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  2. #12
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    Quote Originally Posted by Chewbacca10 View Post
    Thanks for the replies, all.

    The videos were quite helpful. I know now that I didn't have my support-hand wrist straight enough. The main issue that I have remaining is that the right-hand side of thumb on my firing hand seems to be touching the slide release lever slightly. I don't know what that's going to do under recoil, but it may be a little while before I can get to the range. Is the position of that thumb a concern?

    So, from what I am gathering, the thumbs-forward position seems to be the dominant position. However, it seems as though there are at least some authorities on the topic who are a little less rigid on that. Case in point:



    At any rate, I'll continue working on the thumbs-forward grip and see how it feels after a few weeks.
    The thumbs forward grip is a two handed grip for semi auto pistols. As noted it is better described as the "pronated wrist" grip since proper execution of this grip involves minimizing use of the thumbs, whether they point forward, flag up etc.

    Shooting revolvers and one handed shooting are separate topics.

    The issue with using the old locked down thumb grip for two handed shooting semi auto pistols is the locked down thumb creates a a gap and weak point in the grip. It is an 80% solution. That may be "good enough" or it may not. I'm not willing to leave that performance on the table.

    Recoil is like water and will take the path of least resistance. If you give it a gap, it will take that gap. Think about gripping a water balloon with both grips and what it would look like.

    re: interference with the slide stop, it is a matter of the individual interface between the gun, your hands, and your grip. You pressure test it buy shooting under time pressure and adjust as necessary. Some platforms may not work with your hands or your grip. With a proper, high, thumbs forward grip I often do not get lock back on my duty G17. However, it is the grip that gives me the best performance. With 18 rounds in the gun I'll take that performance bump over slide lock back. Other solutions to this could be modified parts (in my case the Kagwerks Glock Slide stop) or changing platforms.

    There is not one perfect solution for everything. The best performance comes with dedicated work on one make and model of gun, second best (and more common) is dedicated work on one "family" of guns i.e. all Glocks, all 1911s, all S&W M&Ps etc. or similar guns from different makers such as all Striker fired or all TDA guns.

  3. #13
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    Good grip video from Vogel; check out 1:38 where he mentions the torquing grip of the firing hand:

  4. #14
    Quote Originally Posted by Chewbacca10 View Post
    The main issue that I have remaining is that the right-hand side of thumb on my firing hand seems to be touching the slide release lever slightly.
    The long slide release lever of the P30 tempts the thumb to rest on it. (I've shot about 25,000 rounds with P30 pistols, so I know it a little bit.)

    What can happen due to this is that the slide does not stay open, after you've fired the last round. The problem gets worse, when the magazine spring gets older and weaker (the magazine spring pushes the lever up, if the magazine is empty). This is why I avoid putting the thumb on this lever.

    Quote Originally Posted by HCM View Post
    Other solutions to this could be modified parts (in my case the Kagwerks Glock Slide stop) or changing platforms.
    For the P30, there exists a hardware solution, too: The slide release lever of the P30S, the model with an external safety, is shorter. A few P30 users have replaced the long P30 lever with the P30S lever, I didn't.

    PS:
    Clarifying myself: The magazine spring does not get weaker just by getting older but by being compressed many times. I'm not a native English speaker, I hope my English is not too bad. I've learned much about shooting by reading posts from the people here. I think, this is the best pistol shooting forum in the world (I'm from Germany).
    Last edited by P30; 08-04-2020 at 01:52 AM.

  5. #15
    @Chewbacca10
    Try what Bob Vogel shows at 1:43 in the above video ("driving the web of the hand up", "pinching motion"). I automatically don't put my thumb on the lever, when I implement this. It helps even more for controlling recoil, this is its main purpose, not touching the slide release lever is a positive side-effect for me.
    Last edited by P30; 08-04-2020 at 02:27 AM.

  6. #16
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    Quote Originally Posted by Chain View Post
    Good grip video from Vogel; check out 1:38 where he mentions the torquing grip of the firing hand:
    Just keep in mind that Bob Vogel teaches Bob Vogel’s grip which typically works for Bob Vogel and a select few people. Great dude and he’s got an awesome grip, but his specific technique is difficult to execute consistently for a lot of people.

  7. #17
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    Lots of videos and info so far - probably enough to completely send you into analysis paralysis. The ONE video I would study (they're all good for certain things) for all-around grip success on any gun with any shape grip is the Mike Seeklander video. Pay close attention starting around the 3:15 mark about counter-rotating your hands. This puts an enormous amount of pressure at the rear of the grip without having to "squeeze the oil out of the gun" as Rob Leatham says.

    I've worked the Vogel grip, the Haley grip, the Langdon grip, etc but I always come back to Seeklander's instruction.

  8. #18
    Deadeye Dick Clusterfrack's Avatar
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    All the discussion about various grip techniques shows how robust the standard thumbs-forward grip is. There are a lot of ways to implement it.

    I drank the "grip the fuck out of it" koolaid for years, and it's only been in the last three years that I found I didn't need to do that, even with light plastic guns. All it takes is a quick search on Youtube to watch teenage girl grandmasters shoot and you can see that Vogel or Seeklander level of hand strength is simply not necessary for even very high levels of shooting.

    If the gun doesn't move inside your hands, and your grip doesn't come apart during recoil, that's enough grip.

    I grip hard with my support hand, and medium with my firing hand. No counter rotation, extreme wrist angles, or that kind of thing. Just a comfortable grip with very stiff wrists.

    The only guns I have to really crush are mouseguns like a LCP or snubby.
    "You can never have too many knives." --Joe Ambercrombie
    Shabbat shalom, motherf***ers! --Mordechai Jefferson Carver

  9. #19
    Deadeye Dick Clusterfrack's Avatar
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    I posted this somewhere before, but here it is again:

    There are a lot of people who don't really know why what they do works, and some of these people are very accomplished shooters. After spending serious time down Hwansik Kim's rabbit hole, I think there is:

    1) Confusion between gripping hard and locking the wrist. It is not obvious that these can be done independently unless you work on it.

    2) Confusion between gripping the gun hard and returning the gun after recoil. These are not the same thing, and aren't directly related unless the gun is slipping inside the grip, or the grip is coming apart.

    3) Confusion between how everyone needs to grip guns, and how a particular gun fits one person's hand.
    "You can never have too many knives." --Joe Ambercrombie
    Shabbat shalom, motherf***ers! --Mordechai Jefferson Carver

  10. #20
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    Lotta good info here.

    My thoughts:

    I have taken a good bit of formal instruction. Some of it was quite good, and some of it was quite bad. Some of it was too advanced for me at the time, and some was counter to what I already believed to be best practices. Best bet is to do your homework befor spending your hard earned cash and expensive sweat. Someone who can coach you on the line and make things better for you is someone you want to listen to. They are someone to ask questions of and get drills from. Think relationship potential. In a coach/mentor/friend way.

    Self training is what I can afford to do most of the time. Changing something as fundamental as grip, or stance when I went from Isosceles to Weaver back to Isosceles is a big undertaking. Weeks of dry and live fire. And the level of self awareness required is huge. It is not for everyone. Prior, quality, instruction really helps in this manner.

    @YVK and @Clusterfrack have excellent points on the whole Bruce Lee zen of it all, where you do what is necessary to do what you need to do. They are two (of many) people that I really try to make time to listen to here. I have moments where I am capable of that. I also believe that this takes more skill, training and knowledge to know what needs to be done, how to do it, as well as what you are currently doing that you need to stop doing. Part of my desire in learning to do this drives co-workers batty. And at the end of the day I am responible for standardized instruction. So when my shooters are having trouble and need to be remediated I can offer small tweaks that may or may not help right then, but everything I do to help them when they are struggling needs to be documented.

    I have tried stuff I have seen in books, and video. I find video more helpful, if still somewhat limited.

    That is not to say that the cause is hopeless. My favorite people to shoot with are those that are more proficient than I am, and those that are less proficient. The ones that are better than me I can ask questions of why and how they do what they do. Either they can explain it, or they can't. Either they can see what I am doing and coach me, or they can't. As far as those less proficient, I can often recognize some of my bad habits in others, and in trying to explain the issue to them I have a few monkey touch a monolith moments.

    I very firmly believe in getting quality initial training, then practicing on my own for a year or three until I can afford to get some formal sustainment training. If you have the scratch then more frequent formal training is good. Practicing on your own should be dry practice and live fire. I try to keep notes on all the drills I am exposed to, and what I think of them. Timers and notebooks and scorable targets are necessary, lasers and widgets and other electronics are nice, but not necessary. With enough training and practice, you can zen out and start teaching yourself.

    Sorry, up past my bedtime again...

    pat
    Last edited by UNM1136; 08-04-2020 at 11:12 AM.

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