Todd Louis Green and the modern approach to using your sights

[TCinVA]

I went to a class with Tim Herron as well and fully agree that his class was worth that tidbit about what I kinda came to understand as "rear sight focus"

It's what started me down the path of figuring out how to finally describe exactly what "see what you need to see" means to people who need a clear explanation.

It didn't take immediately. I struggled with the concept in his class. It wasn't until after his class when I was on the range experimenting that I figured out the rest of it. I drew to a hostage plate at 25 yards and saw white through my rear sight window and my front sight was surrounded by white and I just sent it with no further prevarication. It resulted in hitting the dead center of that plate and spinning it, and then everything crystalized. Distance didn't matter. I didn't have to check my sight and re-check it and worry about whether it was good enough.

I just saw a "go" signal I could process as a "go" signal quickly and went. And it worked. And now I knew what I wish I could have told myself 20 years ago about using sights.

So far in class it's been something clients have found immensely helpful.

I think my strongest asset as an instructor is that I'm not exceptionally gifted or talented at any of this. My eyesight isn't superior, I wasn't born with exceptional hand-eye coordination, etc. I've had to learn most everything I know the hard way, usually through repeated demoralizing failure. It's not the most enjoyable process, but the one upside is that I think I understand what a typical person is missing when they come to training and I can focus on bridging that gap.

Ashton and I say outright that what we teach in our pistol classes is the stuff we wish would have been explained the way we explain it 20 years ago.

Everybody who has ever fired an accurate shot with a handgun has had to use the exact same process because it's physics, not magic. Understanding the process properly creates vastly superior results.

[Jim Watson]

Just for fun...
"Half the bravos in town are chopping into their target with the beam already hot. You can stop them if you have a quick wrist."

[luckyman]

TC, just to make sure I don’t mis-translate anything, could you more precisely define what you mean by “rear sight window” in the context of iron sights?

[TCinVA]

TC, just to make sure I don’t mis-translate anything, could you more precisely define what you mean by “rear sight window” in the context of iron sights?

That section in the rear sight where it's cut out? The part you are supposed to see the front sight through? That's the window. The notch. Whatever you want to call it.

You see the specific target area you want to hit through that window.

If the target you are trying to hit is bigger than that window and your front sight is in that window somewhere, you'll hit it.

If it is smaller than that window, put your front sight on that specific target area as seen through the rear window and you'll hit it.

[Totem Polar]

I think my strongest asset as an instructor is that I'm not exceptionally gifted or talented at any of this. My eyesight isn't superior, I wasn't born with exceptional hand-eye coordination, etc. I've had to learn most everything I know the hard way, usually through repeated demoralizing failure. It's not the most enjoyable process, but the one upside is that I think I understand what a typical person is missing when they come to training and I can focus on bridging that gap.

Ashton and I say outright that what we teach in our pistol classes is the stuff we wish would have been explained the way we explain it 20 years ago.

I agree with this premise whole-heartedly, and I suspect that you are indeed that sort of instructor. Your writing displays a clarity of thought and process that can only come through serious amounts of time wresting with the subject.

[luckyman]

That section in the rear sight where it's cut out? The part you are supposed to see the front sight through? That's the window. The notch. Whatever you want to call it.

You see the specific target area you want to hit through that window.

If the target you are trying to hit is bigger than that window and your front sight is in that window somewhere, you'll hit it.

If it is smaller than that window, put your front sight on that specific target area as seen through the rear window and you'll hit it.

Thanks. Yes I had always heard that called the “notch” so I was wondering if “window” meant something else like the whole width of the rear sight.

[TCinVA]

I also have this thing about language. The more we can relate language to things people understand well in other contexts, the simpler the learning process becomes for them.

If I call it a window people have a tendency to subconsciously think "Something I look through to see something else" and thus I don't need to explain that concept.

I'm all for correct technical language when it is necessary, but if I've got 8 hours to teach somebody what they are going to have to rely on to save their life the more I can borrow from what they already know and understand the better. I always try to find out what a client does besides training classes so I can relate what we're doing in terms they already understand.

[Hstanton1]

This may just be the single most helpful thread I have come across on this forum. I’m new enough to shooting that I learned on a Glock, and most of my time has been spent on red dots, but learning to shoot well with iron sights has always been a goal of mine for a number of reasons.

The three step approach and general expansion on “see what you need to see” articulates answers to questions that I didn’t even know I had.

A question though, with this method in mind, what’s the ideal (maybe that’s not the right word) shape/size for a front sight? Just something bright enough to catch your attention as being within or not within the window of the rear sight?

I ask because I’m finding the thick, painted front sight on my brig tac easier to pick up in general than a small fiber optic front sight, but I lose precision and a sense of where that sight is within the window, if that makes sense.

[Warped Mindless]

If this thread was around 10 years ago I would have saved myself a lot of money and ammo.

Forwarding it to all the new shooters that are popping up lately.

[Warped Mindless]

That section in the rear sight where it's cut out? The part you are supposed to see the front sight through? That's the window. The notch. Whatever you want to call it.

You see the specific target area you want to hit through that window.

If the target you are trying to hit is bigger than that window and your front sight is in that window somewhere, you'll hit it.

If it is smaller than that window, put your front sight on that specific target area as seen through the rear window and you'll hit it.

What’s it mean when you look through the window, at you target, completely target focused and you don’t see any sights? If I focus back on the sights they are in perfect alignment but if I’m 100% target focused my mind blocks out the sights totally and doesn’t even give me a blur.