I shoot 115gr Winchester White Box the vast majority of the time for practice. My preferred defensive round is 124HST or 124 Gold Dot. I feel like the biggest thing to take note of is the difference in how they pattern in your gun. If one shoots high and the other slightly lower, or this round needs a tip of the front sight, this one needs a drive the dot... that kind of thing. I feel like that's more important than difference in recoil impulse. There will likely be a difference, but the focus is usually on getting the bullet where you want it... if you focus too much on the recoil you're bound to mess up the more important part.
That being said, outside of a few local steel matches I'm not a competitive shooter yet.
-Cory