point shooting from the hip ?

Williamsburg Hipsters....

If you hang out in Williamsburg in Brooklyn NY, you'll see a lot of "hipsters" :D

Don't get me wrong, I do not advocate "point" or "hip" shooting. It's cool if you are a legend like Bill Jordan or COL Applegate or Fitz Fitzgerald but for most gunners & license holders, use of the sights is ideal.

Many years ago, NYPD detective & pistol team member; Jim Cerillo was asked what he saw in a police shoot-out. Cerillo said; "I counted every serration in the front sight of my revolver." ;)
James Cirello was a highly respected LE officer & became a US Customs instructor when he retired from the NYPD.
He & his other stake out squad members used pistols & DA revolvers, always training to shoot with sights.

Clyde
 
A good two handed CQB pistol hold...is right in front of your chest about the level or your diaphragm, with the elbows folded against the side of the body, with the forearms slightly extended. You'll have to swivel your hips to achieve horizontal multi-directional shot angles.
 
Erno86, sure it is.

However, I think that is usually taught for instances when one already has a gun drawn, and is moving about in a searching or clearing mode.

I don't think it is taught for drawing and firing when one is under immediate, very close attack. I could be mistaken. In those circumstances, a two handed hold may be preempted by the need to use the support hand for some other function (blocking, striking, grabbing, deflecting, pushing, etc).
 
Al, thanks.

Note that in the video, he has the gun in one hand. His other arm is in an elbow strike posture that also keeps his weak hand well clear of the muzzle.
 
The reason that I am interested in point shooting is that my 60+ year old eyes can track a target pretty well until that gun sight comes into my line of sight. Then I start fighting the strong eye against the weak eye and my sight picture goes out the window. If I take my time, I sort things out pretty quickly and at 30 feet I consistently put 12 rounds in the 8-9 ring.
I want to keep both eyes on the target and hit what I actually see without having to think about it. I have seen the FBI training films where the average agent was achieving this at what looked to be 15-20 feet. They were hitting stationary and moving targets both. If it worked in 1940 it ought to work now?
 
Tartan Butler...

Match shooter Tartan Butler of Southern California has a www.youtube.com clip of shooting 6 targets with a Glock pistol with a recorded time of 1.98 seconds :D.

He used the hip/CQB method.
If you constantly train & have the time/$$$ you can learn to use hip shooting but for most license holders/CCW license holders it's not a smart choice.
 
ClydeFrog said:
Match shooter Tartan Butler of Southern California has a www.youtube.com clip of shooting 6 targets with a Glock pistol with a recorded time of 1.98 seconds .

He used the hip/CQB method....
Click to expand...

You must mean this one.

But here and here he seems to be using his sights and seems to be doing somewhat better.

Note how close the targets are when he's shooting without his sights compared to his shooting with his sights.
 
Such displays seem impressive, until you consider that likely the shooter has been practicing repeatedly, from a consistent position, against those targets, also in a consistent position. Move the shooter and the targets and see how well he does.
 
csmsss said:
Such displays seem impressive, until you consider that likely the shooter has been practicing repeatedly, from a consistent position, against those targets, also in a consistent position. Move the shooter and the targets and see how well he does.
Click to expand...
Good point. Look at the Taran Butler videos again, especially the one in which he's shooting the USPSA course of fire. Notice how quickly he can shoot, even with movement, from varying positions at targets at varying distance, when using his sights. Unsighted fire really has no great speed advantage.

Yes, it takes a lot of practice to shoot that quickly using one's sights. But it also takes a lot of practice to shoot well without the use of sights. Being able to shoot quickly with sights gives one a great deal more flexibility.

A primary use of shooting without sights, from the retention position, is to keep the gun out of reach of the target when the target is close.
 
That is the point I have been making. It may not offer a speed advantage, but retention is another matter.
 
Match shooter Tartan Butler of Southern California has a www.youtube.com clip of shooting 6 targets with a Glock pistol with a recorded time of 1.98 seconds .

He used the hip/CQB method.
If you constantly train & have the time/$$$ you can learn to use hip shooting but for most license holders/CCW license holders it's not a smart choice.
Click to expand...

The guy is a master level shooter. There are maybe a dozen people in the world can shoot like that.
 
Butler; shooting....

Thanks for the correction. :D
To my knowledge(articles about Butler himself), he only started target shooting in the late 1990s/early 2000s. He trains a lot & is a sponsored pistol shooter but he shows that with effort & proper technique almost anyone can be a great shooter.

CF
 
Having the benefit of my own back yard pistol range I've practiced drawing and shooting from the hip a bit. Not a lot, but IME it's not as hard as you'd think. I'd have a hard time hitting a bulls eye, but at 10 yards it's very doable to keep all my shots within a standard silhouette.
I shoot at steel, so I don't like to get much closer than 10yds, but I assume a 12" group at 10yds would translate into a 6" group at 5yds which - while it isn't "good" - isn't terrible. And that's a shooter of moderate ability and maybe 100 rounds of practice.

I don't have one, but a crimson trace might be a good investment to get an idea of where you're aiming without having to shoot. I'm not sure that the laserlyte targets would work all that well for this as they tend to be kind of small, where as a laser sight would show you where you were pointing even if you're way off.
I haven't tried anything more difficult that shooting at static targets, and I imagine it would be trickier, but again it's probably just going to come down to practice..
I don't know how much training would help though. I started noodling around with it after I watched the hip shooting "top shot" episode where the basics were explained, and then it was just a case of lots of practice.

On a pragmatic note since hip shooting tends to involve bending your wrist a lot you probably want to use a revolver, or - if you're using an auto - make sure you're not bending your wrist enough that the slide could come back and bite you.
I've mostly used a ruger 22/45 and not had an issue, but using, say a 1911, might require a little more care.
 
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