What does "follow through" mean?

A stool has to have three legs in contact with the ground all at the same time.
Focusing on one aspect of shooting is OK,but if you compromise any others,you may not see results.

I'm certainly not the expert to explain it to you.You can find a percentage of really good stuff on Youtube.
Rob Leatham's name has been dropped a few times,mostly regarding "trigger slap"
When I watch Rob Leatham,he is about being sufficiently accurate to not drop any points,while realizing the shot that is 0.1 second slower is the loser.
There is an umbrella strategy,the "stool" that has been stated,point the gun at the target and don't move it till the bullet has left the gun.
To that end,how your feet are on the ground,how your bones are stacked,etc are components of the shot.
Rob Leatham emphasizes no amount of sight focus makes up for moving the gun as you pull the trigger.He then demonstrates some pretty darn good ,fast shooting with his eyes closed.
First foundation is grip.Done right,the gun is stable in the hand,AND movement during recoil is minimal.The gun also returns to point of aim.Ideally,it returns to sight picture.
If you don't begin with the foundation of grip,balance,and stance,you are chasing your tail.And BTW,that includes having your feet move.

An aspect of follow through is calling the shot.See the sight picture as the gun recoils.You can't do that with your eyes closed.Its a technique to discipline your eyes to stay open.

The desire to see target reaction causes problems.First,its time better spent getting and killing your next target.Maybe worse,is a recoil anticipation where you leave your sights,move your head to see the target better,and then shoot.

While follow through is essential,ideally it is not static. Its a dynamic series of sequences.

I recall the basics of learning foil fencing.A great deal of emphasis was put on static poses ;step one,step two...
It was,for me,a major hurdle to incorporate all those fixed pose drills into one smooth/explosive movement.
Try the Rob Leatham videos. See what you think.Try Jerry Miculeks videos.
Study,and practice,the grip and stance they teach.
Learn trigger control so you don't move the gun.
Call the shot so your eyes are open.
If the shot called good at the instant of recoil,you finger can relax at the trigger and you can recover from recoil with your sights on the next target,pressing the trigger.
 
Thanks for the information guys. There is a lot of it to digest. While that is a good thing in general, I think I'm getting more confused.

Actually, I think I've psyched myself out lately. Over tha past several months, I've tried to shoot smaller groups than I had been. I concentrated on sight picture, front sight focus, and a slow smooth trigger press. Unfortunately, my marksmanship has actually become worse. Right now I am miffed by what's happening.

I used to be able to keep all my shots inside a 6" circle from 7 yds. Not great, I know. But now my group is not only that large but high and left. On the pistol correction chart, that means I'm either pushing the shots or lacking follow through. Hence the reason I resurrected this thread.

I am also experiencing some truly awful flyers. Not even close. Those usually go way low and left. I have developed the yips, I think.

It might be time for me to hire a hands-on trainer who can watch what I'm doing and correct my errors.
 
I used to be able to keep all my shots inside a 6" circle from 7 yds. Not great, I know. But now my group is not only that large but high and left. On the pistol correction chart, that means I'm either pushing the shots or lacking follow through. Hence the reason I resurrected this thread.
Click to expand...
Ok, that's a good gauge of your skill level and I can give you solid advice that will be appropriate for where you are based on that information.

1. You have a bad flinch--you are anticipating the shot. At 7 yards, the gun is capable of making groups that are smaller than an inch and you should have no real difficulty doing the same assuming your visual acuity is normal and you have no unusual health issues like a hand tremor.

2. You should focus on sight alignment because at 7 yards the target does not need to be seen clearly to get good hits. Just understand that focusing on the sights won't solve the anticipation problem that is causing your groups to be so large.

3. Forget about trying to track the front sight during recoil and forget about trying to switch focus back and forth from the target from the sight. None of that is useful for shooting slowfire groups at 7 yards.

4. Forget about the pistol chart. You have a more foundational issue that needs to be addressed before that chart will be of any use to you.

Here's a good video to watch.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=li0rGtXh23I
I have developed the yips, I think.
Click to expand...
That's correct. You are getting the sights aligned perfectly and then spoiling the shot by moving the gun AFTER you make the decision to fire, right before the shot breaks.

Most likely you are blinking when you anticipate the shot actually firing and flinching at the same time which means that you don't actually see what's happening. So the last thing you see is perfect sight alignment, then you reflexively close your eyes (blink) as part of the flinch/anticipation and when you open them again, the shot didn't go where you wanted it to.

I've worked with shooters who have this problem and one thing I usually do at the very beginning of the session is to get them to align the sights with their finger off the trigger and then I reach over and press the trigger for them. They are amazed at the small size of the groups. Because they don't know when the shot will break, they can't flinch before the shot and the bullet goes where the sights are pointing. The secret is, of course, that the bullet ALWAYS goes where the sights are pointing, it's just that if you blink and then move the gun, you don't know where the sights are pointing and therefore you don't know where the bullet will go.

Start doing the following exercise as dryfire practice. Take the normal precautions for dryfiring to insure that you are practicing safely.

Count 1, 2, 3 at a normal speaking pace. Do NOT slow your pace when you start using the technique or alter it during the exercise.

Start from low ready.
Count 1 as the gun comes up on target.
Count 2 as the sights align on the target.
Count 3 as you break the shot.

Keep the sights on target after the shot breaks (follow through) and then go back to low ready and start again.

You should see the sights clearly starting at two and they should stay on target solidly from that point on until you reset to low ready to start again.

The point is to distract your brain from generating the flinch reflex by giving it something else to do and also by shortening the time it has to prepare to flinch.

By the way, BEFORE you can really do this exercise effectively you will need to be able to pull the trigger on your pistol in a reasonably short amount of time without moving the sights significantly. If you can't do that, then you need to practice dryfiring until you can.
 
Imo, simply put, it's retaining control and being steady to follow through with a second or even dozens of following shots.

Follow through is how a sniper can hit a target, rack the bolt and have his scope on target for the second time without a minute trace of wasted effort.

Follow through. Bring gun back to bear, release trigger to reset, observe that gun fired without jamming and went to target,that the first target was neutralized, whether or not another shot, or even another target requires more rounds.

Follow through, imo, has nothing at all to do with speed. They are actually the worst of enemies. Taking the few seconds to carry out the process of following through with the various aspects of the shot delays all further shots slightly. Focusing only on speed means that the shooter doesn't really care about control.

In slow, deliberate shooting, imo, it means to create consistency. Fire, retain position, keep control, observe,prepare for a repeat shot. If you rack your bolt with your eyes off of target, off the scope, rifle out of the proper position on shoulder,, squirming all over the position, you are not properly following through with tha round, retaining control of weapon or giving the situation proper attention.
 
JohnSKa .... Thanks!

I went to the range today and took your advice with me. My markmanship was much improved. I jave been either trying to track the front sight or peek at the target as the shot fired. Neither of those work, as you correctly pointed out.

Once I started to forget those things, I was hitting most within 3" of dead center from 10 yds ... much better than I have done previously. Also, when I shot more quickly, my group improved ... not as much time to psych myself out.

I think it will take some time to completely get rid of my bad habits, but I now know what they are and how to fix them.

You're a fine instructor. Best regards.
 
I'm very glad I could help out a little. It sounds like you're well on the way to making some serious improvement.

The basics of shooting are very simple. The problem is that your brain is very concerned about loud noises and rapid movements in front of your face. It wants to protect your face/eyes and so it tries to flinch away to keep everything safe. Controlling your reflexes is not easy, but it can be done and the payoff will show on the target!
 
John, since our conversation here, I've gone from miffed to highly encouraged. No more high left nonsense + ridiculous flyers. You cured my yips!

Thanks again, and long live the Republic. :-)
 
Glad your groupings improved. I learned follow-through via archery. With its lower velocity arrow, follow-through is much more important with archery than with modern firearms. If you can master follow-through in archery, shooting is a cinch.
 
Just to emphasize some of what John said:

The reason for front sight focus is mechanical. It's to keep your focus close enough that the rear sight is still clear enough to achieve adequate alignment. If you focus on the target or, as is a common error, let your focus drift out somewhere between the target and the front sight, the rear sight becomes so badly blurred that you lose all precision in the sight alignment. You can prove this to yourself by focusing on the target while using sandbags on the bench to keep the gun stable. Get the best sight alignment you can while focusing on the target. When you have it, without disturbing the gun, shift focus to the front sight and move your head, but not the gun, until the sight picture is correct. That shows you where you were actually aiming the gun vs. where you thought you were aligning it. Repeat by picking the gun up off the bags and starting over. Generally, you'll find you didn't get back to the same actual aim point with your focus beyond the front sight. You'll find repeating the exercise under different light conditions makes the actual point of aim move around, and this is the source of unreliability.

I appreciate the fellow thinking you should focus on the target because that's natural, but given how poor site focus is at that point, it is really moving you from aimed fire to a version of point shooting, which his a whole different can of worms. I won't stir the pot by getting into that discussion here. I'm only going to reiterate that target focus spoils aimed fire. Learn Cooper's color code, as it teaches you to program yourself to shift focus from the target to gun sight at the appropriate moment.

An exercise I find helpful is to put up a blank sheet of paper or a reversed target and get a good sight picture over the approximate center of paper. Practice keeping your eyes open and your grip undisturbed by watching where the sights settle after recoil. That is, you don't follow the sight as it recoils, but at discharge you will keep looking at where it was when it jumped out of view and on keeping your grip muscles in unchanged tension. These are both elements of follow-through. Just allow the gun to jump as it will and watch for the front sight's return into the rear sight notch.

In that exercise, what you are looking for is how well the front sight alignment survives the recoil event. If it returns to perfect or near-perfect alignment in the rear sight notch, then you have a near perfect grip for accurate placement of a second, fairly rapid follow-up shot (aka, the hammer, double-tap, etc.) when you get to where you want to try that. If the front sight is off to one side, you want to shift your grip on it or try different weak hand tension until you get the sight returning pretty close to perfectly. That's the point at which the gun is lining up with your bone and flesh structure to shoot repeatably into a group.
 
... you don't follow the sight as it recoils, but at discharge you will keep looking at where it was when it jumped out of view and on keeping your grip muscles in unchanged tension. These are both elements of follow-through. Just allow the gun to jump as it will and watch for the front sight's return into the rear sight notch.
Click to expand...

Yes! This is what I was not doing. I was following the front sight.

My instructor told the class to focus on the front sight and make a slow smooth trigger press, but he never to me or the class to keep your focus where the sight was and let it return there. I took his instruction literally.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top