How to Shoot a Pistol? – Discover Everything You Need for Next Level Shooting

Pistols are uniquely American. Few countries in the world allow their citizens to own guns. Americans can not only own guns, they can own pistols. That is very rare on the planet and you should be taking advantage of this.

Learning to use a pistol like a carpenter uses a hammer, takes time, skill and expertise. If you’re completely new consider training. If you’ve been to the range a time or two, and you’d like to channel your inner John Wayne and sling lead from your sidearm, you’re in luck.​

This is the start of your pistol education for people who’ll be carrying a pistol for protection from predators, both 2 legged and 4 legged, and people wanting to get a start in handgun hunting.​

Whatever you want to do with your handgun you have to know these things…​

1. Pistol Shooting Fundamentals​

1.1 Sight Picture​

This is very simply how you’re engaging with the sight. Be it a red dot, a notch and post, or a magnified optic, you’re going to have to look at it and you’re going to have to use it properly.

This is where the adage ‘focus on the front sight’ come from. The rear sight should be fuzzy, the target should be slightly fuzzy but the front sight should be crystal clear. This allows your mind to completely level the top of the pistol and aim it perfectly at the target.​

If you’re using a red dot or a scope, focus on the target and make the reticle slightly fuzzy.​

1.2 Sight Alignment​

This is how the sights are supposed to be aligned together. On 99% of pistols you’re going to be using a notch and post style sight.

All you have to do is put the post in line with the top of the notch and put an equal amount of light on either side. Most sights will have dots to line up or a line and a dot. Either way, put the post in the middle and shoot. On scope or red dot’s going to vary but you’ll want the reticle to be centered and even as much as possible before you shoot.

1.3 Trigger Control​

This is usually the fundamental that gets people. Trigger control is the hardest fundamental to master because it’s the only physical part of shooting a gun. Shooting is 99% mental, there’s no physical reason you can line up a scope a nail a target at long range. The mental reason is because you’re freaking out from the recoil of the gun.

Guns scare everyone just a little bit when it goes off, everyone! Humans have a fear of sharp loud noises and a gun does exactly that and the reason most people can’t shoot pistols well is because they jerk the trigger and skew the shot. Essentially there’s two steps to a perfect trigger press.

That is all you have to do to have a perfect pull. In an ideal world, you’ll have pulled the trigger to the rear without disturbing the sights and the shot will go exactly where you intended it to. If not, some other fundamental was disturbed.​

1.4 Follow Through

Follow through can be called +1 when you’re shooting. All you have to do is make sure you hold the shooting position for a half second after the bullet leaves the gun. You need to hold the position because your mind will make you drop the gun or move the gun while you’re pulling the trigger.

There’s multiple ways to do ensure a proper follow through but the easiest is to do two things. Keep the sights aligned with the bullseye or target after the shot no matter where the shot went, and ease the trigger forward to the rest point without losing hold of it.

1.5 Breath Control – sometimes​

This is a hokey one. It only applies for those people shooting the smallest of groups and at the greatest of ranges. A great example would be a handgun hunter shooting out to 150 yards or more. The amount your chest moves when you’re breathing can be as much as an inch.

That inch up or down will make it impossible to hold your sight alignment still. The solution, hold your breath while squeezing the trigger. That’s all that’s required. No special rests, no weird equipment just hold your breath for the half second you need to pull the trigger.

If you do it with your breath all the way in or all the way it doesn’t matter as long as you’re completely motionless. If you’d like more advice, the “best” way to go about controlling your breath is to take a normal inhale, then exhale half your breath and hold it until you break the shot. That way you have a little breath in you but your muscles aren’t working to hold in too much air.

2. Applying the Fundamentals

When you go to shoot a pistol there’s five factors of the shot that determine where the bullet goes. These are called the five fundamentals of marksmanship and they apply to both rifles and pistol but they’re amplified by a pistol’s lacks a shoulder stock, is much lighter weight and has a much smaller sight radius.

The fundamentals of marksmanship are ways to manipulate the gun to get the most accuracy from the gun. They are the only things that determine where the bullet goes. Not your grip, not the direction your feet are pointing, not which hand you’re using, will determine your accuracy barring any mechanical defects of the gun you’re using.

3. Measuring Your Progress

As you shoot more and more it’s easy to fall into the trap of only doing drills and shooting at targets and ranges you’re good at. Eventually you’re going to have to get worse to get better.​

What I mean by that, is you need to tackle what you’re bad at. If you’re really good at bullseye shooting except for when you go fast, start getting faster. Your groups are going to get larger for a while and then they’ll start to shrink again as you get better. You’ll be bad for a little while until you’re good.

Measuring progress by your group size is bad because there’s too many variables. Set a standard like shooting an index card at 25yards and then time yourself it takes you to draw, get a sight picture and shoot. Try and shrink that time down rather than the group size on the paper.

Same thing with distance, put smaller and smaller targets out and strive to make first round hits. Always draw from the way you’ll carry your gun in the field otherwise your practice isn’t going to be as realistic as it needs to be and you won’t be progressing in the right direction.

4. Technique Vs. Fundamentals

Fundamentals are the basis of shooting. Technique is how those fundamentals are delivered onto the target. So-called tips or arguments like “Weaver vs. Isosceles” or how your feet are pointed, or how you grip the gun help you deliver your fundamentals better but you’ll never miss a shot because your feet are pointed the wrong way.

You’ll miss a shot because your fundamentals are off. Don’t believe me? What stance are you in when shooting from a bipod? How about shooting from your driver’s seat in a carjacking?

You can successfully make both these shots while having a bad grip, poor body alignment and a nonexistent stance, but have the fundamentals delivered and make a successful shot. People get wrapped around the axle about everything besides the fundamentals because they’re very very simple, but very very important.

Next time you go to the range remember your fundamentals before you start playing around with grips or drills or which arm you bend or which finger goes where. Everyone’s body mechanics are different so the way this person holds their gun, and the way that person follows through with their shots is going to be different.​

5. Situational Accuracy​

How accurate do you really need to be?​

5.1 Self Defense​

Self-defense shooting most always happen in bad breath distance and almost always in low light. Rarely will it happen in complete darkness and almost never past 15 yards. That means the best you need to be able to hit a 4-inch circle at 25 yards in low light, while drawing from concealment.

If you can do this, you can make a head shot at 25 yards and a 100-yard body* shot should you need to. You need to find a range that will allow you to draw from concealment and shoot. Everyone can shoot from the bench, but no one ever defended themselves with the gun already in their hand. *This is not a legal brief, follow all laws for self-defense and lethal force.​

5.2 Hunting

Hunting it gets a little harder to draw an accuracy standard. Most professional hunters and guides say you need to be able to put 5 rounds into a pie plate sized target at 100 yards with the gun you’re going to hunt with. A pie plate is about 8 inches, the size of a deer’s vital zone on a broad side shot. Doing it 5 times means you have both precision and accuracy with your chosen gun and 100-yard handgun hunting shot is rare at best.

I would add in the caveat you should do it while tired and slightly stressed. I would say sprint 100 yards, do 10 pushups and then put 5 rounds into a 6-inch circle at 100 yards without missing a shot. If you can do that with your gun, sight, bullet combination, you’re good to hunt with that gun. If you change calibers, sights, or guns you need to redo the test and make sure you’re still that good.

5.3 Getting More Accurate

Accuracy is a nebulous term. It is really a tradeoff of time vs. precision. In a scientific sense, accuracy is placing a bullet in the right spot, precision is putting it there more than once. Accuracy in the real world is a compromise of how fast do you need to shoot vs. how accurate you need to be. A defensive shooter will likely put more weight in speed, whereas the pals betting lunch on who can hit the Zima bottle at 200 yards with one shot will care much more about accuracy.

Therefore, to be become more “accurate” in the field you need to work on placing precise rounds faster and faster until you’re the understudy of Jerry Miculek. Everyone can hit bullseyes if they get 10 minutes to break the shot, the key is doing it quickly and under pressure.

6. ​Dry Practice

6.1 What is Dry Practice?​

Dry practice, also called dry firing, is when you pull the trigger of your gun with no ammunition inside the gun. This is used to practice weapon manipulation and trigger control without recoil and without worrying too much about gun safety.

Too many people make this solely about trigger control. In fact, you can find video online where for several minutes at a time people will stand in front of a mirror and hand cycle their semi-auto pistol and try and make perfect trigger pulls. This is a problem; a good trigger pull is only part of what your dry practice should be and should be trained at the range with ammunition because recoil changes everything.​

Instead try this…​

Dry practice should be more about loading and unloading, grip, drawing from concealment and picking up the sight quickly. Only pull the trigger when you absolutely must.​

6.2 Dry Practice Safety

It is import we stop here and say you must follow the firearm safety rules. That means knowing absolutely sure, 100% sure you gun is completely unloaded before your dry fire. Infect practice in a room devoid of any ammunition. If that means you go outside with empty magazines and dry practice in your back yard, that works. Get away from all ammo sources.

The second safety rule for dry practice is pointing your gun in a safe direction just in case. That means away from a highway, away from the rest of the house and preferably towards a backdrop that will stop the bullet.

When you’re done dry practicing, resist the urge to pull the trigger again. That is when most negligent discharges happen, resist that urge. Overall, just be conscious of you muzzle and be 100% you’re being safe.

6.3 What Dry Practice Should Include​

Dry Fire practice is important and the first thing you need to do is concentrate. Don’t watch TV, don’t listen to music. Focus. You have a gun in your hand, albeit unloaded, still you need to focus.

The main thing you should be focusing on during dry practice is a perfect draw stroke from where your gun will be, to a perfect trigger pull and follow through with a perfect sight picture.

Notice I didn’t say “good” or “alright” it need to be “perfect” go slow as it takes but o nothing incorrectly and do everything smoothly and slowly until you can go faster while still being perfect.

If you’re a hunter, practice a hunting shot. If you’re training for defense, train for a self-defense style scenario. The ways and reason’s you’d use a handgun are as many as the handguns themselves. Seriously take the time to simulate a real-world scenario and train based off of that.​

6.4 What Dry Practice Shouldn’t Include​

Do not, under any circumstances use any live ammunition during dry fire practice. I’ve known two gentlemen, who used live ammo in place of snap caps to practice malfunction cleaning and both of them had a negligent discharge.

During your dry practice never accept any distractions or interruptions. Turn off your TV, your cell phone and if it helps wear your hearing protection while you’re practicing. If someone is dying and you need to attend to them, reload and holster your gun. Dry fire practice is over. If you have time to come back make absolutely, 100% sure your gun is empty and there’s no ammunition in the room.

Some of the things you’ll hear people say are things like “I watch The Walking Dead and dry fire practice at the zombies on the screen.” This is a very bad idea. Even a deadly idea for beginners. Every time you draw a weapon you must have 100% concentration on the wepon in your hand. If not you’re more likely to have a negligent discharge and you’re going to learn a bad habit because you’re not paying enough attention.

Not to mention the fact you can’t enjoy the show if you’re trying to improve your trigger control.​

6.5 Final Tips on Dry Practice​

7. Moving Between Calibers

Inevitably you’re going to buy a second handgun and probably one in a different caliber. If you’re looking to move up in caliber you’re going to want to know a few things.

7.1 Moving Up in Power​

The biggest problem with moving up in caliber or cartridge capacity is getting a definite answer to how much more the recoil is. Remember there’s 3 parts to recoil, the push, the noise and flash, and the muzzle flip.

Some guns don’t flip the muzzle at all and have a strong push backwards like the .45acp. Other have very “snappy” recoil that brings the muzzle up and doesn’t push very hard, much like a .357 mag J-frame revolver.

The noise and muzzle flash will largely depend on the individual gun you’re shooting. When in doubt try to rent the gun you’re considering buying, before you buy it. That way you can be sure about moving up in power and be confident in your purchase.

7.2 Should I Practice with .22lr?​

No!

Unless you’re going to be hunting to shooting .22lr when you use your gun, don’t use .22lr to train or practice. For example, if you carry a 9mm for CCW don’t shoot self-defense drills with .22lr. For some reason, people have become obsessed with shooting buckets and buckets .22lr.

It’s not as cheap as it used to be and doesn’t off the same training stimulus as a centerfire cartridge. If recoil is a problem, buy reduced recoil loads and work up. If cost is an issue, don’t shoot as much. The .22lr is a poor substitute for centerfire ammo. Shoot the cartridge you’re going to have on your when you’ll need your gun.

Need any more proof? Name a single professional agency, Government or otherwise, that trains their agents with .22lr. Good luck finding one.

As we sought peer review pushback for this article, we spoke with adult shooting education expert Shepard Humphries, who just about had a coronary when he heard about our “No!” 22lr advice. We challenged him, and this was his input about compartmentalisation.

8. Handgun Hunting

Handgun hunting is my favorite way to hunt. I love the challenge of limiting yourself to archery ranges is fun and gives an adrenaline rush you can’t beat. It’s also a joy to carry a short, lightweight weapon in the field when you need to cover long distances to chase game.

The downside of handgun hunting is that you really need to be a skilled marksman with hard to shoot cartridges. Big bore revolvers are considerably more expensive than a budget oriented rifle. A worthy semi-auto will be more expensive still. Not to mention the price of ammunition for sharpening your skills prior to your hunt.

If you’re still so inclined, get yourself a good pistol, a sturdy belt and holster and start practicing. When you can shoot a 6-inch paper plate 5 times in a row at 100 yards, you’re certainly ready for the hunt.

8.1 Handgun Hunting Ethics​

When you hunt with a handgun, it’s much like hunting with a bow. You make an agreement with yourself to do a few things when you decide to use a handgun for hunting, first you agree that you’ll only take shots you know will quickly kill the animal you’re trying to harvest.

This means doing a few things; practicing until you’re skilled enough to hunt in the situation you’re going to face, it also means that you agree to hunt with the proper equipment in regards to cartridges and proper field rests for your gun.

These might seem like idle comments but you really need to be an above average hunter and take handgun hunting even more seriously than you would other form of hunting simply because more can go wrong. You should assume you have every limitation of archery tackle when you step into the field.

8.2 Handgun Hunting Calibers & Cartridges​

Hunting calibers still have their share of debate and controversy but not nearly as much as the CCW cartridges. The best Hunting cartridges can be divided into two different categories. Semi-auto pistols and revolver cartridges. No doubt for hunting the revolver is a much better choice but the semi-autos are quickly catching up. Here’s a breakdown:

Semi Auto Pistols​

Revolvers

8.3 Equipment

When you start to hunt for game with a pistol, you’ll rarely go after game with just a pistol and ammo to increase your chances you might want to carry a few choice pieces of gear:

Tripod – Having a good tripod is great for taking long range shots. With rifles, you can often get away with just shooting sticks but I really would recommend the extra weight and bulk of a tripod for a pistol, it really does make a difference. Especially past 65yards.​

Rangefinder – Handguns have steeper curves and shorter ranges than even the slowest rifles. That means you need to know an accurate hold for the distance to the target. Make sure you have the ability to know the exact range to your target by bringing a laser range finder.​

Scope – Consider using a scope for handgun hunting. Yes, it adds weight, bulk, cost, and complexity but if you plan on killing out past 50 yards on small or medium sized game, a scope helps simplify aiming and helps you see.​

Ground blind – With handguns, just like bows, you have to get close. Unlike with bows, elevation can be a hindrance with handgun hunting because the angle of the shot encountered with treestand hunting is often straight though large bones that can hinder a handgun bullet. An eye level shot out of a ground blind, is much better and you’re much more likely to get a double lung hit.​

9. The Verdict

Pistol shooting is where every shooter should start. The ability to hit targets at distance with a pistol is one of the best things you can learn before you move onto shooting a rifle. Besides that, it’s cheaper to shoot most handguns than it is most rifles, and more ranges allowing pistol shooting than rifle shooting you have little excuse not to have John Wayne level skills with your chosen handgun.

You’re far more like to need a pistol than you’ll ever need a rifle for self-defense. The simple fact your life or the life of your family or friend may someday depend on your ability to shoot straight and use a pistol, should be reason enough to motivate you to become the master of your handgun.

Get in your dry practice and get to the range to put some full house loads through your gun.​