Shooting On The Move at 60+ Yards With A Subcompact!?!

There’s always a lot of talk about whether or not it’s possible to make distance shots with guns that are small enough for most people to carry on a regular basis…especially with the size of some of the new big-box stores and churches.

Ironically, one of the last trainings I ran for my church’s security team included shooting targets at the front of the church from the back of the church.  That part was an eye opener for many.

So, today, I’ve got a different sort of video for you.

A lot of what you see online for shooting videos are shots that were attempted 10, 20, 30 or more times before a success gets caught on film.  And those successes are edited together to make a highlight reel.

This was all shot in 1 take…no splices or cuts.  You’ll see misses and a malfunction and, more importantly, what happens after those misses and malfunctions when they’re not scripted.

I’m going to demonstrate reacting, turning, drawing and engaging a target at 60+ yards while moving to cover and then leaning back out from cover and engaging it again…all in just over 3 seconds.

Then, engaging at 85 yards, an 8″ popper with a 4″ head at 60+ yards, a 10″ plate at 65 yards, and a 5 shot string, on the move, at the 60+ yard torso target…all in 1 take.

There are a TON of lessons here, but here’s the video…

Here are some of the biggies…

1. When you build a foundation of solid fundamentals (primarily muzzle alignment and trigger press, but grip is pretty darn important too) all of a sudden it makes shots that are further than normal, faster than normal, or shots that require more movement than normal much MUCH easier.  Skip the fundamentals and everything you want to do is going to take more time, take more money, and be more frustrating.
2. What you do between shots is critical.  Most people shoot one shot at a time and lower their sights & lift their chin between shots.  This leads to an unacceptable lag between shots.  What you need to do is trust your sights, run the gun, and for targets that you’re expecting a reaction on, assess it with your peripheral vision or sound.
3. What you do after a miss is critical.  Most people chase their misses (blaming the gun) rather than trusting their sights and focusing on technique.  On the 8″ popper with the 4″ head, I missed it.  5 times in a row.  But it wasn’t because of the sights, ammo, or wind.  I could see the dirt popping up between shots to the left of the target with my peripheral vision.  Looking at the video after the fact, I could tell that I was disturbing the sights about 1/64th-1/96th of an inch based on where the bullets were hitting.  That’s between 1/2mm and 1/4mm…almost nothing.  But instead of shifting my aim, I paid more attention to my trigger press, stopped pushing my shots, and made the next 3 hits in a row.  That kind of accuracy doesn’t matter diddly squat at normal self-defense distances…but the ability to press the trigger without disturbing the sights matters A LOT.  In a lot of self-defense shootings, people miss at in-home distances because they can’t press the trigger without moving the muzzle so far off target that they completely miss.
4. Reloads happen.  I wasn’t counting rounds and I wasn’t planning on reloading on film.  And I wouldn’t have if it hadn’t been for that pesky popper.  I didn’t realize I’d reloaded until I saw the empty mag on the ground after I was done filming.  When I looked at the video, I could see that I started the reload about .15 seconds after the slide locked back, which is faster-than-conscious visual processing speed.  Takeaway:  Reloads are a skill worth practicing until they’re automatic.  Ideally practice them so that you are identifying them by feel and not by sight.
5. Don’t make major adjustments to your point of aim on a torso-sized target inside of 100 yards with a pistol.  At 100 yards, put the top of your sights level with the top of the shoulders and you’ll hit center mass with a .22, 10mm, 9mm, .40, .380, .45, .357, .38, etc.
6. Don’t adjust your point of aim with a pistol for wind inside of 100 yards.
7. Stock guns with off-the-shelf ammo (Fiocchi 147gr JHP in this case) are probably more accurate than you are.  Doodads are awesome, but time spent maxing your ability out will help you get the most money and fun out of whatever gun you pick up.
8. Even though I have an obscene amount of steel targets that I can shoot from my deck (I showed less than half), I do 99-99.9% of my training with dry fire.  Usually between half an hour and an hour per week.  Inside, where it’s dry and warm.  It’s cheaper, quicker, and WAY more effective…especially when you are focusing on higher level skills like vision, balance, and hand-eye coordination.  In addition, the ONLY way for a shooter to develop flinch is with live fire…and the best way to fix a flinch is the proper integration of dry fire and live fire.

What this means for you is that, with the right step-by-step training, you can hard-wire life-saving gun skills…dynamic gun skills that will work at ANY reasonable distance…in less time than what has ever been possible with live-fire-only or old-school dry fire training.

So, the next question is…where are you at and where do you want to go?

If you want to build that solid foundation, than 21 Day Alpha Shooter is the place to start and you can click >HERE< to learn more.

The Texas church shooting highlighted the need for a smooth, efficient, and fast draw stroke.  Draw Stroke Mastery is the ONLY course of it’s kind that will show you, step-by-step, how to build a sub-second draw stroke…first from open carry, and then from concealment.

Very few self-defense shootings are simple, or stationary.  They involve movement, decision making, and stress modulation combined with fundamental shooting.  The Dynamic Gunfighter presentation will show you more about how to train for real-world self-defense shooting than 99% of all live, in-person concealed carry training being taught today.  This one-of-a-kind training will show you how you can do it yourself or how you can plug into the same proven step-by-step system that I use.  It delivers dramatically different results than any other training available today, and takes a little explaining, but what you’re going to see is what training that’s considered “elite” will look like 5-10 years from now.  Learn more now by going >HERE<

Whatever you do…make sure you train often and train SMARTER than the other guy.

Questions?  Comments?  Fire away by commenting below

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