Gun Room, Combatting the Shooter’s Curse :: By Terry Wieland

At one time or another, everyone who shoots a firearm flinches. It doesn’t matter if it’s a magnum rifle, a .22 target pistol, or a 20-gauge shotgun, shoot long enough and one day you will flinch. And, when you flinch, you will in all likelihood miss whatever it was you were shooting at.

Ah, you say: So if you hit your target, it wouldn’t matter if you flinched?

The answer is yes, and that gives us an insight into the nature of shooting itself. Because, after a lifetime of shooting, watching others shoot, and reading accounts of shooting, I have come to the conclusion that everyone flinches, to some degree, every time they pull the trigger.

The difference is, when you miss, it’s called a flinch. When you don’t miss, it’s something else.

Forty years ago, Col. Jeff Cooper carried out an experiment with some top-notch competition pistol shooters. He would hand them a target pistol, but not say whether it was loaded or not, and they were not allowed to look. They simply aimed and pulled the trigger. He repeated the procedure several times, and with a number of different shooters. Sometimes the gun fired, sometimes it did not.

Cooper found that in every instance there appeared to be a flinch! If the gun fired no movement was apparent; if it was not loaded, however, as the hammer fell the shooter would push his hand forward in a convulsive movement that looked very much like the classic flinch.

Cooper concluded, however, that what he was seeing was not a flinch but a subconscious “counter push” compensating for the recoil before it happened.

Cut now to a skeet, trap, or sporting clays field, or to any rifle range you care to name. If you watch a shooter whose gun unexpectedly fails to fire, for whatever reason, you will see the same kind of convulsive movement. And yet, the same shooter may have just dusted 20 clays or put three shots into a quarter-inch group. The question is, how?

Flinching is a problem that has been with us for centuries, but only recognized for what it is since shooters began really paying attention to where their bullets went when they pulled the trigger. Frederick Courteney Selous, the famous African hunter from the late 19th century, drew attention to flinching when he wrote about how he had been affected by the horrendous recoil of a gun he used early in his career. It left him with a flinch that plagued him the rest of his life.

From stories like this come the widespread belief that flinching is simply fear of recoil, manifested by—in the worst cases—the shooter shutting his eyes and yanking the trigger as he cowers away from the expected blow. Sometimes it does take that form, but that is not the only response, and excessive recoil is not the only cause.

Among shotgunners, trap shooters are by far the most recoil-conscious. They use heavy guns—usually nine to ten pounds—and light target loads, and they are always looking for lighter (but still effective) ammunition and new ways of taming the kick. Why? Because they discovered long, long ago that repeated firing of light loads can cause a flinch just as bad as one resulting from a few heavy loads. And serious trap shooters typically shoot 250 to 500 rounds a week all year long.

The other major cause of flinching is muzzle blast. The louder the noise, the more we want to avoid it. We do this by wearing hearing protection, which helps, but aside from noise there is also the concussion. This is more of a problem in an enclosed range than it is outdoors with a shotgun. However, shotgunners can still experience it by standing on a trap range beside a shooter with a shotgun with ported barrels. When the gun goes off, you are buffeted by the shock wave.

Ported barrels are one more way that shooters attempt to tame recoil, but it is a case of creating a new problem as you attempt to solve an old one, and most trap ranges do not welcome ported barrels on the line.

A lesser cause of flinching is simple nervousness. When you absolutely have to break the next clay, down the next bird, or drop that elk 300 yards away, the realization of what is riding on the shot can wreak all kinds of havoc.

Here we come to the various other manifestations of flinching. For example, you may find yourself unable to pull the trigger when the clay appears, and ride it long after you should have shot. In the worst cases, you may track the clay right to the ground, and never shoot at all. At the time, you are powerless to do anything; afterward, you wonder what you’ve done and why, and resolve not to do it again. Well, good luck.

Usually, though, this is a momentary hesitation. Other times, the flinch may appear as a desperate yank on the trigger that causes the barrel to dip visibly, and naturally the target sails blithely on, unscathed.

The word “flinch” is unfortunate because it implies fear, and fear of one’s gun is not manly. As a result, people are extremely reluctant to admit they flinch. It is a century too late to try calling it anything else, though.

The phenomenon Jeff Cooper reported should teach us something, and that is, the body prepares itself to respond to a particular stimulus it knows is coming. This can be good or bad. If someone takes a swing at you, you put up your hands to shield your face. Is that cowardice? No, it’s good sense—as is having a solid left hook as your next response. The forward push Cooper witnessed is the shooter’s counter-punch.

Once we accept that all of us do this, a few pieces fall into place. For example, why is it impossible for one shooter to sight in a rifle for another? Is it just because we see the sights differently? Hardly likely, with a modern riflescope. Rather, each shooter’s reaction in anticipation is different, and when you sight your rifle yourself, this is incorporated in the setting.

It explains why I may shoot a particular shotgun very well, yet someone who is exactly my size can’t hit a thing with it. Or, why two people of quite different size and physique may end up with a set of shotgun dimensions that are virtually identical. It is not just a question of seeing the target or barrels differently; it’s a matter of different physical reactions as the gun is swung and the trigger pulled.

Once we know we have these little quirks, some things suddenly make sense and can be either corrected or compensated for.

For shotgunners, the obvious solutions to the classic flinch that makes you miss are:
Wear hearing protection to minimize noise whenever possible, and don’t shoot unnecessarily heavy loads.

Don’t use a gun that is too light, and acknowledge that any gun of any gauge will hurt you if the gun is too light for the load you’re shooting.  A 20-gauge can batter you worse than a 12, and even a 28 can have a nasty bite.

Shooting a pump shotgun can also help: The action required in operating the slide provides a distraction and gives your hands something to do other than flinch.
If you open a box of shells and find the recoil sharp or uncomfortable, then put them away immediately and shoot something lighter.

If your problem is hesitation in shooting, then concentrate on shooting more quickly. An excellent way to do this is to shoot with a partner, throwing one bird at a time that you both shoot at. Having to get your shot off before he does distracts you from any anticipated recoil, and forces you to concentrate on the bird and pull the trigger.

Having a little bet on the outcome doesn’t hurt, either. When combatting a flinch, you do whatever it takes.

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