Follow Through / Recovery

Of all the fundamentals, follow through is the least reinforced and a quick casualty to marksmanship evaluation. Good practices in the recovery stage contribute to greater hit ratios in multiple round engagements.

Many shooters wonder why they are consistently hitting low of their point of aim. The answer, poor recovery. Here is how this occurs:

1. I'm aiming at my target; my sight picture and alignment are good.

2. I practice good trigger manipulation through the break of the shot

3. Where did I hit?

The signals that the brain send to the body are lightning quick. Shooters are often trying to evaluate their hit as they squeeze the trigger. This is an almost simultaneous act, so that:

As the shot is breaking,

The pistol is lowered slightly in order to check the target

Resulting in a low shot.

In order to cure this problem, practice good recovery techniques with fundamental drills. Live Fire Drills: Pistol 1 and Pistol 2. By consciously acquiring a second sight picture, then resetting the trigger, before checking your target, shooters will accomplish two tasks.

The first is simple; the shooter will slow down and not rush back to a starting position or to check the target.

Second, by associating the acquisition of a second sight picture with trigger reset as part of the normal recovery process shooters will find that they are faster and more accurate in multiple round engagements.

Moving Targets:
Follow through is especially important when shooting a moving target. Shooters should track the target through the entire engagement. (Rhythm drills, phase 3 of Pistol 5 and Rifle 2, are very good drills to prepare for this kind of engagement.)

Good rules of thumb for follow through while tracking moving target:

1. Handguns, depending on the speed and distance of your target you should track just forward of the center of your target or the leading edge.

2. Rifles, foot speed vs. velocity of most rifle rounds is negligible, aim at center mass.